Ocean Club’s dramatic Versailles Gardens setting on Paradise Island. Photo by Gladys Shiels
Only one man can play the next James Bond, but many can walk in 007’s super spy footsteps…and some are willing to travel to do so.
“I know of at least five distinct groups from different countries that travel the world to retrace the steps where Bond movies were filmed. And they pay top dollar just to experience where they happened. ‘What villa did he stay in?’ ‘Where did he order the martini in the casino?’” said John Conway. He has firsthand experience with 007 fans and even James Bond actors themselves, as he is the longtime general manager of The Ocean Club, A Four Seasons Resort Bahamas, on Paradise Island in Nassau. Seven 007 movies have been filmed in Nassau. The Ocean Club served as a sexy and sinister setting in “Casino Royale,” the first of Daniel Craig’s, the franchise’s latest Bond, James Bond.
“We have access to a couple of restored Aston Martin DB5’s like the one 007 won in the poker game and drove up to our valet in the movie, so we include it in theme parties. We recreate the casino, too,” Conway told me as we talked at a reception dubbed “License to Chill” (echoing 007’s “License to Kill”) that he and the Ocean Club staged during Virtuoso Travel Week in Las Vegas. Keith Cash, pouring Vesper martinis, brought secret agent authenticity to the Vegas reception – the Bahamian bartender was on set when the six-seat bar he’s tended for decades at the Ocean Club was used for the variation of Bond’s “shaken, not stirred” scene in 2006’s “Casino Royale.”
Almost every 007 actor has enjoyed, over its 65 years, the Ocean Club’s 107-room, beachy boutique luxury on 38 acres with its biggest pool an oceanfront oasis. “Sean Connery lived and died in Nassau, so he was a regular with us,” said Conway. Connery, the original Bond, starred in 1965’s “Thunderball,” a film he essentially remade there in 1982 as “Never Say Never Again.” Two turns as 007 were filmed in Nassau during the record seven times Roger Moore played the part.
Four Seasons Ocean Club’s John Conway with MPS at Virtuoso Travel Week. Photo by Gladys Shiels
Conway said he exercised many mornings beside 007 Pierce Brosnan when the actor lived in-house to film the post-Bond movie “After the Sunset” in 2004. Conway described Brosnan as exceedingly friendly and nice.
So is Conway, obviously, because the good sport agreed to be costumed for the reception in a paisley pink Bahamas blazer – one a typically tuxedoed 007 would not be caught dead in, literally. “I look like the ice cream man. But we’re here representing the Bahamas where we have so much sunshine and a positive outlook, so of course lighter, brighter colors rule the day,” said Conway.
Shining stars, ranging from Michael Jordan to Michael Jackson, have swarmed to swim at the Ocean Club and its neighboring Atlantis Resort. But Conway was the celebrity at the reception: he’d been named one of five global finalists, from hundreds of nominees, for the Hotelier of the Year Award presented by Virtuoso Travel, the world’s leading network of luxury and experiential travel. He’s balanced preserving the iconic resort’s heritage with thoughtful innovation and modernization.
“My number one job as a leader is to listen to both the customer and, even more importantly, the employees. My second job is to create the environment where people want to be part of something. Those two things have to be applied in any situation,” he related.
Conway felt the 007 producers should have cast the classy Idris Elba as the next James Bond. But I may have met a new candidate when Conway drifted away to mingle. I chatted with another Virtuoso Travel Week participant, Filippo Curinga, of I.D.I. Travel. “I helped a group of Russians kiteboard from Mexico to Cuba. “I was on the boat watching out for the sharks,” explained Curinga, who said the group liked trying to set Guinness World Records. “They are Virtuoso members from Russia’s biggest travel agency and they try to set records every year in different areas. But it is always crazy. Last year it was Antarctica. It’s been everywhere from Miami to Mauritius.”
Contact Michael Patrick Shiels at [email protected]. His new book, Travel Tattler – Not So Torrid Tales, may be purchased via Amazon.com. Hear his radio talk show on 730 AM 1240 in Lansing on weekdays from 3 p.m. to 6 pm.
