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Patrick Bauchau: 007Forever Chat

From 007Forever -- May 24, 2000
Moderated by Michael "Icebreaker" Kersey

(Michael Kersey moderated an online chat with Patrick and Bond fans and also interviewed Patrick for the 15th Anniversary of A View to a Kill.)

icebreaker: Welcome to 007Forever, if you've just joined us. Tonight, we are looking back at the 15 year anniversary of the James Bond film A View To A Kill with Special Guest, Patrick Bauchau, but we will be taking questions regarding all of Patrick's work. We will be trying to group them together, such as a few questions at a time about 007, The Pretender, his new movie, etc.... So, if you don't immediately see your question being answered, please hold on. It should be up soon.

pbauchau: Cordial "Hello" from Scarpine.

icebreaker: Lynn-Holly Johnson, who played a Bond girl in For Your Eyes Only, once said, "What other movie can you do that 20 years later people are still talking about?" 15 years later, is it nice that people still remember you from A View To A Kill?

pbauchau: I think it's great. I understand that fascination with the Bond franchise. I share in it myself.

bauchaudotcom: Patrick, can you tell us more about how you got the role of Scarpine?

pbauchau: I had finished recently making a film with a German director called Wim Wenders...State of Things. I was in London coming back from that shoot. That's when I met my London agent, Jean Diamond. She mentioned that the Bond people were getting started on making the film. I should meet with them...which I did. That way they proposed me playing Scarpine. Of course it didn't feel like the enterprise it turned out to be. Looking at the part on paper it didn't look like it would be that time consuming. I'd probably have a few weeks of shooting with gaps in between, so I could go home. I happily signed on. But it turned out that the 007 stage burned down, and the situation that it created was that we were all on call uninterruptedly for the next few months. In some way it created an opportunity for more improvisations, but in reality they still needed this and that and that shot...so if anything, it took longer than any other Bond shoot.

icebreaker: Patrick, you were originally supposed to play Scarpine as an Italian. What happened to that idea?

pbauchau: As often in film, particularly action films, it was a good intention that was abandoned in the course of filming. So Scarpine has a more cryptic background...more mysterious background.

bondfan: How did working with George Lazenby compare with working with Roger Moore? Did you compare notes at all?

pbauchau: I think that they couldn't be more different from the other. George is from the Australian bush and is something of an adventurer in that way, and Roger is more of the smooth backgammon player. But they were both wonderful to do a little bit of fencing with. :-)

icebreaker: And you are friends and neighbors with George, correct?

pbauchau: Well we live in the same megalopolis. He leaves in a remote part of LA county.

bauchaudotcom: Patrick, do you mean fencing literally, or verbal/mental fencing? ;-)

pbauchau: Nothing literal. Let's call it ping pong.

icebreaker: Roger Moore is famous for his practical jokes, did he ever play one on you?

pbauchau: LOL! Well, on one particular occasion on a boring day, shooting in London, Roger sensed that something was going on in the balloon. He noticed that I had quietly fallen asleep (in the balloon) while they were lighting a corner of the stage. So he organized with John Glenn the director a situation where they moved a key light in my direction and filmed me while I was asleep. At the end of all the Bond movies there is always an assembly of all the big takes and they included that (gag reel). Oh and I woke up with all the crew and cast staring at me.

icebreaker: Had you read any of the Bond books or seen any of the films before doing A View To A Kill?

pbauchau: Oh yes. You bet! I was a great fan of the very first Bond that came out, Dr. No, and I've seen most of them since. There was even a project with which I was involved, with a French director, for a Bond on the stage...a theatrical version. I would have played the Bond part on stage...in French. It would have been an interesting mix of French and English. The story takes place largely in Quebec and upstate New York and Vermont...part in English and part in French. A very interesting mix.

icebreaker: That sounds like Ian Fleming's short story, For Your Eyes Only.

pbauchau: I think so, yes. I think that may have very well been the one.

icebreaker: How do you feel about A View To A Kill? We love it, even after 15 years.

pbauchau: LOL. I love it too, of course, but perhaps with more distance since I haven't seen it recently. Since it's a 15th birthday I will take another look at it.

icebreaker: Okay, we are going to switch gears for a few minutes and talk about The Pretender. As all of us want to know, what is the latest news on the show? What can you tell the fans about it being renewed by TNT?

pbauchau: At this stage we know nothing. I know that discussions are going on about where it stands. Most of the cast and crew are hoping it will go on for a lot of seasons...particularly on the production and writing staff. Since they prepared a fifth season, that would be their best. They were frustrated since it feels interrupted. Always unnerving experience. LOL

jarod: How did you get the part of Sydney?

pbauchau: The part materialized late in the night. I was shooting a film in Italy...a picture called We Free Kings (aka I Magi Randagi). My agent called me in the middle of the night and mentioned that I should report at the earliest opportunity. The next thing I knew, at the end of the shooting I left for LA and Toronto where the pilot was filmed. The way I was cast...because the casting person called Tori had seen a film that I had shot the year before in Brazil (Jenipapo, aka The Interview), in which I played a priest. And so from playing a Catholic priest I found myself playing a "priest" in The Pretender.

icebreaker: You have a very good agent. Seems to get you a lot of work around the world.

pbauchau: LOL! Indeed, indeed.

icebreaker: What was the Canadian show Mount Royal about, if you recall?

pbauchau: Mount Royal was a sort of national enterprise for the Francophone part of Quebec...to celebrate the entrepreneurial spirit of Montreal. In it I played André Valeur, the hero who was a tycoon who creates businesses... stories about problems with his family. Some was shot in Paris but some in Montreal. Big TV series. It aimed to be the Canadian Dynasty.

icebreaker: Patrick also worked in Blood Ties, a very good vampire soap opera sort of show.

pbauchau: The producers were the producers of Dynasty.

icebreaker: You can buy it on tape probably at Amazon.com or Reel.com.

pbauchau: And in Blood Ties they were trying to create a soap from vampires. It developed along the lines of the Anne Rice story...or could have. They only shot the pilot. Though well-received, the network for which it was shot, Fox, couldn't afford it.

icebreaker: We're going to move back to some more Pretender questions.

mahakali: Many Pretender fans have said that Sydney reminds them of someone who was a friend or mentor in their respective past. Did you give him any attributes from anyone in your own past?

pbauchau: As an actor you look for certain models for the character. I suppose some of it has to do with my own father who shares a profession -- as an analyst.

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Photo of Patrick Bauchau and Roger Moore in A View to a Kill © 1985 Danjaq Productions/Eon/United Artists. Click image to see a larger version in a new window. Do not use photo without prior, written permission.