Daliah Lavi, ’60s spy femme fatale, dies

Daliah Lavi, right, chats with Dean Martin during filming of TheSilencers. Director Phil Karlson is at left.

Daliah Lavi, who co-starred in the 1967 Casino Royale spoof as well as The Silencers, has died at 74, according to an obituary posted by The Hollywood Reporter.

Lavi also appeared in Some Girls Do and The Spy With the Cold Nose.

In 1966’s The Silencers, Lavi played Tina, a character actually in the first Matt Helm novel, Death of a Citizen.

While the movie was done as a spoof, the basic dynamic was retained from the serious original story. Helm thinks Tina is on his side when she’s really working for the other.

The ’66 movie, starring Dean Martin, took the basic plots of two serious Donald Hamilton novels and went in an outlandish direction.

Lavi’s career extended from the 1950s into the late 1990s. She was born in Palestine. The former actress died May 3 in Asheville, North Carolina, according to an obit published by the Asheville Citizen-Times.

That obit says her “funeral and interment will take place in her native Israel.”

UPDATE: IMDb says never mind about Nolan and Bond 25

Christopher Nolan

UPDATE (12:30 p.m.): IMDb has now stripped out Syncopy from its list of companies involved with Bond 25.

ORIGINAL POST: The Internet Movie Database created a buzz the past 24 hours when it listed director Christopher Nolan’s Syncopy production company as being part of Bond 25.

Phil Nobile Jr., a writer for the Birth.Movies.Death website put out a tweet yesterday with a screen capture from the professional (paid subscription) part of IMDb.

He struck a sarcastic tone. “IMDbPro – because this is totally info worth paying for.”

Regardless, the buzz was reinforced this morning when @Bond25Film on Twitter said it received a confirmation from IMDb that the information was correct.

Nobile came out with a follow-up post.

“For the record, I bet this is not true. I also think that, if it’s true, this is a TERRIBLE idea,” Nobile wrote. Nolan’s stamp on Batman “is one of the most asexual in the business, and the world of James Bond is a sensual, sensuous one.”

Nolan’s name surfaced for a time as a possible director of SPECTRE before Sam Mendes returned to the 007 director’s chair.

Logo of Syncopy, Christopher Nolan’s production company

The thing about Nolan and Syncopy is you don’t just get a director. You get a group of associates, including Emma Thomas, Nolan’s wife who produces his films.

Eon Productions doesn’t normally do co-productions. Thunderball was an exception because Kevin McClory held the film rights and he became Eon’s partner for the one film.

Nolan also likes to write his own movies. Whatever progress has been made toward hashing out a Bond 25 story would likely be rewritten by Nolan if he were the director.

In January, there was a brief spell of Nolan fever among 007 fans. That took place after actor Tom Hardy (an acting regular in Nolan films) said he’d like to play James Bond with Nolan directing. As usual, we’ll see.

Here are a couple of the tweets from this morning if you want to look.

 

It appears that the rumours about SYNCOPY are true. IMDb has confirmed that #Bond25 is correctly listed under Nolan’s production company. pic.twitter.com/3vy5sqPoS6

— Bond 25 (@Bond25Film) May 4, 2017

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@TheSpyCommand The staff came back with the response. Could quote it, but it’s very short and to the point; the info is *correct*.

— Bond 25 (@Bond25Film) May 4, 2017

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