Licence to sneeze: the James Bond theme was originally written for a musical

Posted On August 17, 2024August 17, 2024

Since Dr No burst onto the scene and wasted no time establishing the title character as an instant icon, the big screen adventures of James Bond have adhered rigidly to a set of tropes that have become integral to the ongoing success of the legendary franchise.

The gun barrel opening is a requisite, 007 will more often than not ask for a martini shaken but not stirred, there’s going to be an array of delightful gadgets, a string of exotic locations dotted all around the globe, the so-called ‘secret’ agent introducing himself to everyone he meets with his real name, and at least one love interest if not more.

All par for the course from one of cinema’s most enduringly popular properties, but no Bond movie would be complete without the theme song. Without a word of understatement, it’s among the most easily recognisable pieces of music that have ever been created, but in an alternate timeline, the unforgettable arrangement would have been used to soundtrack a song about a man’s magical sneeze.

It sounds preposterous, but it’s a fact. The arrangement that became known simply as ‘James Bond Theme’ was originally penned in 1961 by Barry Norman, with the intention of being used for a musical adaptation of VS Naipaul’s A House for Mr Biswas. Had the production not fallen apart, then 007 would have been in need of a new cue.

A House for Mr Biswas traces the title character as he struggles to find freedom in an abode he can call his very own. The son of a Trinidadian labourer, he moves from one crowded house to the next for years in an endless quest to call himself a homeowner. Where does the sneeze come in? From the lyrics, of course, which are so outlandish, it’s incredible to think Bond owes his theme to it.

“I was born with this unlucky sneeze, and what is worse, I came into the world the wrong way round; pundits all agree that I am the reason why my father fell into the village pond and drowned, Hindus and Chinese, African and Portuguese, everybody worry about my sneeze,” are the words from lyricist Julian More that worked in sync with Norman’s music on ‘Bad Sign, Good Sign’, which is an eye-opener.

Listening to the song and knowing that it was composed by the same guy who wrote the Bond theme, the similarities become even more apparent. The opening bars are burned into the pop culture consciousness and have been for over 60 years, and it was almost used for a singsong about a man with a particularly potent sneeze.

Instead, A House for Mr Bisawas never made the leap from the page in the early 1960s, opening the doors for Bond to acquire Norman’s composition and turn it into an indelible earworm.

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