The writer who helped bring James Bond to the big screen was investigated by MI5 as a suspected communist agent, according to secret files made public for the first time yesterday.
Wolf Mankowitz introduced the film producers Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman to each other and helped to script their first Bond movie, Dr No.
He also went on to write the screenplay for the first cinema version of Casino Royale – an unofficial Bond spoof starring David Niven – made in 1967.
But while Mr Mankowitz helped to establish Bond as the world’s most famous fictional spy, papers released by the National Archives in Kew, west London, show that for more than a decade his activities were monitored by MI5 amid concerns that he was a real life secret agent.
Mr Mankowitz first came to the attention of the Security Service in 1944, towards the end of World War II.
He and his wife Ann were mentioned in an intercepted letter from a former soldier and suspected communist called David Holbrook who MI5 were investigating.
Mr Holbrook wrote that he went to see the couple in Newcastle where he found them “avoiding National Service and doing themselves well” earning £6-a-week lecturing for the left wing Workers’ Educational Association.
“Mr Wolf always assaults me with the denouncement ‘You know you’re not really a Marxist’ which is probably true, but I like to sneer a bit and think I am more useful than he is,” Mr Holbrook added.
MI5 were sufficiently interested to ask Newcastle Police to investigate Mr Mankowitz. The police reported back: “He is known to frequently discuss the theories of Marxism with his friends while in lodgings.”
MI5 then caused further investigations to be made the following year when Mr Mankowitz decided to enlist with the Territorial Army.
He was described by his commanding officer as a “highly strung individual of nervous temperament” who was awaiting an interview with a psychiatrist. He doubted, however, that he was a subversive influence.
“Even if he possesses communist views I do not think he has the personality or strength of character to pass them on to his fellow soldiers,” the officer wrote.
“There is no evidence that he has attempted to air these views while with this unit.”
Nevertheless, MI5 continued to keep tabs on him after he left the Army and when in 1948 he applied for a job with the Government Central Office of Information, his appointment was blocked.