Ernst Stavro Blofeld has consistently served as the primary antagonist of James Bond movies for decades, but the role has been recast a number of times. Constant recastings have plagued the cinematic incarnation of this famous foe who originated in Ian Fleming's 007 novels. Appearing in three of Fleming's books, Blofeld made his silver screen debut with the second James Bond film From Russia with Love. Here he was primarily obscured as only certain parts of his body could be seen, though he did already have his iconic white cat companion.
Blofeld finally stepped out of the shadows with his first full-fledged cinematic appearance in the 1967 feature film You Only Live Twice, where he would be portrayed by Donald Pleasence. The characters' immensely distinctive personality won over audiences to a noteworthy degree. Such a positive response ensured that this would be far from the last time Blofeld would appear in the James Bond franchise. In the years following You Only Live Twice, some form of this criminal mastermind has emerged in six 007 titles. In all but one of these appearances (Christoph Waltz reprising the role in No Time To Die being the exception), Blofeld has been portrayed by a different actor.
The reasons for Blofeld constantly being portrayed by new performers are myriad and tend to vary from movie to movie. For Blofeld's second major appearance in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, he was portrayed by Telly Savalas. This recasting occurred because the producers wanted a version of Blofeld who could serve as a more imposing threat to the new James Bond actor George Lazenby. However, more complex issues would be at the root of later recastings of Blofeld. By the time the 1980s rolled around, EON Productions, which produces the James Bond films, were involved in a legal dispute that prevented them from using, among other elements, Blofeld and his organization SPECTRE in their movies.
This meant that the closest EON's Bond movies could come to featuring a Blofeld appearance was through an unnamed figure played physically by John Hollis and voiced by Robert Rietti in 1981's For Your Eyes Only. After that feature, Blofeld remained absent from the primary James Bond film series for thirty-four years. However, during that hiatus, Blofeld did manage to make a single appearance through a rare non-EON 007 project called Never Say Never Again. Here, the iconic villain was once again played by a new performer with Max von Sydow being the newest person to adopt the Blofeld mantle.
In November 2013, thirty years after the premiere of Never Say Never Again, the legal issues that prevented Blofeld and SPECTRE from appearing in EON's James Bond movies were resolved. Immediately, work began on re-introducing a revamped version of Blofeld into Daniel Craig's take on 007. This creative move that would necessitate the fifth recasting of the role since Donald Pleasence portrayed him. Such an incarnation emerged through the 2015 motion picture Spectre where Blofeld was portrayed by Christoph Waltz. This version of the character was rewritten to have a much more personal connection to James Bond than past takes on Blofeld, to the point that Waltz' Blofeld proclaims to be "the author of all of [James Bonds'] pain". Meanwhile, the primary author of the pain behind the constant recasting of Blofeld has been a swarm of behind-the-scenes legal issues.
