How The Family Revived An Icon

Some people grow up watching Bond; if you’re a Broccoli, you grow up making him. EON, the production house behind 007, has been a family business since Albert “Cubby” Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, who produced the first nine films together, set it up in 1961. Today, a second generation of Broccolis — Cubby’s daughter Barbara and stepson Michael Wilson — runs the London-based outfit. They guard the Bond tradition fiercely, but they’ve also brought the once-fading franchise forward. “They’ve re-examined the character and focused on who Bond is — not just what his world is like,” says John Cork, co-author of James Bond: The Legacy. The result? “A total revitalization of the series.” Or close enough for genre work.

They were groomed for the job from their youth. Michael had an uncredited part in Goldfinger, and by the 1970s, he was helping with scriptwriting. Barbara was “a general dogsbody on set from the time I started,” recalls Roger Moore, who says “she inherited a lot of her father’s talent.” By 1985, she was an assistant director on A View to a Kill, a film Michael co-wrote and co-produced. But the franchise, though still profitable, was flagging — the last three films in the ’80s were the worst box-office performers of the series. In the early 1990s, an ailing Cubby relinquished more and more work, and 1995’s GoldenEye was the first Bond co-produced by Barbara and Michael (and the first with Pierce Brosnan). The step-siblings redeployed their spy, adding some serious action to get things up to date. It was 007’s box-office best since Moonraker in 1979.

Broccoli and Wilson have maintained the momentum since then, with bigger budgets and globally recognized talent — Asian action queen Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon); the enigmatic Sophie Marceau — to stay competitive. At MGM, 007’s financier and U.S. distributor, vice chairman Chris McGurk insists “everything is really mutual in terms of approvals,” but the studio’s only contractual power is to greenlight (or not) a film. All else, from script to cast and crew, is in EON’s domain.

One gripe about this power structure is that it breeds inertia. The Broccolis aren’t obstructionist, says a studio insider, but “they are very adamant about the things James Bond can and cannot do.” One perennial suggestion that always gets vetoed is for new larger-than-life villains � la Blofeld, who bedeviled Bond in five of the first seven films. “They always say: James Bond is the hero,” says an MGM exec. “No one can overshadow him.”

For Cubby, making Bond a family business meant a personal touch with talent — cooking spa-ghetti for cast and crew or flying an actor’s hairstylist in on Concorde. “He was a big daddy figure,” says Lois Chiles (Holly Goodhead in Moonraker). “He invited us to be part of his family.” But the Mr. Nice Guy routine stopped at the business office door. “You felt that he was on your side,” says Lois Maxwell, who played Miss Moneypenny in the first 14 films. “Except when it came to the money. Then he’d fight with your agent for every last penny.”

Cubby’s success won him a fair level of respect in Hollywood — in 1982 at the Oscars, he got the Irving Thalberg award for his production work — and every studio wishes it had a franchise this lucrative. But the family is still considered a niche player. Cubby did make more than 20 non-007 films, but only one was a hit: 1968’s Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, also based on an Ian Fleming work. The family now has a stage version of Chitty on in London, and they dabble in licensing. But Bond is the core of their business, and they’ll continue, says Wilson, “as long as people want the product.”

A big test of the Broccoli-Wilson era will come when Brosnan gives up his 00 status. Broccoli’s standard reply to queries on that topic: “That’s like walking down the aisle and being asked who your next husband will be.” Well, maybe, but we do want to know. The new 007 will be the first not chosen by Cubby — who died in 1996 — and the clearest sign of his heirs’ plans for the future. Brosnan will be back for the next film — which may start shooting late next year — but is noncommittal on a sixth. “It’s hard to plan,” he says. “Not knowing what’s around the corner is one of the joys of being an actor.” And the curse of being a producer, even when you’re working with James Bond.