Best remembered as 'M' in the James Bond films, Bernard Lee was a popular character player in British films throughout the 1950s and 1960s. Born into a theatrical family, he made his stage debut aged six and later attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. He first appeared on the West End stage in London in 1928, and continued to work in the theatre during the 1930s, taking only occasional film roles.

It was only after World War Two that he concentrated his efforts on the cinema, and was much in demand in British films of the 1950s as friendly authority figures, including army sergeants, police detectives or navy officers. Detectives became a particular speciality, and he played this role in more than a dozen films, including The Blue Lamp, Beat the Devil and The Detective. In the early 1960s he also made regular appearances as police detectives in the 'Edgar Wallace' second feature series, usually as 'Inspector Meredith'. He also made memorable appearances in The Third Man, Operation Disaster, Glory at Sea, Pursuit of the Graf Spee, Dunkirk and Whistle Down the Wind.

He was effectively cast against type in only two films, as the union agitator in The Angry Silence, and as a disgruntled civil servant who becomes a spy for the Russians in _Ring of Spies (1963)_ .

In 1962 he made his first appearance as the head of the British secret service in the first James Bond film, 'Doctor No'. He went on to feature in the next ten films in the series, appearing with Sean Connery, George Lazenby and later Roger Moore as Bond, and will probably be considered the definitive 'M' by more than one generation of Bond fans.


Grandfather of Jonny Lee Miller He worked as a fruit porter to fund his drama studies. He was notorious for enjoying a drink, but never let this affect his work. During filming of The Third Man, Lee went missing and the director sent crew to trawl the local bars to find him. He was seriously ill during the filming of Live and Let Die (1973), causing the producers to consider replacing him with Kenneth More. However Lee recovered sufficiently to play the character M until Moonraker (1979), the last Bond film made before his death from stomach cancer in 1981. Was preparing to reprise the role of 'M' in For Your Eyes Only (1981) at the time of his death. As a sign of respect, the script was changed to say that M was on leave, rather than recast the role with another actor (which did not occur until Octopussy in 1983), and scenes originally meant to include M were rewritten with other characters, such as Q for the confession booth meeting with James Bond (Roger Moore).