Geoffrey Moore on his role as an MI5 agent in new movie Knightfall

Words: Jonathan Whiley

The name's Moore, Geoffrey Moore. If I didn't introduce the oldest son of James Bond – the late, great Sir Roger Moore – with a tongue-in-cheek line and a raised eyebrow, then quite frankly I wouldn't be keeping the British end up. Ahem.

Mercifully I suspect Jaffa – as he's known to many – would forgive me. The 60-year-old actor, producer and restaurateur, who co-founded the much-loved and much-missed Mayfair institution Hush (of which more later), has a wonderful sense of humour and makes for relaxed, entertaining company.

We meet over Zoom. As London bakes in the heatwave, an effortlessly stylish Geoffrey dials in from his home in Switzerland. We're here to discuss his return to the screen after a prolonged absence in Knightfall, a slick spy thriller in which he stars opposite Ian Ogilvy, Jeanine Nerissa Sothcott and Michael Paré.

“Not having been in front of the camera for such a long time, I realised how much I missed it,” he says. “It was really enjoyable working with Ian Ogilvy, considering he took over from the old man in The Saint [as agent Simon Templar]. We had such a good time off camera. We talked a lot about California, where he lives and I used to live. I spent almost 30 years there and we were comparing what it was like.”

With Geoffrey's last acting role in the 1990s, what was it about this film that persuaded him to return? “Money!” he jokes. “No, Jonathan [Sothcott, the producer] used to come to Hush quite a bit and we always talked about ‘one day'. I never expected him to say: I've written a part around you'. I really felt it was something I could just about get my teeth into, considering I haven't been doing this for a long time. After 15 years he [Jonathan] said: ‘Look, I think I've finally written this thing.”

Photo credit – Jordan Smith

The film sees Charles Knight (Ogilvy), a retired spy-catcher, called into action alongside his estranged daughter Ros (Jeanine Nerissa Sothcott) and her boyfriend, MI5 field agent Hugh (Moore) as they intercept a deadly biological weapon. Given the genre and his role, is Geoffrey conscious of the parallels with his famous father, who played the role of 007 in seven Bond films?

“You know, he was one of my best friends. He was a dad and a mate and I miss him every day. I'm not too concerned or too conscious about the idea of whether someone sees me like that or I feel that way. My dad is in me. I speak to him every day and he's with me.”

“In a sense I'm carrying his torch because he gave up his career for Unicef, creating the goodwill ambassador role with Audrey Hepburn [he stepped back from full-time acting work in 1991]. I thought, you know what, I'm not that long in the tooth and why not do a bit of the Roger in the Jaffa style? There is no point running away from it. If you can flaunt a name or you can use that then you better have something good to sell.”

I had heard his father once recommended him for the role of James Bond to producer Albert Broccoli. “There was truth there,” he confirms. “The old man said: ‘You should give him a test'. Then he made me do the ‘Bond, James Bond'. In Italy all my relatives out there – my mother [Italian actress Luisa Mattioli] being from Rome – were all: ‘Fantastico!' It hadn't happened, I hadn't gone for a test, they were just talking about it.”

“Joking apart, I think I could have pulled it off but I don't think the producers – especially Barbara Broccoli and rightly so – would have invested in a lack of experience to a very demanding commitment.” Having the Moore surname, Geoffrey says, is both “pressure and a privilege”.

Photo credits –  Globe photos/ Zumbaprss.com/Alamy

“In the early days I remember people would say: ‘It must be so hard.' When I was at school I was rather large and I would loathe anyone to know who I was. It was an embarrassment to be the son of James Bond. I was pretty fat and I sold doughnuts at school. I would go down early and watch the baker with these doughnuts and fresh jam and I was the doughnut king. I used to eat like 12 a day. I ate my profit; I charged 50 cents on every doughnut and I wasn't very good at business, but I was good at eating, that's for sure.”

He has since built a career that has included film roles (two alongside his late father), a restaurant business and an album. Three years ago he performed a single from it at a concert in Germany. It was a way, he says, to say: “I'm not just Roger Moore's son.”

He says he misses Mayfair and has fond memories of The Connaught (“a great hotel”), Scott's (“one of the best”) and Doug Hayward's tailoring shop on Mount Street, where Michael Caine, Roger Moore, Johnny Gold and Terry O'Neill would hang out.

“Mayfair is my favourite; it's the centre of London,” he says. “It was very different back then, far more of a village feel. It is a little downtown Dubai [now], but Berkeley Square still feels like it was.”

Another much-missed institution is Hush. Geoffrey co-founded the restaurant with his friend Jamie Barber in 1999. The Lancashire Court site closed its doors in 2023 and reopened as Soho Mews House.

“Originally I wanted to do a themed cafe around the world of espionage [called The Spy Cafe]. I did have a good concept, but I was too late; it was after the fashion cafe [trend] tarnished and cheapened the idea. So I thought, how do you keep the bums on seats, and turning to an espionage thing… hence ‘Hush'. After a year and a half of looking I see this building and I think, this is where two spies would meet in Warsaw or Dubrovnik. It was just perfect.

“The easiest part was the customers. The hardest was convincing the chef that no one likes tongue. These are ladies from Bond Street. They don't want to eat cow's tongue for f***'s sake.” When I ask him to pick out a memorable moment, he tells me about a visit from Bill Clinton, then the US president, who came for dinner with his wife Hillary and daughter Chelsea.

“He turned up at the door and said: You must be the young proprietor, how is your dad?' I said: ‘He's doing great Mr President, he sends his best'. And he said: ‘Call me Bill'. We go up the stairs and the lounge is packed and then all you hear is the music. I hadn't told anyone and it was like a freeze frame.”

It didn't go entirely smoothly. “These two knuckleheads were making a racket and Clinton was on his first course, he was having soup and he kept looking up as if to say: Deal with this. The secret service threw one of them out via the fire exit, smashing his watch in the process. He turns over and in a cockney accent starts threatening them. The secret service said: ‘Would you like us to take over?'” The offender was read the full riot act and apologised. “The secret service guy laughed and said: “That was fun, wasn't it?'”

Does he miss it? “What I miss is the routine. I miss customers that I would get to know and colleagues you would get on with and friends that would turn up out of the blue.”

And what of Monaco? He had a childhood home there and his father, who died in 2017, is buried there. “I think [Prince] Albert has done a marvellous job considering he took over a court filled with politicians who were very set in their ways and balancing old meets new. Monaco used to be more glamorous, but it still has its charms and you miss it.”

Does he visit often? “Not as often as I'd like. I have friends there and the prince is such a smart, lovely guy – if ever I'm there I take the opportunity to knock on the door. He's chilled.”

What next for Geoffrey? He tells me there is a Knightfall follow-up in the pipeline and he's involved in another film project he can't say too much about. Licence to thrill? Only time will tell.

Knightfall is released digitally on September 14