The Spy Who Loved Me

Lewis Gilbert CBE (born 6 March 1920 in London) is an English film director, producer and screenwriter.

Early life

He was the son of music hall performers, and spent his early years travelling with his parents, and watching the shows from the side of the stage. He first performed on-stage at the age of 5, when asked to drive a trick car around the stage. This pleased the audience, so this became the end of his parents’ act. When travelling on trains, his parents frequently hid him in the luggage rack, to avoid paying a fare for him. His father contracted tuberculosis when he was a young man. He died aged 34, when Gilbert was seven. As a child actor in films in the 1920s and 1930s, he was the breadwinner for his family, his mother was a film extra, and he had an erratic formal education. At age 17, Gilbert had a small uncredited role in The Divorce of Lady X (1938) opposite Laurence Olivier.

He began shooting documentary films for the Royal Air Force during the Second World War, and was eventually seconded to the U.S. Air Corp film unit. His commanding officer was William Keighley, an American film director, who allowed Gilbert to take on much of his film-making work. When viewing rushes of film which he had made of airmen preparing to fly, he met Arthur Elton, who was head of the films division for the Ministry of Information, leading to him becoming a film director.

Directorial career

Gilbert made his name as a director in the 1950s and 1960s with a series of successful films, often working as writer and producer as well. These were often based on true stories from the Second World War. Examples include Reach for the Sky (1956) (based on the life of air ace Douglas Bader), Carve Her Name with Pride (1958) (the story of SOE agent Violette Szabo) and Sink the Bismarck! (1960).

In 1966 Gilbert directed Alfie starring Michael Caine. Gilbert’s wife Hylda discovered the Bill Naughton work when she visited the hair salon and sat next to an actress who was in a production of the play. Upon seeing the play, Hylda urged Gilbert to make it into a film. Gilbert used the technique of having the lead character speak directly to the viewer, a technique he used in his film of Shirley Valentine (1988). Gilbert said Alfie was only made because the low budget was “the sort of money Paramount executives normally spend on cigar bills”. The film was nominated for five Academy Awards including best picture. Gilbert was nominated for a Golden Globe for best director, and the film was remade in 2004 with Jude Law. In 1967, Gilbert was chosen to direct Lionel Bart’s musical of Oliver! but contracted to another project had to pull out and recommended Carol Reed who took over.

James Bond

Despite being known for character dramas, Gilbert directed three of the most epic and expansive installments of the James Bond series. After some reluctance, he was persuaded by Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli to direct You Only Live Twice in 1967. Gilbert returned to the series to make two more films, The Spy Who Loved Me in 1977 and Moonraker in 1979. In these films he worked with Roger Moore.

Later career

In the 1980s he returned to more small-scale dramas with successful film versions of Willy Russell’s plays Educating Rita (1983) and Shirley Valentine (1989).Gilbert also directed the film Stepping Out (1991).

Lewis Gilbert was awarded the Fellowship of the British Film Institute in 2001.

On 20 June 2010 he appeared on the BBC Radio 4 programme Desert Island Discs. In it he said of The Adventurers, that the film was a disaster, and that he should never have made it. Of working with Orson Welles on Ferry to Hong Kong, he said that it was: “dreadful, it was my nightmare film. It was a dreadful film, and everything was wrong with it; principally him [Welles].” He also said that his biggest mistake was failing to secure the directorship for Oliver. Lionel Bart had assured Gilbert that nobody else would do the film, but Gilbert also signed a contract to make anotehr film (that he has since refused to name), which caused him to miss out on directing Oliver!.

Personal life

He was married to the former Hylda Tafler for 53 years, until her death in June 2005; they had two sons, John by a previous relationship of Hylda and Stephen who was fathered by Lewis. Lewis first saw his future wife in a lift, but the doors closed before he could step in. He saw her later and arranged to meet her at the booking office on Waterloo station (London) at 11:00. But there were two booking offices at Waterloo and each waited at a different one, so they did not meet. Furious, Lewis telephoned Hylda later, but they sorted out the mistake and began their relationship. During their marriage, Gilbert fell on hard times financially and, fearing he could no longer support her as he thought she deserved, he left her. She remarried, but that relationship failed, and she and Gilbert were later reunited. —Wikipedia