Scotch & Spies
If spies drink, as they do quite often in most espionage / spy genre films, what do they drink? I'm not entirely sure, but I thought I'd do a little bit of research and see if I could find out. The results of my totally non-scientific-and-less-than-thorough research is summarized below:
Burn After Reading
While John Malkovich's character certainly drinks, and gets drunk (quite a lot), he pours whatever he is drinking from a decanter, so it is pretty much impossible to figure out if it is whisky, rum, cognac, or something else.
The Gun Seller
In Hugh Laurie’s dark comedy The Gun Seller, the main character, former Scots Guard Thomas Lang, drinks Famous Grouse, or has Lang puts it: “I picked up a glass and a bottle of the Famous Grouse, poured myself a couple of fingers, and…added enough water to turn it into just a Vaguely Familiar Grouse.” And yes, the author is that Hugh Laurie, of Blackadder, A Bit of Fry and Laurie, and House MD, fame. As a side note, I found it incredibly hard to read the book without having House's dry, sarcastic voice inside my head.
Spy Game
In what I perceive as a clear, tongue-in-cheek shot at the de-masculinization (is that even a word?) of the Bond films during the Roger Moore / Timothy Dalton / Pierce Brosnan eras (see below), the 2001 film Spy Game (starring Brad Pitt and Robert Redford) makes it clear that spies drink whisky, Scotch in particular, not "girly drinks":
Bishop (Pitt): I thought spies drank martinis.
Muir (Redford): Scotch, never less than twelve years old.
Bishop: Is that right? Agency rules?
Muir: My rules.
Unfortunately, it was never clear to me what kind of Scotch Muir is drinking in this scene (although someone more observant than me asserts that it is Glenlivet 18), but we know that whatever it is, it must be at least 12 years old (unless the bartender poured him something younger without him realizing), a point that will become important shortly.
James Bond
A number of sources (that are believed to be reliable) have indicated that in Ian Fleming’s original novels, James Bond drinks Scotch - Talisker (no age statement given), to be specific - along with Scotch & Sodas (shudder…), rather than vodka martinis (“Shaken, not stirred”), although he does order a martini in both the 1953 novel Casino Royale and in the recent canonical film by the same name. That being said, eagle-eyed viewers have noticed Bond drinking whisky in some of the more recent movies (including Jack Daniels Old No. 7 in GoldenEye). It seems, however, that it is Bond’s boss, M (played by the always fantastic Dame Judy Dench), who drinks Talisker, as astute fans have spotted a bottle of Talisker in her office (At work?! Really?! If I drank Scotch at work there would be serious consequences, like me losing my job) in both The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day.
"Bob Howard" (The Laundry Files)
Like Bond, Bob (which is not his real name, as you find out in The Fuller Memorandum) drinks Talisker , but again, we have no age statement associated with this. Bob's wife, Dominique (or "Mo") drinks Lagavulin (no age statement given), which she pairs with chocolate...not entirely sure how Islay would go with chocolate, but when I happen to have a bottle of Lagavulin, I'll have to give it a shot.
So, what is My Point?
Well, now we have a bit of a problem. In Ontario, outside of the rarely found Classic Malts “Talisker Collection” (three 20cl bottles consisting of Talisker 10, Talisker 18, and/or Talisker 57 North / Talisker Distillers Edition) the only Talisker available at the LCBO is the Talisker 10 year-old. Similarly, the only Famous Grouse whiskies available at the LCBO are The Black Grouse (Peated) and The Famous Grouse, which are both Blended Scotch Whiskies with no age statement; for some reason the LCBO has, over the past few years, discontinued all of the Famous Grouse Blended Malt Scotch Whiskies, which were blends of single malt whiskies with age statements ranging from 12 to 18 years.
If spies drink “[s]cotch, never less than twelve years old,” and lacking ready access to any Talisker or Famous Grouse products with an age statement of at least 12 years, then what should spies in Ontario drink? (And here I must take pains to point out that I AM NOT A SPY, I just happen to like espionage themed films and books; I work for the tax department, as my name suggests, and it is your guess as to whether it is municipal, provincial or federal). Granted, there are plenty of 12 year-old, or older, Scotch Whiskies available at the LCBO, with representation from each of the various distilling regions (Islay, Island, Speyside, Lowland, Highlands, Campbeltown), including Lagavulin 12 year-old and Lagavulin 16 year-old, but at $110 per bottle, minimum, for those two expressions, drinking Lagavulin could get pricy. So, the question is, which of the 12 year-old or older Scotch Whiskies out there most closely match the Talisker and/or Famous Grouse and/or Lagavulin flavour profiles without breaking the bank? Does anyone out there have an opinion?