John Grover, legendary James Bond editor, dies at 87

John Grover, the British film editor who worked on six James Bond movies and helped assemble Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey,” died Sept. 28. He was 87.

Grover died Monday at his home in Buckinghamshire, England, after a short illness, his son Tim told The Hollywood Reporter. British Film Editors, where Grover was a longtime vice chairman and which gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award in April, also announced his death on social media.

John Grover’s career spanned Bond, Kubrick and Lean

John Grover was the credited film editor on three 007 films: “For Your Eyes Only” (1981), “The Living Daylights” (1987) and “Licence to Kill” (1989), according to Deadline. On three others, “The Spy Who Loved Me” (1977), “Moonraker” (1979) and “Octopussy” (1983), he worked as an assembly editor or co-editor. On “Moonraker,” he and editor John Glen shaped the final cut from 800,000 feet of film, a 10-month job that ran until the day before the premiere, The Hollywood Reporter noted.

Born Oct. 24, 1938, in Barnet, Middlesex, Grover started out at MGM Studios as a numbering boy, where his uncle was supervising editor. He went on to work as an uncredited assistant editor for some of the era’s biggest directors, including Robert Wise on “The Haunting” (1963), David Lean on “Doctor Zhivago” (1965), John Frankenheimer on “Grand Prix” (1966), Kubrick on “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968) and Herbert Ross on “Goodbye, Mr. Chips” (1969).

His work on “2001” came with an unusual assignment: recording heavy breathing for the film’s spacewalk scenes. Grover said he wore the spacesuit helmet himself and spent six months on the task. “He’d sit right at the front with a notebook, and you’d run the sequence and he’d be writing and he’d come back and say, ‘OK, John, very good, do it again,'” Grover said of Kubrick, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Author Michael Benson has written that Kubrick breathed into the helmet himself, and British Film Editors says both men were recorded, with Grover’s take thought to be the one used.

John Grover was less enthusiastic about the finished film. “I think [2001 is] a load of rubbish, it’s the most boring, long, stretched out [film],” he said at a 2016 editing conference, while acknowledging it was “very ahead of its time.”

He described a warmer collaboration with Lean. “He’d say, ‘Get everybody in here, let’s have a look at this, what do you think?'” Grover recalled. “He’d listen to you, provided you had an answer.”

That connection resurfaced years later. Grover had been given a music box on the “Doctor Zhivago” set that played “Lara’s Theme,” and he worked it into “The Spy Who Loved Me,” where Barbara Bach’s Anya Amasova uses it. The brief cameo earned composer Maurice Jarre royalties.

What it means for fans of Bond and classic cinema

John Grover’s credits link the James Bond series with Kubrick’s science-fiction landmark, giving fans a direct thread between the spy thrillers of the 1970s and ’80s and one of cinema’s most influential space epics.

John Grover also co-edited Timothy Dalton’s 007 debut, “The Living Daylights,” with Peter Davies, a pivotal moment when the franchise recast its lead. During postproduction, a work print leaked and circulated on VHS, and Grover was summoned by producer Albert Broccoli and associate producer Tom Pevsner. “That was really frightening,” he said in 2018, according to The Hollywood Reporter. He had marked frames with identifiable symbols to track copies, and the leak was traced to a New York trailer company.

Background and other credits

In all, John Grover worked on six films starring Roger Moore, including the war movies “The Wild Geese” (1978) and “The Sea Wolves” (1980). His other credits include “The Final Option” (1982), Tobe Hooper’s “Lifeforce” (1985), “Buddy’s Song” (1991) and “Funky Monkey” (2004), plus Jim Henson’s “Labyrinth” (1986), which he called his favorite film.

On television, he edited episodes of British series such as “CI5: The New Professionals,” “Monsignor Renard” and “Fat Friends,” along with American TV movies including “Nobody’s Children” and the 1992 version of “Frankenstein.” His final film was the 2005 Lithuanian drama “Dievu miskas” (“Forest of the Gods”), according to Deadline.

John Grover is survived by Jenny, his wife of 62 years; son Tim; daughter Camilla; five grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

Reporting from Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter contributed to this story.

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