the author-comedian-actor, with a visual assist from our photographers, offers antic comments and ample evidence that these femmes--fatale and fabulous--are the most plenteous and pulchritudinous to appear in a james bond flick, the nuttiest ever filmed
Last winter, producer Charles K. Feldman approached me to appear in his new James Bond extravaganza, Casino Royale--not, as I had expected, as James Bond, but as 007's nephew, Little Jimmy Bond, who eventually is unmasked as the evil Dr. Noah. We dickered for a few days, until I asked him if there were going to be any girls in the picture. He started listing them, and three hours later I interrupted to accept his original cash offer of three dollars. Armed with assorted aphrodisiacs and my fatal good looks, I quickly embarked for London. Soon I was submerged in more flesh than Flo Ziegfeld ever imagined in his wildest fantasies, with Ursula Andress on my right, Joanna Pettet on my left, Barbara Bouchet on top of me and 24 girls beneath me, making the world's most electrifying blanket. They were only a portion of the numbingly voluptuous women in Casino Royale--Killer Girls, Fang Girls, Guard Girls, Orgy Girls--but I dealt with each one as a master: now half mocking and aloof, now suddenly coy and roguish. Ursula was simple. She was an animal and I was an animal. I toyed with her, leading her on for the good of the picture and finally extracting from her a performance so stunning it compares favorably with my own. Joanna Pettet was a completely different problem. She saw me as a symbol of all men--the understanding father, the amusing little boy, the poet driven mad by a relentless passion. It was all I could do to keep Joanna from going over the line, but I managed it. I tried to imply nothing in our on-screen kisses that would give her too much hope. Just enough to keep her looking forward to the next take. I was cruel in order to be kind. Of Barbara Bouchet, I will say nothing except that to this day I receive flowers from her now and again with a perfumed note that reads, "You made me feel like a woman for the first time. Thank you." Finally, there were the 24 girls who were hired to guard the character I portray. It was hell. I resisted temptation like a preacher. The only time I slipped at all was with numbers 4 to 21, inclusive. But nobody is perfect. Certainly not those few of the movie's six directors who were unable to find roles for themselves amidst the lovelies; but Casino is at least two up on all other Bond extravaganzas: It boasts three 007s. Imperfect, too, I dare say, are the Playboy editors, who begged me to act as an editorial consultant for the captions accompanying these 13 pages of pictures of my conquests--the girls of Casino Royale. You'll notice a certain flippancy in their treatment of my inside revelations, which they've subverted with a host of irrelevancies they call facts. There's only one reason I'm letting them get away with it: They're giving me a free copy of the issue.
