Tracy Bond

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Tracy Bond
James Bond character
Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo by Diana Rigg.jpg
First appearance On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1963 novel)
Last appearance On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969 film)
Created by Ian Fleming
Portrayed by Diana Rigg
Information
Full name Teresa Draco di Vicenzo
Aliases Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo
Gender Female
Occupation Countess
Spouse(s) James Bond (husband)
Count Giulio di Vicenzo (former husband)
Children Unnamed daughter
Relatives Marc-Ange Draco (father)
Classification Bond girl

Teresa "Tracy" Bond (born Teresa "Tracy" Draco, and also known as the Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo) is a fictional character and the main Bond girl in the 1963 James Bond novel On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and its 1969 film adaptation. She is the only Bond girl to actually marry 007. In the film version, Tracy is played by actress Diana Rigg.

Biography

Born Teresa Draco in 1943, she is the only child of Marc-Ange Draco, the head of the Union Corse, a powerful Corsican crime syndicate – not quite as large as SPECTRE, but with substantially larger "legal" operations, including Draco Construction. Teresa goes by "Tracy" because she feels "Teresa" does not suit her (as she introduced herself to Bond, "Teresa is a saint; I'm known as Tracy").

Tracy's mother died in 1955; her father then sent her to a boarding school in Switzerland. Deprived of a stable home life, Tracy joined the "international fast set", committing "one scandal after another"; when Draco cut off her allowance, Tracy committed "a greater folly" out of spite. She later married Italian Count Giulio di Vicenzo who, during their marriage, got hold of a large portion of her money before eventually leaving her; he subsequently died while driving a Maserati in the company of one of his mistresses. During this marriage, Tracy had a child, who later died of spinal meningitis.

File:Tracy and James just got married.jpg
Mr. and Mrs. Bond.

Desperate with grief for her child, Tracy attempted suicide by walking into the sea in Portugal, only to be saved by James Bond.[1]

When her father meets Bond, he pleads with Bond to continue to see her, claiming that their relationship had changed her for the better. Bond initially refuses, but he changes his mind when Marc-Ange offers his resources for anything Bond desires. Since the events of Thunderball and the demise of SPECTRE, Bond had been hunting for Ernst Stavro Blofeld, and at one point was willing to retire from MI6 because he felt the hunt was folly and that his services and abilities could be used better. Using Draco's resources, however, Bond is able to track Blofeld to Switzerland. In return, Bond continues to see Tracy and eventually falls in love with her. Tragedy strikes on their wedding day, however, when Blofeld and his henchwoman Irma Bunt shoot at Bond and Tracy in a drive-by shooting. Tracy is shot in the head and killed.

In the film, Tracy drives a red 1969 model Mercury Cougar XR-7 convertible.[2]

Legacy

In Fleming's novels, Bond is a broken man after Tracy's death. In You Only Live Twice, he has begun drinking heavily, is compromised in his abilities as an agent and M is forced to acknowledge that he is no longer fit for service. However he decides to give Bond one last chance and assigns him to an intelligence-related diplomatic affair in Japan. This in turn leads to a duel to the death with Blofeld in the climax of the novel, and Bond is finally awarded his revenge. In the aftermath, however, he is left with amnesia.

In the films, James Bond is tracking Blofeld in the pre-title credits sequence of Diamonds Are Forever. The film does not explain why nor does it mention Tracy. Originally, it had been planned that On Her Majesty's Secret Service would end with Bond and Tracy driving away from their wedding. The scenes where she was shot were filmed at the same time with the intention that they would form the pre-title sequence of Diamonds Are Forever. This was rendered inviable when George Lazenby left the role, as it would have meant either having two actors play Bond in Diamonds Are Forever or re-filming Tracy's death with the new actor as Bond, so the scenes were added to the end of On Her Majesty's Secret Service.[citation needed]

Subsequent films reference the fact that Bond was previously married, but only fleetingly:

  • In The Spy Who Loved Me, when Bond meets Anya Amasova in the Mujaba Club bar, in Cairo, Egypt, she recites a few facts about his life to prove that she had researched him. She mentions facts about his career and his relationships, noting that he had "...many lady friends, but married only once. Wife killed..." at which point Bond immediately cut her off, snapping "You've made your point." Anya comments that he's surprisingly sensitive, to which Bond responds, "About certain things."
File:Tracy Bond gravestone.jpg
The tombstone of James Bond's wife, Teresa, which Bond visits in For Your Eyes Only. Shown at a James Bond convention in 1992.
  • In For Your Eyes Only, in the pre-titles sequence, Bond lays flowers at Tracy's grave (in an English churchyard) before boarding a helicopter. An uncredited man in a wheelchair who strokes a white cat – intended as Blofeld but unnamed for legal reasons – has booby-trapped the helicopter. Bond lifts the man's wheelchair with one of the helicopter's skids and drops him (wheelchair and all) down a tall industrial chimney. The headstone clearly reads: "TERESA BOND, 1943–1969, Beloved Wife of JAMES BOND, We have all the time in the World" – referring to the final words in On Her Majesty's Secret Service and the Louis Armstrong song. Also, the headstone shows Tracy died in 1969, the same year On Her Majesty's Secret Service was released.
  • In Licence to Kill, after Felix Leiter's wedding, Felix's new wife Della throws her garter at Bond, teasing him, "the one who catches this is the next one to..." Bond looks visibly pained; when Della asks Felix about it, Felix makes a short, sad reference to Bond once having been married, "but that was a long time ago."
  • In GoldenEye, Alec Trevelyan tells Bond, "I might as well ask you if all those vodka martinis ever silence the screams of all the men you've killed... or if you find forgiveness in the arms of all those willing women for all the dead ones you failed to protect."
  • In The World is Not Enough, after Bond meets Elektra King, they talk about her father's death, and she asks Bond if he has ever lost a loved one. Bond hesitates, then changes the subject without answering.

Curiosities

Tracy's wedding dress is now kept at the Admiral Hotel in Milan.

References

  1. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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