Mr. Moore is at it again: playing the world's most famous spy with almost weary ease and more than a touch of tongue in cheek. Frankly, he told Christine Sparks on the set of the latest Bond extravaganza - Octopussy, superstardom is a bit of a hoot. But being dad to a teenage daughter ? Now that can give a chap cause to worry ...

When the lights go down for next year's première of the new James Bond epic, Octopussy, the critics will dip their pans in vitriol to write about the star's performance. For them Roger Moore care not a fig..

The one who will really worry him will be beautiful dark-eyed girl two seats away. She is 19-year-old daughter, Deborah, who with the two sons Geoffrey and Christian is casting an increasingly disapproving eye over Dad's carryings on.

"My children don't actually criticise my performance because they figure there are enough people in the world doing that". He grins. "But I'm starting to worry about my daughter because she's becoming a serious actress. She's just joined LAMDA (a major acting school) and I think she's going to be very 'theatre' and look down her nose at Daddy the movie actor. She hasn't criticised my reading of a line as yet, but I can see it coming any day".

Not that the reading of lines is a major part of a James Bond performance. Although an unbelievable 55, Moore/Bond spends most of his time leaping from exploding buildings or cuddling girls a third his age with their necklines down to their waists and their legs up to their armpits. He's the first to see the joke against himself, quipping that he can't manage more than one take per love scene, but as Debbie is the first to reming him, it is not Art.

"She feels I shoudn't be wasting my time as she said. I should do more serious films. They showed The Man Who Haunted Himself on TV recently. They all felt that that was the sort of thing - acting-acting".

Deborah's own plunge into acting-acting has involved leaving the family nest in Gstaad, Switzerland, and sharing a house with Bryan Forbes's daughter Emma in London, an arrangement that has done much to soothe any worries in the paternal breast.

"She's learned a certain independence at boarding school, and as far as surviving in London goes she probably knows more than I do. Girls discuss all sorts of things these days that we mere males have no idea about. Debbie has her head screwed on. Apart from that, she's very pretty, so she's obviously used to advances and has worked out her own modus operandi for rejecting them. I think her mother's given her some advice along those lines, but I wouldn't like to because I don't want to give away my secrets. Why ? Well, she might pass them on to her brother. I'm not going to tell him either. The fun, for boys, is finding out for themselves. You can't lift them on and off, you know".

There is a pause while he realises what he has said. Delicately I suggest he might like to re-phrase it.

"Yes I would", he grins. "But it would only come out worse".

He has only himself to blame if Deborah regards him with the knowledgeable eye of an expert: from babyhood all three Moore children have been allowed to swarm happily over their father's place of work; he enjoys having them around.

"I don't think there would have been any pointin my trying to keep them away from my work. You can't say to children, 'You're going to do this ... You can say 'I'd like you to ...'. I always wanted Debby to study medicine, because I'm a hypocondriac and I thought it would be wonderful to have the free medical attention in the family. But she showed no inclination, didn't even dress up as a nurse when she was little".

"When she was very tiny she used to come to the studio and I'd let her hold my hand while they were shooting close-ups of me. She was well out of the picture, but she didn't know. When I was in The Persuaders, I directed an episode and let her be in it. She was terribly good".

Part two will follow next month

 

Read our previous stories of the month