JAMES BOND IS DEAD! if you have any doubts of this? then read on!
ppw3o6r
Great BritainPosts: 2,280MI6 Agent
In 2012, I approached EON Productions with a retail quality volume entitled The Most Famous Gun in the World in the hope of receiving 50th Anniversary endorsement. The volume was rejected and they would not even look at it however I was told as an unofficial volume I could not use the James Bond name, the 007 brand or any of their copyrighted press photos! I informed them they only owned the 007 brand with the Seven forming a gun, they did not own the James Bond name as Ian Fleming openly admitted he nicked it from the author of Birds of the West Indies and as for the copyrighted images, as long as I showed the clear copyright for each film they couldn't stop me using them! They could however say no publication can use their copyright images but it would be unlawful to direct this at one individual project and so after previously rejecting it for quote "not being commercially viable!" 007 Magazine printed and sold out Famous Gun!
From:Meg Simmonds <Meg.Simmonds
Sent:14 June 2016 16:26
To:john reynolds
Subject:RE: Famous Gun project
Dear John,
Thank you for your email. Regrettably we cannot give you permission to include any Bond materials or images owned by EON in your book project. We have exclusive official long standing partnerships with Dorling Kindersley and Taschen meaning we cannot give approval in this case.
Can I kindly remind you that all Bond assets are copyrighted and trademarked.
I realize this isn’t the answer you wanted and that you will be disappointed however we cannot and do not support any unofficial projects. Please note, we have informed both Chris R & Joss of our position on this matter.
Best regards,
Meg
Meg Simmonds, Archive Director
Eon Productions Ltd.
IN CASE ANYONE WANTED TO SEE WHAT AN OFFICIAL CEASE AND DESIST LOOKS LIKE? and remember after being hit with this I later loaned them Sir Sean Connery's Little Nellie helmet from You Only Live Twice and the Asprey On Her Majesty's Secret Service Angels of Death vanity case for Bond in Motion!
Jump forward to September 13th 2021 and the follow up entitled "007 the Armoury" a 150 page hardback tome was delivered to EON's London address in Mayfair, 138 Piccadilly, in the hope of it receiving official 60th Anniversary endorsement. Six months later after waiting patiently I received the following communication this evening (email addresses have been removed as a matter of courtesy and the data protection act!):
From:Meg Simmonds Meg.Simmonds@
Date:7 March 2022 at 16:25:44 GMT
To:john reynolds @msn.com>
Subject:007 The Armoury
Hello John,
Sorry not to get back to you sooner.
I did show your book to our publishing managers. Unfortunately they don’t think it is the right time to publish a niche book on Bond firearms nor the brand image they want to promote at this time. I know this will be disappointing news for you. If anything changes I will let you know.
All the best,
Meg
Meg Simmonds
Archive Director
EON Productions
If weapons are something which the 007 brand does not wish to be associated with?, then where does that leave Bond 26? Will 007 address life threatening situations with well thought out meaningful politically correct debate with a nice cup of tea while taking into account the feelings of his antagonist? ..... BULLSH*T!
I should add by the way that 007 The Armoury is a "SIR SEAN CONNERY TRIBUTE EDITION. I also produced a SIR ROGER MOORE TRIBUTE EDITION pre-pandemic for their considerations
and even though I think he is A GREEDY TOOL! if Lazenby were to kick the bucket tomorrow? I would produce a GEORGE LAZENBY TRIBUTE EDITION because of my love for his one Bond movie!
Comments
Bond will point his finger at the numerous baddies and say “bang, I got you” as they fall to the ground dramatically.
Also, instead of courting females for copulating Bond will invite them to his room to marathon seasons of Love is Blind on Netflix while praising how many social media followers they have
Unfortunately, the response doesn't show up when I read your message, but I can imagine what it says based on your follow-up comment.
This is bitterly disappointing as your publication was an absolute masterpiece and a must-have for every Bond fan and cinema fan. It will be interesting to see how they accommodate this position in the next film. As you say, perhaps Bond will take down villains with a carefully-raised eyebrow and a disturbing clearing of the throat.
I am very, very sorry for you, PPW as the brilliant author and unrivalled expert, and for myself as the reader. What is Bond associated with? Guns, girls, cars, martinis, and exotic locations. I guess Bond can't be associated with alcohol because of the damage it does to families and societies in general. So begone, booze. Exotic locations: Can't be associated with them because that encourages travel which contributes to Climate Change...unless you travel by a peanut oil-powered yacht (preferably not bought cheaply from an Oligarch). Cars? Oh goodness, no. Can't be associated with motor vehicles, not even hybrid or electric ones. Girls? It is the 21st century. Get real, 007. No association there.
However, an association might be contemplated if there's...wait for it...a product placement fee or some tax incentives. So, morals aside, roll on up Bollinger and Heineken; Aston Martin and Triumph; Italy and Austria. The more dollars, the merrier. I'm sure that if Walther offered some payola, Bond could find himself associated with weapons. Perhaps Bond could carry a Blunderbus in the next film, if the price is right. Hey, I bet there are some Russian armaments companies who'd happily pay EON a bit of product placement right now.
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Meg's message has just popped up and I am raising an eyebrow of my own at the line about this "not being the right time." Would that be a reference to the Ukraine situation? If so, I sincerely hope that EON do the morally correct thing here and withdraw all distribution of NTTD as it contains a lot of guns, deaths, explosions and a Royal Navy frigate with very large missiles. So let's take NTTD off all media platforms. No streaming, no downloading, no on-demands, no DVD/BluRay/4K sales and certainly no showings on any cinema screens anywhere. Better also make sure that the new book on Craig's Bond doesn't come out. Probably wise to go through the entire 007 shop inventory and remove anything that pertains to guns and violence or which has that dastardly 007-gun logo. And while they're at it, since there's never been a Bond film that doesn't include guns and death, it's probably best if EON just packs-up shop completely and not only doesn't make B26 at all, but stop all sales and marketing of any Bond items. After all, they wouldn't want to be seen as hypocritical on this matter, would they?
One need only look at the 007 Store to see that, give or take a Golden Gun trinket, firearms will while always being a part of the films, will never fit a 21st century marketing plan. Advertising, on a poster, sure, but marketing or celebrating the guns specifically tips -- optics-wise -- into unsavory territory for them. You can call it hypocrisy, but I don't recall a world where marketing and brand-building were ever on the up-and-up.
It's why there are countless books celebrating Bond cars (which often come with guns, mind), and no books glorifying "The Best T I T S of Bond!" It's just not the done thing.
Besides, all the interesting history is written by the outsiders (Battle For Bond, Some Kind of Hero). An endorsement would come with an approvals pass from EON legal. You're better off.
I understand what you are saying, HMH, but if Eon are going to stand up and say that they don't want Bond associated with weapons, then they need to come up with a new 007-logo.
Sorry to hear Donk 😓
Or what, the fan police will shut them down? It's not a democracy. Moreover, this policy has probably been in place longer than anyone realizes.
Not to mix metaphors, but it's their sandbox, and they get to decide where the line is. Frustrating to hear but unrealistic to believe otherwise.
None of this is to diminish Donk's frustration, but aside from logos and posters, they actively downplay the guns in merch and tie-ins and have for some time. I think that's the industry, not just Eon.
I think it sounds like a great book and some really fantastic effort has clearly gone into it, but we can’t really complain that the people who own something have the right to control their property as they see fit. If not I’ll take it that I’m welcome to camp on anyone here’s lawn! :D
And as Halfmonk points out, you’d probably be going around in circles with approvals forevermore if it were made official anyway.
It is indeed just privately-owned entertainment, not a democracy, and (thank goodness) there is no fan police and I am perfectly happy with that.
My point here is that common sense states that if their stated reason not to be connected with an external project is because they don't wish to be associated with guns, they really shouldn't use a gun as their main logo.
They would have been better just to have said "...we regretfully respond that we are not interested at this time. If anything changes..."
That basically is what they said: “it’s not the brand image we want to promote at this time”. i.e they’re not interested. At this time.
I’m not sure what we’re complaining about: their reason wasn’t good enough? What are you proposing we do about it? 😊
Well.....THAT SUCKS!!!!!
There's nothing I can say that already hasn't.
We are being deprived from what will, one day, be one of the most sought after books that was never published.
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Thank you all for your comments, in particular The Domino Effect (post #3). The fact is EON do not own the James Bond name but they think they do! (Birds of the West Indies author), they do not own 007 which was a unit Ian Fleming set up during the war for his espionage activities. They own their trademarked brands for 007. What does this mean? anyone can write a book about James Bond and try and get it published. Anyone can use copyrighted photos for illustration as long as the copyright holder's details are very clearly listed so credit where credit is due. As for myself, in 2012 I was supported and given access by a gentleman named Richard Hooper who passed away in the period between Skyfall and SPECTRE hence re-approaching EON in 2016 for SPECTRE inventory access and very clearly not getting it!
The second volume was being written specifically for them in the hope of receiving 60th Anniversary branding/endorsement, in fact I had been told that if they endorse/support the project I would receive Armoury/Archive access to complete the No Time to Die section which would then hopefully lead to their support in an official exhibit of 007 The Armoury which would be a combination of weapons and props. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the current situation in Ukraine because it is known in the industry that one of the producers is a gun collector himself while the other is anti-gun believe it or not?
James Bond 007 is trademarked by Danjaq all over the world so I think it's hard to argue that they don't own it, but I would think it is possible to write an unofficial book on the subject in the manner of being a discussion piece or journalism, otherwise you'd think no-one could ever even write a magazine article about Bond. And as you say, copyrighted images can be used as long as they're illustrating something and not just being decorative. Plus of course there are plenty of unofficial books around, and many of them are excellent and praised by Bond fans- I don't think it would be a terrible route.
It’s just one kick in the knackers after another…such a shame they won’t get behind this…they will probably put out their own version at some point - half as good and twice the price 🤨
Thank you for saying so Sir Miles but they do not have the inventory to put out their own version and where they denied me access to their armoury (Joss), my armourer can't stand them after his company was dropped for no good bloody reason when they contracted Richard Hooper in 2006 for Casino Royale so there is no way in hell he will let them in through the door to access my inventory even if I was present!
007 The Armoury is not dead but I will have to go in a different direction to get it published and I am so bloody proud of this work and my designer (Acacia_Avenue) that no matter what it costs both in time and money, it WILL be published and hopefully for this the 60th Anniversary!
As a privileged purveyor of these pages, it’s essential it gets printed. No one else will ever get access to this amount of information and screen used weaponry ever again. It’s an impossible task for EON to do it.
So glad to hear that you are pushing on with this…whenever it’s completed and ready, please let me/us know as if it’s even a quarter as good as The Most Famous Gun In The World that you did with 007 Magazine, then it will be a must buy 🍸
It’s probably got 3/4 more info in it. So that’s a given.
Three-quarters more info? That's madness! The first one seems unbeatable. I personally can't wait for it and I am very happy for all those individuals who were unable to get a copy first time around.
I may have exaggerated a tad, but not much.
It’s weird ain’t it how some studios and production companies openly encourage and include fans’ efforts, and others….. not so much.
dont be disheartened though donk, your efforts and encyclopaedic knowledge of bondian boomsticks is always admired here.
I have no idea how it works though, how do the likes of Greg Williams etc get a foot in the door? Could you go the same route? Or is that what you’re already trying?
the bottom line is that no one has the knowledge you do, not even EoN realise what they’ve got sometimes it seems.
if it’s any consolation I tried to get them to sign a model for a charity auction and they sadly declined. And then sent it back. In a Jiffy bag. Smashed to bits.
personally donk I don’t think anyone has a chance of getting ‘in’ with the EoN crowd. Never mind, carry on regardless.
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Thank you for saying so Sir Miles but they do not have the inventory to put out their own version and where they denied me access to their armoury (Joss)
Do they store their own weapons then? I'd imagined they hire them, that's very interesting.
They hardly own any weapons. Maybe one PPK from FRWL. And maybe a few stunts for exhibition. They’re all hired out from the armourers.
Right, that's what I thought. I'm not sure I understand then.
They still have things like the Golden Gun, Moonraker lasers, holsters, and a load of vintage stunt rifles and bits like that. As well as behind the scenes pictures etc.
If ive got it right, donk needs help from EoN by getting access to the archive and various armourers who still hold the actual screen used firearms. And they’ve said no.
its not a massive surprise if I’m honest and I can’t help feel bad for donk, but like it’s been said already, it’s their sandbox and there’s not much anyone can do to make them let anyone else get in and play.
Vive le droit à la libre expression! Je suis Charlie!
www.helpforheroes.org.uk
www.cancerresearchuk.org
That’s right. The armourers have said they’d give full access if EoN back the project. Doing it without their approval would possibly cause problems as you can see from Megs letter. They were going to fully cooperate anyway, but she put the collybosh on that.
This one always amused me and proof that EON do not own the untrademarked 007. Off Evo-Stik's own website. Look how many times they have printed 007! This is as close as someone could get to how 007 was branded in the 1960's without the trademarked 7! 🤣
To clarify something regarding the Bond armourers. EON hire the handlers and the weapons for their productions however when a production has wrapped they have the option to purchase weapons (which the armourers hate!) for the Archive however these are still kept at the armoury in question. If the contract to supply arms and handlers is awarded to another armoury then the EON inventory is moved to the new company. This has only happened once previously and that was the gold plated Beretta 950B Jetfire which Beretta gifted to Sean Connery and simply put he did not want it! The collection at the current Bond armourers is somewhat larger and that is as far as I'm going on the subject!