Production
In 1954 CBS paid Ian Fleming $1,000 ($8,654 in 2013 dollars) to adapt his first novel, Casino Royale, into a one-hour television adventure as part of their dramatic anthology series Climax Mystery Theater, which ran between October 1954 and June 1958. It was adapted for the screen by Anthony Ellis and Charles Bennett; Bennett was best known for his collaborations with Alfred Hitchcock, including The 39 Steps and Sabotage. Due to the restriction of a one hour play, the adapted version lost many of the details found in the book, although it retained its violence, particularly in Act III.
The hour-long Casino Royale episode aired on 21 October 1954 as a live production and starred Barry Nelson as secret agent James Bond, with Peter Lorre in the role of Le Chiffre and was hosted by William Lundigan. The Bond character from Casino Royale was re-cast as an American agent, described as working for "Combined Intelligence", supported by the British agent, Clarence Leiter; "thus was the Anglo-American relationship depicted in the book reversed for American consumption".
Clarence Leiter was an agent for Station S, while being a combination of Felix Leiter and René Mathis. The name "Mathis", and his association with the Deuxième Bureau, was given to the leading lady, who is named Valérie Mathis, instead of Vesper Lynd. Reports that towards the end of the broadcast "the coast-to-coast audience saw Peter Lorre, the actor playing Le Chiffre, get up off the floor after his 'death' and begin to walk to his dressing room", do not appear to be accurate.
Read more about this topic: Casino Royale (Climax!)
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