Marc-Ange Draco

Nationality:

**Marc-Ange Draco** is the head of one of the Unione Corse, one of the most powerful crime syndicates in the world and father of Tracy Bond and Bond's father-in-law. He first appears in *On Her Majesty's Secret Service*.

## Novel biography

### *On Her Majesty's Secret Service*

After paying his daughter's debt at the Royale-les-Eaux casino and subsequently interrupting her suicide the next day, Draco's henchmen capture James Bond, and escort him to Marc-Ange Draco's office. Believing he is the only hope for his daughter's well-being, he explains that his only daughter was the former wife of Count Giulio di Vicenzo who, during their marriage, managed to get a hold of a large portion of her money before eventually leaving her with Draco paying for a divorce; he subsequently perished while driving a Maserati in the company of one of his mistresses.

During this marriage, Teresa had a daughter and Draco bought a small château in the Dordogne and installed her there and for a time she settled down, but her child passed away due to spinal meningitis six months before she meets James Bond. Then, he offers Bond a personal dowry of £1 million if he agrees to marry her. Bond refuses the offer, but agrees to continue romancing Tracy under one agreement that Draco reveals the whereabouts of Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the head of SPECTRE. After communicating with a contact on the phone, Draco reveals that Blofeld is in Switzerland.

After escaping Blofeld's forces, Bond then enlists Draco and his forces to launch an attack on Blofeld's headquarters. While arriving to Piz Gloria, Draco manages to bypass the security preventing them from entering. Before Bond and Tracy drive off to their honeymoon in Austria, Draco gives Bond his £1 million cheque.

### *Never Dream of Dying*

Draco reappears years later not only as a member of the criminal organization known as "The Union", but it is also revealed that he is the uncle of The Union's leader, Le Gerant. After Tracy's death, Draco faked his death and lived in solitude for many years before he met a young actress whom he later married and had a daughter with. The two are killed in an explosion caused by James Bond in an attempt to kill some escaping Union thugs.

Draco takes this almost as a personal attack and then tries his best to see Bond killed. He keeps Bond at gunpoint, intending for the incoming explosion to end both of their lives, but Bond uses a flashlight to distract him and take his gun. Draco takes out a knife to kill his son-in-law, but Bond shoots him first.

## Background

Academic Christoph Lindner identifies the character of Marc-Ange Draco as an example of those characters following his tradition of having morals closer to those of the traditional villains, but who act on the side of good in support of Bond; others of this type include Darko Kerim (*From Russia, with Love*), Tiger Tanaka (*You Only Live Twice*) and Enrico Colombo ("Risico").

Fellow academic Jeremy Black noted the connection between Draco and World War II; Draco wears the King's Medal for Courage in the Cause of Freedom. He argues the war reference is a method used by Fleming to differentiate good from evil and raises a question about "the distinction between criminality and legality".

## References

1. ↑ Lindner, Christoph (2009). *The James Bond Phenomenon: a Critical Reader*. Manchester University Press. ISBN 978-0-7190-6541-5.
2. ↑ Black, Jeremy (2005). *The Politics of James Bond: from Fleming's Novel to the Big Screen*. University of Nebraska Press. ISBN 978-0-8032-6240-9.