Website last updated: 23-11-2024

In Memoriam of actor Richard Kiel - born on this day in 1939

By: Steven Jay Rubin
Published:
2020-09-13
Richard Kiel Jaws James Bond
The James Bond Movie Encyclopedia presents This Day in James Bond History - remembering the late actor Richard Kiel on the anniversary of his birth in 1939. Kiel will always be remembered as “Jaws,” an enormous, unstoppable steel-toothed assassin, working for megalomaniac Karl Stromberg (Curt Jurgens) in The Spy Who Loved Me (1977).

There are fans who thought Jaws was too much of a comic book villain to be taken seriously, but his appearance in the film captivated a whole new generation of James Bond fans who had missed the serious Sean Connery Bonds of the mid-60s. The result was that The Spy Who Loved Me was an enormous success in the summer of 1977, the summer of Star Wars, reviving the fortunes of a film series that was flagging.

Richard Kiel’s Jaws was so popular that producer Albert R. Broccoli brought him back for the 1979 film Moonraker:



Richard Kiel epitomized the larger-than-life film character. How do you battle a 7’2” foe with hands the size of dinner plates? Roger Moore’s Bond had his own hands full. Despite their light comedy elements, the Roger Moore Bonds were enormously successful for United Artists – and the scale on which they were produced influenced scores of tent pole action films that followed.

Kiel, in person, was a gracious, humble man who always treated his fans with respect. Many of us remembered him as one of the Kanamit aliens in the iconic “To Serve Man” episode of Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone. So let’s raise a brew to a legendary actor and an unforgettable presence in the James Bond Universe.

All text. Copyright © 2020 Steven Jay Rubin. All rights reserved.

Tags:

#birthdays
#in_memoriam
#richard_kiel
#roger_moore
#steven_jay_rubin

Tag Cloud

Bond 25 Bond girls Bond villains Britt Ekland Daniel Craig Dolph Lundgren George Lazenby Izabella Scorupco James Bond museum Kristina Wayborn Mary Stavin Maud Adams No Time To Die Ola Rapace Pierce Brosnan Roger Moore Sean Connery Spectre Timothy Dalton
 

All information, text and graphics (unless otherwise stated) on this website are protected by copyright law. Please contact us to use anything.

This website is not in any way endorsed by EON Productions Ltd, Danjaq, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Sony Pictures, United Artists, Ian Fleming Publications, or any other James Bond copyright holders. It is an independently run non-profit website from a personal basis in spare time.

James Bond film images © 1962 - 2024 EON Productions Ltd, Danjaq LLC, MGM Inc. and United Artists Cooperation.

James Bond book covers © 1953 - 2024 Ian Fleming Publications and Glidrose Productions Ltd.

Founder & Managing Editor: Anders Frejdh