Actor known as James Bond's 'Q' dies
by Myrna Oliver
Los Angeles Times
Desmond Llewelyn, best known as "Q," the faithful and canny supplier of trick cars, reverse-firing guns, exploding toothpaste and other spy-baiting toys through 17 of the 19 James Bond films, died yesterday of injuries suffered in a car crash. He was 85.
Mr. Llewelyn was returning home from autographing books about his life in the town of Firle in East Sussex south of London when his car slammed head-on into another auto. Sussex police said the actor died of massive multiple internal injuries after he was airlifted to a hospital.
Three people in the other car were said to be in stable condition, and no cause was given for the accident. Mr. Llewelyn was driving alone.
Even as the actor portraying the suave British secret agent changed from Sean Connery to George Lazenby to Roger Moore to Timothy Dalton to the current Pierce Brosnan, Mr. Llewelyn endured. His most recent Bond caper, "The World is Not Enough," is in theaters.
Aging wisely in the current film, Mr. Llewelyn is shown trying to train an apprentice - the comic John Cleese - for the day he ultimately might retire.
But in real life, the actor had no intention to ease out of the franchise that brought him his greatest fame, cinematic status and, at long last, modest wealth.
"I will play Q as long as God lets me. I have no inclination to stop," he told a Scottish newspaper shortly before the opening of the current film, which has Cleese, designated "R," moving into the gadget department.
Less than a month ago, Mr. Llewelyn told CBS News he hoped to be on board for the 20th Bond installment scheduled for release in 2002.
Meanwhile, in existing footage, Mr. Llewelyn continues to devise new miracle gadgets for Bond, ever hopeful his prize material may survive the mayhem-prone agent's deployment. In the 1997 "Tomorrow Never Dies," Mr. Llewelyn's first line to Brosnan as Bond was a cautionary, "Now pay attention, 007." His last of the film, after Bond's usual field day of explosive action, was: "Oh, grow up, 007."
On board from the second Bond film, "From Russia with Love" in 1963, Mr. Llewelyn resisted the director's instruction that he use a Welsh accent, even though he was born in South Wales, the son of a Welsh coal mining engineer.
"My interpretation of the character was that of a toffee-nosed English," Mr. Llewelyn said. "At the risk of losing the part and with silent apologies to my native land, I launched into Q's lines using the worst Welsh accent, followed by the same in English."
The actor's version won out.
Mr. Llewelyn missed only the first Bond film, "Dr. No" in 1962 and the 1973 "Live and Let Die," Moore's first outing as 007.
The Q character, formally named Major Boothroyd, was nicknamed "Q" for Quartermaster, a position in the British army that specializes in sciences for the military. No such character existed in the Ian Fleming novels creating James Bond, although the written Bond did receive equipment from Q Branch.
Ironically, Mr. Llewelyn said that absent the Bond cinematic magic, he was "allergic to gadgets" and couldn't even manipulate a hotel key card correctly.
Mr. Llewelyn spent his entire career as a character actor in supporting roles and achieved fame only in his 50s as Q. His first film was the 1939 "Ask a Policeman."
When World War II intervened, Mr. Llewelyn joined the Royal Welsh Fusiliers of the British army. He was captured in France and was a German prisoner of war for five years.
He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Pamela; two sons, Ivor and Justin, and two grandchildren.
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