Every now and then I get asked about Timothy Dalton’s James Bond (and despite my expression in the above picture, I like this) having written He Disagreed with Something that Ate Him (released in 2018! Where the hell has that time gone?) and generally being willing to bend anyone’s ears about the topic. Recently, as part of the film’s 35 year anniversary, David Lowbridge-Ellis MBE (better known to some of you as Licence to Queer) and the 007GB Fan Club invited me down to London for a screening at the Prince Charles Cinema and a get-together afterwards at the Hippodrome round the corner. It was a really nice event; it’s always great to meet other Dalton enthusiasts and to pick the brains of other Bond aficionados and scholars (pictured above left to right are David himself, Llewella Chapman author of Fashioning James Bond, Alan Church who did optical effect on this and other Bond films (and is a lovely man whose brain I am desperate to pick), James Chapman, author of Licence to Thrill, and Steve Clamp, TV news presenter and, possibly, the biggest Dalton fan in the world.

There I was happily chatting when, out of the blue, a well dressed gentleman asked for a quick video interview – turns out this was Chris Swalmius-Dato who has a Youtube channel devoted to discussing movie and tv franchises. Despite the noise of a televised football match in the background we had a fun chat about Dalton and his impact on the Bond series.

This was a terrific event, and it was great to meet so many Dalton fans – also nice to hear how the Fan Club runs as many of these as it can for free – go check them out for more of the same.