Source : PERTHNOW NEWS
Jane Seymour was almost bitten by a snake during the making of the James Bond classic Live and Let Die.
The 75-year-old actress starred in the 1973 007 flick as Bond girl Solitaire and recalled how filming for one of the movie’s climactic scenes went awry.
Looking back at the scene in an interview with CNN, Jane said: “Solitaire is going to be tortured with this snake. Now, this dude here with the goat thing. His job was to pick up the snake and taunt me with a snake. And I hate snakes. Hate hate hate snakes.
“Anyway, the guy there is doing it. And then the snake came around and bit him, and he dropped the snake. And the snake came straight for me, and I’m like screaming.
“The snake people caught it at the last second.”
Jane explained that she felt “abject horror” when it came to shooting the scene at close quarters with the reptile.
She recalled: “They are getting the snake really close to me. And the director says, ‘Stop smiling’. I go, ‘That’s not smiling, that’s abject horror.’ I go, ‘No, no, that’s too close. That’s too close.’ Oh my God, I was terrified of that snake.”
Seymour was only 20 when she was cast in Live and Let Die, the first Bond movie to star Sir Roger Moore as 007, and felt that she only landed the role because film bosses wanted “a virgin”.
The Dr Quinn, Medicine Woman star said: “This was when I was 20 years old. I had just been announced as being a Bond girl. They only hired me because they were looking for someone to play a virgin. I think I’m the only Bond girl that was actually a virgin.
“It was my first huge movie. It was real stunts with real people who almost died doing them. Most of my training really had been in dance, so one of the things I loved the most was the snake scene, because I could use my dance skills and throw myself up there in the air and be held by all those men.”
Jane admits that she “didn’t realise” how much the role of Solitaire would define her career and explained that she relocated to Hollywood as she felt typecast in the eyes of British viewers following Live and Let Die.
She said: “I don’t think I’ve realised what a big deal it would be in that, to this day, if I do anything with any British press, the only thing they will mention for my entire career is the Bond film.
“The same goes with a certain generation of producers and directors. So I came to America where they took me more seriously.”
