It is no secret that James Bond creator Ian Fleming was distinctly underwhelmed about the casting of working class Scotsman Sean Connery in producer Cubby Broccoli’s first 007 film Dr. No (1962). “What was it he called me?” Connery asked in a Daily Express interview in 2008, “that over-developed stuntman. He never said it to me. When I did eventually meet him, he was very interesting, erudite and a snob.”
Actors including Cary Grant, James Mason and David Niven turned Dr. No down but Connery won the support of Broccoli’s wife Dana and bore an uncanny resemblance to the James Bond comic strip Lord Beaverbrook commissioned in 1958 for the Daily Express with illustrations by John McLusky.
Dr. No was a critical and commercial success, grossing $6m with a modest $1m production budget. Connery would reprise the role of James Bond in From Russia with Love (1963), Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), You Only Live Twice (1967), Diamonds Are Forever (1971) and the independently produced Never Say Never Again (1983). Turnbull & Asser dressed 007 in all seven films. Dr. No director Terence Young introduced Sean Connery to his Conduit Street tailor Anthony Sinclair and his shirtmaker Turnbull & Asser to craft a masculine, minimal wardrobe to suit his bodybuilder’s physique.
Lois Maxwell, who played Miss Moneypenny, said: “Terence took Sean under his wing. He took him to dinner, showed him how to walk, how to talk, even how to eat.” The actor’s Pygmalion moment at T&A was recorded in a series of photographs with Michael Fish fitting Mr Bond’s shirts. Clearly visible is the two-button turned-back cuff, also known as the cocktail cuff, that Young recommended having admired David Niven’s Turnbull & Asser shirts. It is the only touch of flamboyance in an otherwise rather sober wardrobe. All of James Bond’s Dr. No shirts are white or pale blue Sea Island poplin and his ties are all dark blue grenadine.
“The Bond look was quite bold,” says Paul Cuss who cut Connery’s shirts. “Up until then collars had been quite shallow. For Bond we made them much higher with a medium spread. I think the first order was for 72 shirts made from Sea Island cotton. For every scene we made six identical shirts for Sean Connery. The production company paid. Turnbull & Asser wasn’t credited for the Bond films but word of mouth got the message around.”
“Ian Fleming never mentions Turnbull & Asser in the Bond novels but he does say 007’s shirts are Sea Island cotton and made on Jermyn Street,” says James Cook. “Fleming only names brands such as Cartier, Dunhill and Anderson & Sheppard in relation to his villains because he thought the bad guys liked to flaunt it. Bond never does.”
Turnbull & Asser New York’s senior bespoke manager and James Bond connoisseur Rob Gillotte explained the complexity of making shirts for Sean Connery to Esquire in 2014: “If you look at pictures of Sean Connery in Dr. No and From Russia With Love, I don’t know if people know this but he was a 46-inch chest with a 33-inch waist and over six foot. But when you look at him you don’t really notice it. That’s what a good shirtmaker and a good shirt can do.” Without the benefit of the tailor’s canvas and padding, the shirtmaker has to use all the tricks of his trade to fit to a gym-toned body such as Connery’s.
James Bond style has been the subject of Nick Sullivan’s excellent book Dressed To Kill (1996) and definitive websites such as Matt Spaiser’s The Suits of James Bond, which examines every thread of every costume made for all six actors. With the exception of a startling T&A sugar-pink tie that Connery’s Bond wears in the Las Vegas sequences for Diamonds Are Forever, Turnbull & Asser’s services to Sean Connery’s 007 are unimpeachably elegant and fit for purpose. There has never been a better-dressed Bond.
Turnbull & Asser: Made In England, 130 Years by James Sherwood is out now (£50; turnbullandasser.com)
