On Her Majesty's Secret Service

"This never happened to the other fella."
---George Lazenby as James Bond

THE VANITY CASE GIVEN TO THE ANGELS OF DEATH
Earnst Stavro Blofeld recruited twelve beautiful women to his Institute for Physiological Research at Piz Gloria, Switzerland under the guise of curing their various food allergies.  In movie reality, Blofeld was brainwashing each of the women to be the instruments he used to release poisons in different countries around the world.  Blofeld called the twelve his 'Angels of Death'.  For Christmas, Blofeld gifted each Angel a very special vanity case containing various cosmetics.  But two of the items in the case were not what they appeared to be.  The face powder compact was transformed into a radio receiver which Blofeld would use to communicate with and control the Angels, and the large atomizer bottle contained the poison mixture rather than perfume.

For the movie, John Asprey made twelve identical vanity cases.  Today, only one of those twelve survives, and it is in private hands (not owned by EON or Amazon/MGM).  Together with two very talented collaborators (Jeffrey Joslin and Ed Maggiani) I vowed to re-create the vanity case prop as accurately as I could.  Almost three years later, we have produced the prop you see above.  I call my prop a re-creation rather than a reproduction because not only is it a highly accurate copy of the original, but we also used where we were able the same vintage items as were used in the original case seen in the movie.  The face powder compact and the large perfume bottle are the exact same items as were used to create the 1969 cases.  Even the eyeliner pencil is vintage to that time period.

We were given extensive information from the owner of the sole surviving original vanity case, including pictures and measurements.  We committed to making twelve cases, just as in the movie, one for each Angel of Death.  Instead of numbering the cases, each one was named for one of the Angels.  I selected The Israeli Girl for my case.  She was portrayed by the gorgeous actress Helena Ronee, with whom I had dinner in 2019 at the OHMSS50 Celebration at Piz Gloria.  She also autographed my OHMSS lithograph by Jeff Marshal, and she gave me a kiss!  How could I choose to have the vanity case of any other Angel?

Be sure to view the short video above, for a good look at this magnificently re-created prop.
TRACY'S WEDDING RING
The wedding ring purchased by Bond for Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo (Teresa "Tracy" Draco) was designed by Charles de Temple, a London jeweler who made some of the more flamboyant and dramatic statement pieces of jewelry in Britian during the 1960's.  Temple was hired to create the wedding ring for OHMSS, and two were delivered by him for the film, identical but for being different sizes.  The rings are two-piece, two-color (white and yellow) gold bands, one fitting inside the other, with the stylized words 'ALL THE TIME IN THE WORLD'.  The words are a reference to the title of the song by Louis Armstrong used in the film, We Have All The Time In The World.  Bond repeats those title words at the end of the film as he holds Tracy in his arms after she has been murdered by Irma Bunt and Ernst Stavro Blofeld.  Tracy's wedding ring was Temple's second encounter with the Bond films - the gold pinkie worn by Honor Blackmon to the premiere of Goldfinger also was designed by Temple.  The ring I have is an exquisite replica prop, but the wording has been changed to 'ALL THE LOVE IN THE WORLD'.  An excellent rendition of a difficult prop by Peter and Markus - kudos!
MORLAND SPECIAL THREE-RING CIGARETTES
In real life, Ian Fleming smoked hand made Morland Special cigarettes bearing three gold rings.  Fleming passed this attribute to Agent 007, and thus was born the James Bond Special No. 1 Exclusive Balkan Cigarette, hand made by Morland & Co., cigarette specialists.  References to the cigarettes appear in the novels.  At the beginning of On Her Majesty's Secret Service, while Bond is following Tracy along a coast road in Portugal, we see Bond light up a three ring cigarette, presumably one of his Morlands.  The props pictured above (both the cigarettes and the box) were made for a BBC special program about the life of Ian Fleming, and were purchased by me directly from the propmaker after filming concluded.
When James Bond enters the Alpine Room at Piz Gloria to join the Angels of Death, some unusual playing cards are laid out upon the table.  See the scene from the movie, above right.  The playing cards were designed by Jean Picart le Doux, a French tapestry designer, and were printed by London printer Thomas De la Rue, being first issued in October 1957.  The occasion for the special set of playing cards was the celebration of the First International Playing Card Week being hosted at that time by the printer in London.  While the exact age of my cards is unknown, they are vintage and in very good condition.  The plastic dish holds two decks of the cards.
After dictating his resignation from the Service to Moneypenny, Bond goes to his office to clean his personal items out of his desk.  He runs across some items from the prior films.  In addition to Honey Ryder's webbed belt with the sheath and the knife, he finds the two items pictured to the left - the underwater breather device and the garroting watch.  We also see the black attaché case in the background behind him.
I have the February 1969 issue of 'Playboy' Magazine that George Lazenby perused while opening the safe at the office of Gebrüder Gumbold, Advocate in Bern, Switzerland.  My copy is missing the centerfold, of course - James Bond took it!
At right are interpretations of three letters involving Gebrüder Gumbold, Advocate, hired by Blofeld to help him establish his right to the use of the de Bleauchamp title.  These props are replicas of some of the items removed from Gumbold's safe by Bond.
This book made appearances in several scenes in the film, and is clearly seen being used by James Bond, posing as Sir Hilary Bray of The College of Arms, while doing research work on the de Bleauchamp title.  Below are copies of the Bond family and the de Bleauchamp Coats of Arms.  The Bond family motto shown is 'The World Is Not Enough', while the de Bleauchamp motto is 'For Health and Home'.
Bond Coat of Arms
de Bleauchamp Coat of Arms
A reproduction of the program distributed to attendees of the Royal World Premiere for On Her Majesty's Secret Service held on December 18, 1969 at the Odeon Leicester Square cinema.  The Royals in attendance at the Premiere were the Duke and Duchess of Kent.  Thanks to Marc Slattery for his detailed work to create this repro and for selling a copy to me.
Universal Exports sign as seen early in the film
A couple of versions of Tracy's red Mercury Cougar convertible as seen in the film.
A pin commemorating the recent celebration of the 50th anniversary of the film.
Okay, this is not a collectible, just a memento.  Visiting Piz Gloria had been one of my 'holy grails' as a Bond fan.  Many years ago, when I made my first visit, I had no idea whether I'd ever be able to return.  So I brought home the rock you see at the left - from the top of Schilthorn Mountain, at the base of Piz Gloria!