25 August 1930 – 31 October 2020
The former F1 racing driver on the iconic James Bond star and advocate for all things Scottish who was his friend for 50 years
When people think of Sean of course they think of James Bond, but he wasn’t really acting when he was playing that part. In real life, when he walked into a room, he walked like James Bond and he talked like James Bond, which people could find disconcerting. That was because he didn’t change anything about himself, including his Scottish accent, which tells you a lot about the man.
Sean was a very tough man in some ways, but very sensitive in others. I first met him in 1971 when he was setting up a charity to help young Scots [the Scottish International Education Trust], wanting me to get involved – he liked how I projected Scotland to the world as a racing driver. He loved his country but realised it had its limitations – even though Glasgow’s fine art is renowned, he knew there weren’t similar opportunities elsewhere in the arts. He understood why people moved away for new opportunities, given he had come from a very ordinary background himself and done that, but he wanted Scotland to thrive from within.
