In her breezy yet ambitious Don’t Tell Mama show, Love and Let Die: Confessions of a Bond Girl (directed by Lennie Watts and first performed in June of this year), Shannon Daley portrays a specific James Bond love interest, Sylvia Trench—the character enacted by Eunice Gayson in the first two Bond films, Dr. No (1962) and From Russia with Love (1963). But Daley’s Sylvia is more than just the Bond Girl prototype. She’s all Bond girls rolled into one: all those alluring women romanced by the celebrated secret agent in his various incarnations over the decades, in films starring actors from Sean Connery to Daniel Craig.
Photo: Helane Blumfield
“It seems he’s always been around in one way or another,” Shannon/Sylvia says, early in the show, about the cinematic presence of Ian Fleming’s suave, ageless action figure.
Love and Let Die, scripted by Daley, is not precisely a spoof, although there is that one fanciful moment when Sylvia confronts James (unseen by the audience) in the shadows of her dressing room, observing that he’s wearing a tuxedo under his wetsuit. Nor is this a serious academic deconstruction of the Bond genre, although the question is raised of how the spy can paradoxically enjoy undercover anonymity while simultaneously being a famous figure the world over. Later, the trope of Bond girls dying before the final credits is also noted.
The show has lots of moving pieces. There’s a plot of sorts concerning the rocky love affair between Bond and Trench. Daley spends a good amount of time onstage storytelling and singing, but clips from the films are also screened while she repeatedly goes offstage for a costume change (I counted five outfits in all, including one number displaying a profusion of shiny black feathers that looked glam but also quite uncomfortable.) The clips (which Shannon edited) are grouped by category: one consisting of exotic travel sequences, another featuring chase scenes, a third highlighting steamy romantic interludes.
Shannon, who seemed to be truly enjoying herself at the performance I saw (despite occasional moments of hesitancy), has a big voice, and the famous Bond movie songs she sings are mostly big songs, including The Spy Who Loved Me’s “Nobody Does It Better” (Carol Bayer Sager, Marvin Hamlisch) and the title song from Skyfall (Adele, Paul Epworth). Going big is part of the Bond brand, but Daley definitely enjoys a nice respite from all that when singing a somewhat quieter number, one in which she is able to show us the nuances of her singing skills. The song is “Only Myself to Blame” (Don Black, David Arnold), written for but not heard in The World Is Not Enough. I wish there’d been more songs in this vein.
(Incidentally, the arguably most famous Bond song of all, “Goldfinger,” is not sung—and it is not missed.)
The most interesting musical numbers in the show are some clever mashups of Bond songs with familiar pop tunes. These were arranged by the evening’s musical director and pianist, the charismatic John Fischer. One selection heard early in the evening, dubbed “Thundervain,” blends Don Black and John Barry’s “Thunderball” with Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain.” The most successful of these amalgams—“Tomorrow, I’m Losing My Mind”—pairs Sheryl Crow and Mitchell Froom’s theme from Tomorrow Never Dies with Stephen Sondheim’s “Losing My Mind” from Follies. Listening to the familiar Broadway ballad get the Bond treatment was both amusing and illuminating. The idea may sound wacky, but I found the arrangement sort of brilliant.
Joining Shannon and Fischer onstage at the performance I saw was bassist Jerry DeVore, whose playing added another welcome texture to the soundscape.
I enjoyed myself at this show, and I think it will get even better as Daley refines her performance (and maybe tweaks the script a bit).
The final installment—for now—happens October 7.
###
Presented at Don’t Tell Mama, 343 W. 46th St., NYC, June 25 &26, Sept. 26, Oct. 3 & 7, 2024.
Mark Dundas Wood is an arts/entertainment journalist and dramaturg. He began writing reviews for BistroAwards.com in 2011. More recently he has contributed "Cabaret Setlist" articles about cabaret repertoire. Other reviews and articles have appeared in theaterscene.net and clydefitchreport.com, as well as in American Theatre and Back Stage. As a dramaturg, he has worked with New Professional Theatre and the New York Musical Theatre Festival. He is currently literary manager for Broad Horizons Theatre Company.
