James Bond Origin Comics

Cover artwork by Kev Walker for the upcoming "James Bond Origin" comics by Dynamite. More covers by other artists below.

Interview with Tony Seiniger

Tony Seiniger had a long and distinguished career in advertising starting film advertising in New York while working for a television commercial production company and eventually his own film advertising agency called Seiniger Advertising in Los Angeles.



Q: How were you involved in the James Bond marketing campaigns / who approached you?
TS: I was approached by the advertising executives at United Artists based in New York. Even though I was based in California, they said that they were looking for "new blood" to work on the upcoming Bond movie "Moonraker."  I found out later why they were looking for new blood.


Q: After the success of "Star Wars" (1977) the Bond producers decided to continue with a space themed 007 movie. What was the challenge?
TS: The challenge was very simple. United Artists flew me to Paris to meet with Cubby Broccoli, the film's producer. We had a very brief meeting at the Boulogne Studios. Mr. Broccoli told me that he had been very dissatisfied with the poster art done for the previous Bond film, "The Spy Who Loved Me." He said, "Roger didn't look like Roger." He went on to tell me that he didn't care what idea I came up with, that he didn't care about the concept, only that "Roger should look like Roger."

With Mr. Broccoli's concerns in mind, I knew that a good photography session had to occur. I went back to Paris, and I worked with the unit stills photographer, David James. We spent most of a day photographing Roger Moore, in a variety of poses, one of which was the down angle that would be needed to successfully illustrate the "Bond as a rocket" concept that became the US teaser poster. Mr. Moore was extremely cordial and cooperative, as long as we kept him amply supplied with No.1 Special Montecristo cigars.


Q: Why was Dan Goozeé chosen as illustrator?
TS:  Dan was selected as the illustrator because of his commitment to detail, and his sense of responsibility. Many illustrators back then were very flaky, especially when it came to deadlines. Dan was always someone I could count upon. In today's digital world, I would not have used an illustrator. With the quality of photography I had from the photo session in Paris, I could have executed the "rocket" concept in Photoshop, utilizing a stock NASA photograph of Earth. But this was 1979, long before Photoshop. I did not assign any other illustrators, but since every distribution territory had the right to execute their own versions of the main campaign art, there were many other illustrators involved in "Moonraker" on a world-wide basis.

Q: Dan Goozeé painted the two advance poster artworks and the final finished 1-Sheet art. Who was the illustrator of the design showing space paddles with action scenes ?
TS:  I believe this art was executed by one of the "foreign' territories, not United Artists in the US.



Q: When you heard the title "Octopussy" for the first time what were your thoughts?
TS:  I had not read any of the Ian Fleming books, so I knew nothing about "Octopussy." It wasn't until I read the script that I realized Octopussy was the name of the lead female character.

Q: Who came up with the brilliant idea of showing Octopussy inspired by indian goddess Durga-Shakti with 8 arms ?

TS:  The idea was obvious to me. "Octo" meaning eight. "Pussy" referring to Maude Adams. So Maude Adams with eight arms. I was not inspired by the Indian goddess at all.






Q: Any recollections why this illustration was not widely used ?

TS: I had nothing to do with this piece. But if you look at the figure of Bond, it's clearly taken from the key art for "Live and Let Die." the first Roger Moore Bond film. It may have been an early teaser poster concept executed by an agency in New York.




Q: The teaser design also is very clever showing Octopussy from behind and 13 times James Bond. Along with a great tagline. Who came up with this idea to hide the identity of Octopussy? 
TS:  My idea was to convey that "Octopussy" was the 13th Bond film. Since Maude Adams was NOT a movie star, the emphasis had to be on Bond, not her.











Q: A View To A Kill has a very innovative poster campaign. Who came up with this great idea?
TS:  Again, the concepts for all these Bond posters came out of my head, for better or for worse. Grace Jones had collaborated with a brilliant photographer/graphic designer named Jean-Paul Goude. Together they created striking images of Grace; distorted and exaggerated, but beautiful at the same time. These images were my inspiration for how Grace should be portrayed on the back-to-back poster. Her legs are extended way beyond normal human proportions. And so were Roger's. He had to be a bit taller than Grace.



Q: The movie was Roger Moore's last Bond. Did you know that when preparing the campaign and if yes did it have an impact ?
TS:  We all knew this was going to be Roger's last Bond film. He was nearing 60 years old, a bit old to play Bond, but the Broccolis did not have a ready replacement. They always wanted Pierce Brosnan, but he was tied up with a very lengthy commitment to the TV series "Remington Steele." That's how Timothy Dalton got his two Bond films. The Broccolis had to wait almost ten years for Pierce to be free to play Bond.

Q: Dan Goozeé was again responsible for the posters. Focus was on perspective & location with the Eiffel Tower and the Gold Gate Bridge. Any anecdotes as for the developments of these?
TS:  We had developed a "forced perspective" look with the "Moonraker" teaser poster. There was a very conscious decision on my part to revisit that look for "A View to a Kill." We decided to push this concept as far as we could. The Paris and San Francisco locations are in the film, but never as we portrayed them. We just took it to the limit. After all, James Bond was a cartoon character. At least until the Timothy Dalton films. And Daniel Craig has done even more to dispel the cartoon image.


Q: Any involvements in the “white tuxedo” style which is also pictured in my book or was it done for UK & Japanese markets only ? Note: painted by Brian Bysouth based on a design by Vic Fair.
TS: I had nothing to do with this poster. But remember, the individual territories (countries) releasing these films had the right to create posters that they felt would best appeal to their market.


Thanks to Thomas from the Nixdorf Collection for sharing this interview! He interviewed Tony in 2012.

James Bond Tribute Artworks

James Bond tribute artworks by Adrian Keindorf, Gouache.

Thanks to Darren and Adrian for sharing these.