Episode 37: Casino Royale - The Other Other One

In 1967, the first cinematic adaptation of Ian Fleming's first James Bond novel 'Casino Royale' was released. Nestled in the final forty minutes of this infamously bizarre comedy's two-hour running time, the classic game of wits plot between Peter Sellers' James Bond and Orson Welles' Le Chiffre plays out. Except in this version, James Bond IS a code-name and agent 007 James Bond gives everyone his code name. He's played by David Niven. John Huston is in this too. So is Ronnie Corbett, Deborah Kerr, Ursula Andress, David Prowse, Peter O'Toole and even notorious child molestor Woody Allen. George Raft, William Holden, Caroline Munro and Geraldine Chaplin were also dragged into this. So many big names in this absolute mess edited together from several directors' footage. Jonathan concludes that this is it; THIS is the strangest film he's watched yet. Richard gives us a taste of this production's fascinatingly troubled history which is sadly not available in documentary form (unless we get crowdfunding going). Much of it is available on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casino_Royale_(1967_film)