20 Things You Didn’t Know About On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)
17. “...But A Little Puzzled By Your Remarkable Clinic.”
The visual spectacle of OHMSS was dialled down in favour of emphasising the characters and plot of Ian Fleming's story, which left little room for the extravagant soundstage sets of regular Bond production designer, Sir Ken Adam.
He was replaced by Syd Cain, who provided more grounded sets for the film, but echoed Adam's work in his designs for Blofeld’s laboratory and quarters beneath Piz Gloria, which were mainly housed on E Stage at Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire.
Combining scientific equipment worth £7,000 with antiques, custom-built furniture valued at £10,000, and modern art, the laboratory and office were the most expensive sets built for the film, costing £100,000, but far less than the volcano lair in You Only Live Twice.
Meanwhile, Pinewood’s K Stage housed the cavern leading into the laboratory, where director of photography, Michael Reed used a highly-manoeuvrable Mole-Richardson crane to track the actors’ movements over an underground river, which was represented by dry ice.
Controlled explosions destroyed the sets with such force that “even the explosion-hardened Bond crew flinched”, but were cut from the finished film (even though they feature in some trailers for OHMSS).