Investigating magistrate Alfredo Mondeja to his boss: “I am unable to prosecute Sir Sean Connery for fraud charges regarding the long-ago sale of his Costa del Sol estate. I’m sorry but I can’t. I don’t have the horses. But I did my best.” Boss to Mandeja: “Your ‘best’? Losers always whine about their best. Winners go home and fuck the prom queen.” Mondeja: “I might, however, be able to prosecute Connery’s wife, a.k.a. “Lady Connery” or Micheline Roquebrune. That might pan out.”

(l. to r.) Sean Connery in 1962, 1991 and fairly recently.

I spoke to Connery only once, during a roundtable at a 1982 New York press junket for Richard Brooks‘ Wrong Is Right. I wasn’t much of a fan of the film (nobody was) but it was thrilling to absorb the vibe and smell the aroma of the manly Connery. He wasn’t much of a kidder but he had an engaging smile. Every answer he gave was straight from the shoulder, bordering on blunt.

The word around the campfire at the time was that Connery had made a successful advance upon a female journalist during a hotel-room interview, although not necessarily during his Wrong Is Right activities. We all have impulses, of course, but we control them for the sake of decency and our careers and reputations. But if you were Sean Connery back in the day, perhaps not each and every time.