Since 2006’s Casino Royale, Daniel Craig has starred as Agent 007 in the James Bond film franchise, and this year, he will portray the charming British spy for the fifth and final time.
As moviegoers gear up for the release of the upcoming No Time to Die, many are beginning to speculate about who will play the next Bond and whether it will be Idris Elba or not.
Rather than rush to decide who they want to take over the role in the future, longtime producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson told Variety they are focused on ensuring No Time to Die is fully complete before its release in April.
Though the producers seemed more open to welcoming a new incarnation of Bond than ever before, Broccoli, 59, assured fans and readers there will likely never be a woman playing the character.
“He can be of any colour, but he is male,” said Broccoli. “I believe we should be creating new characters for women — strong female characters.
“I’m not particularly interested in taking a male character and having a woman play it. I think women are far more interesting than that.”
In 1990, Wilson and Broccoli were appointed the franchise’s film producers by Albert R. Broccoli, Barbara’s father and Wilson’s stepfather. The elder Broccoli had served as the franchise’s main producer since the very first film, 1962’s Dr. No.
Albert began working with Wilson, 77, on 1985’s A License to Kill.
After handing down the role to his daughter in 1989, the elder Broccoli acted as a consulting producer for 1995’s GoldenEye before his death the following year.
Alongside Wilson, the younger Broccoli became a key player in casting Pierce Brosnan as Bond and, later, giving Craig the role in 2006.
“We take that responsibility seriously,” she said.
While he wasn’t initially sold on Craig portraying 007, GoldenEye and Casino Royale director Martin Campbell praised Broccoli for her decision to cast the 51-year-old.
He highlighted the fact that Craig was the first to break the mould of a handsome, chiselled Bond after Brosnan appeared in 2002’s Die Another Day.
“To be honest, it took me a little while to see it,” Campbell told the outlet. “Daniel’s acting was terrific, but he wasn’t a pretty boy. Barbara was adamantly in favour of him.”
“He brought flesh and blood to the character,” Broccoli said of Craig.
“Bond in the novel is a silhouette,” she said. “Daniel has given him depth and an inner life. We were looking for a 21st-century hero, and that’s what he delivered. He bleeds, he cries, he’s very contemporary.”
Following Broccoli’s statement about a woman Bond, fans seemed, for the most part, OK with her remarks.
Many credited their opinion to not only the legacy of Bond and the character always being a man but also the fact that they would rather see original woman-led stories in the future.
Here’s what some Twitter users had to say:
The latest Bond film, No Time to Die, hits cinemas across Canada on April 8.
The trailer for the movie can be seen above.
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