“I do not take gifts from strange men”: the ‘Bond Girl’ who was suspicious of her audition
Ever since Ursula Andress emerged from the waves in Dr No with a knife and pair of brass knuckles attached to her bikini, the iconography of the Bond Girl has been almost as legendary as 007 himself. Despite having a tiny budget and uncertain future, that first James Bond instalment was a hit, and it quickly led to one of the most lucrative franchises of all time. Though 007 has only been played by a handful of stars over the past six decades, there have been dozens of Bond Girls, each armed with a different set of skills and a new way to give the secret agent a run for his money.
Over the years, these characters have changed drastically, evolving from cringeworthy pieces of eye candy for the camera to leer at to more complex and powerful operatives in their own right. In the early days, their names alone were so suggestive that you could easily forget whether Alotta Fagina was a real Bond Girl or the invention of the 007 spoof Austin Powers. By the time the series got to Madeleine Swann (Léa Seydoux) in 2015’s Spectre, however, the Bond Girl finally became almost as crucial to the story as Bond himself.
Given this misogyny-laden track record, it’s no surprise that, during the early days of the franchise, the process of casting these female characters was more akin to scouting models than auditioning actors. In an interview with The Telegraph in 2022, Marguerite LeWars, née Gordon, revealed the unusual way in which she landed the role of Annabel Chung, a newspaper photographer who turns out to be a hired hand for the titular evil scientist, Dr No.
The Jamaican-born actor was just 22 and working at the Kingston Airport when director Terence Young spotted her. He was travelling to the country to scout locations for the film, and when he saw her checking his luggage onto the plane, he offered her a contract and a bottle of Dior perfume then and there. Not surprisingly, LeWars had a few follow-up questions.
“I said: ‘How can you give me a contract, you don’t even know if I can act?” she remembered. “I said: ‘Take back your perfume. I do not take gifts from strange men because I don’t know who you are at all.’ He said: ‘Well, just come to a reading.’” She agreed, but ultimately turned down the first part they offered her.
Young had intended for her to play Miss Taro, another spy who works for Dr No, but LeWars did not take kindly to the idea of appearing in nothing but a towel and playing a steamy scene with Sean Connery. “I’ve never heard of him,” she told the director, and ended up being offered the role of Annabel Chung instead. Meanwhile, Zena Marshall took the part of Miss Taro.
One thing that LeWars and Marshall had in common was that they were both playing Asian characters even though neither of them were of Asian descent. Although this type of casual racism is frequently overshadowed by the blatant misogyny of many of the female characters in early Bond movies, it’s another throughline of the first years of the franchise. In 2020, Tsai Chin, the actor who played Ling in 1967’s You Only Live Twice, admitted that she regretted her part in the series, and expressed relief that such a portrayal wouldn’t pass muster anymore.
