Desmond Llewelyn

Desmond Llewelyn was born in South Wales in 1914, the son of a coal mining engineer. In high school, he worked as a stagehand in the school's productions and then picked up sporadic small parts. His family would not give up their effort to prevent him from a life on stage, so an uncle who was a high ranking police officer arranged for Llewelyn to take the department's physical exam. "Thank God, I flunked the eye test, and they wouldn't take me. I suspect the inspector had a hangover because he also failed this other chap I knew, who went out the same day and passed the physical for the Royal Navy, which had a lot tougher test. "After failing the police exam, Llewelyn thought about becoming a minister, realizing after a week-long retreat of quiet and meditation that the ministry "was definitely not for me.

" Llewelyn persevered in his acting quest, and was accepted to the Royal Academy for the Dramatic Arts in the mid 1930s.

Educated at Radley, he trained as an accountant but dropped out and went to RADA after which he started acting in rep in 1936.

The outbreak of World War II in September 1939, halted his acting career, and Llewelyn was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the British army.

He was assigned to the Royal Welsh Fusiliers and was sent to France in early 1940. In a short time, his regiment was fighting the Germans, and Llewelyn's company was holding off a division of German tanks. Llewelyn explained that "eventually, the tanks broke through and many of us jumped into this canal and started swimming down it to the other side, figuring that our chaps were still over there. But the Germans were the only ones there," and Llewelyn was captured, and held as a prisoner of war for five years. At one prison camp, the prisoners had dug a tunnel and were planning to escape the next morning. Llewelyn was down in the tunnel doing some maintenance work in preparation of the escape when the Germans found out about the tunnel and caught him down in it, a crime that earned Llewelyn 10 days in solitary, which Llewelyn called "a blessing of sorts. After spending every day of several years sleeping in a room with 50 other people, the quiet and privacy was rather nice.

He made six films with Christopher Lee: Hamlet (1948), They Were Not Divided (1950), Corridors of Blood (1958), The Pirates of Blood River (1962) and The Man With the Golden Gun (1974).

He made five films with Anthony Dawson: They Were Not Divided (1950), The Curse of the Werewolf (1961), From Russia with Love (1963), The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders (1965) and Thunderball (1965). Terence Young directed all of them except for The Curse of the Werewolf (1961), which was directed by Terence Fisher.

Llewelyn was not the first choice for the role of "Q." Actor Peter Burton played the role of Major Boothroyd (later known as "Q"), in Dr. No (1962), the first in the '007' series. Burton was unavailable when the second movie From Russia with Love (1963) was filmed. The part went instead to Llewelyn and remained his for 16 more productions until his death in 1999. Llewelyn did not play "Q" was in Live and Let Die (1973). Producers felt too much attention was being paid on the gadgetry so they downplayed it by cutting his role. However, audiences enjoyed the role of "Q" so much that Llewelyn was brought back indefinitely. He did not appear in Never Say Never Again (1983) with Sean Connery, as this was not an official EON production. The part of "Q" was played by Alec McCowen instead.

"After the war, Llewelyn returned to London and revived his career, eventually being cast as his trademark Q in From Russia with Love (1963).

Since 1963, Llewelyn has appeared as Q in every Eon Productions Bond film, except Live and Let Die (1973).

On why he disliked Americans: In World War II, Desmond was rescued from a German POW camp by an American GI. When he told the soldier he'd been there for five years, the American replied, "Aw, cut it out. War's only been on for three years," forgetting that it was only the United States that had been at war for three years. Upon telling his story to Ian Bulloch, an American stuntman on the set of Thunderball (1965), Bulloch replied, "Maybe the Yank should've left you there!".

Llewelyn was omitted from Live and Let Die (1973) because producers Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli felt that too much was being made of the gadgets and they would play it down.

Llewelyn said he "was quite disappointed" at being left out of Live and Let Die (1973).

His largest role as Q was in Licence To Kill (1989).

In Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), while posing as an Avis car representative in Hamburg, Germany, Q's name badge reads 'Quinten Quigley'.

He appeared in the The Big Breakfast (1999) in early December 1999.

His widow Pamela Mary Llewelyn died in East Sussex in 2001 at the age of 88.

Holds the distinction of being in more James Bond movies than anyone else: he appeared in his role as "Q"/"Major Boothroyd" in 17 James Bond movies. Coincidentally, Q is also the 17th letter of the modern English alphabet.