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I think Brosnan would do okay because he has a film star's charisma , and that still works today (for him too). Honestly I don't think Dalton would work as Bond today, any more than he did at the time, because the charisma and star presence is the bare minimum. If you can add great acting on top then that's even better, but Bond needs a star.
I get the sense Brosnan would struggle a bit more today. He was much better when he was understated as Bond, wasn't trying to push the emotion of the scene. I think the hotel scene with him and Paris in TND is a perfect example of that. The dialogue is great, like something from a film noir. Brosnan himself is playing it straight but isn't trying hard. Compare that to TWINE ("He knew about my shoulder, he knew where to hurt me!") where his performance wouldn't be out of place in a soap opera. He has similar moments in DAD, but it's most embarrassing in TWINE for me. I think such bad acting would stand out a lot more today in the internet age. Anyway, 'movie star charisma' isn't enough for celebrities anymore. People prefer when stars are relatable in some way I'd say, have some sort of sincerity etc.
I'd say it's difficult knowing something like that and might be secondary to the performance. Is there also a sense that most Bond actors become stars to a certain extent? Unless they choose not to embrace this stardom (ie. Dalton and Lazenby). Craig was a character actor first and foremost but became a movie star over time. Same with Connery. Many actors fall into this category. If you mean they have to have that certain x-factor which is hard to pinpoint then sure.
I don't know, I'd say someone like Chris Pratt cruises on his charisma more than acting ability, but it's obviously hard to quantify and it's all subjective. Is Dwayne Johnson a great actor? I guess I haven't seen him go beyond his limits like, as you say, Brosnan did. Statham still seems to be doing well. I should say it's not my preference and I'd like another really good performer with presence like Craig, but I think a Brosnan-level guy would work depending on where the film was aiming.
Yes that's fair; star presence seems to be a sort of natural, unteachable thing that you either have or you don't- and I think we've been lucky to get four out of our six Bonds who have it.
I guess being a star and being a great actor can go hand in hand too. You've got many examples of actors who started out as character actors and then morphed into big stars because they had that special 'something' - James Dean, Marlon Brando Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Joaquin Phoenix etc. Again, Craig's a star now too after years of Bond and is pretty respected as an actor in both film and theatre outside of the franchise. I guess what I was trying to say is that my suspicion is the next Bond actor will approach the role in a way that's more chameleonic than what we're used to (again, few people being mentioned here have a naturally Southern English accent and many will have to adapt in some way to the role). They can still have that X Factor too I guess, or at least embrace it in a way Dalton or Lazenby didn't quite.
Oh absolutely, and as you mention: Connery is a great example of that. He was an excellent, Oscar-winning actor and a proper top-tier movie star, one of the best there's ever been.
Sure, but as mentioned that's true of literally all of the men who have played Bond so far anyway (Roger was the only Southerner, and he wouldn't have exactly grown up with that accent in Stockwell :) )
Fingers crossed! :)
I still think Dalton actually approached it wrong: he threw out the self-confidence of Bond, and that's something about 007 that people love. Craig held on to the swagger, even though his Bond was more fallible.
That's fair about Dalton and is a common complaint I've heard from people in one form or another. He's not a Bond for everyone. I'm a fan of his Bond but I sort of get that.
Yes, Roger was a South-West Londoner, although he did attend the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art so I'm guessing his accent had long morphed into that 'neutral' English intonation. Craig seems to be a similar case. As is Dalton I suppose (except for the famous 'things were about to turn nasty' slip). Brosnan had his Transatlantic type accent, Connery half-surpassed his Scottish accent until later in his films, and Lazenby I guess spoke a bit slower than he normally would have... when he wasn't being dubbed in that film. I'm not sure if any of them have technically put on an accent as such, even if they adapted themselves to the role in other ways. I just think we'll have that with the next actor and will get a more 'thoughtful' approach to the role... kind of like Robert Pattinson with the new Batman film or something. Can definitely imagine lots of talking about Fleming, Bond as a character etc. come promotion time and less stuff like them working out for a scene where Bond is shirtless a la Craig in CR.
That is something a lot of these actors I see suggested here don't look like they possess. They're good actors or look suitable but not many look like they have that assured swagger that this part needs, especially after following on from Craig
To be fair though, would we have thought Craig had that quality based just on pictures of him? I think you’ve bought to mind the problem with this whole thread. We can’t really judge based off a photo. How someone looks can change dramatically once you see them in motion, depending on how they carry themselves and things like that.
Jack O’Connell for example is one of the few actors who does have that assured alpha male quality you’re on about, but he’s a suggestion that always gets a divided response on here, because you wouldn’t look at a photo of him and think “James Bond”. He’s not the usual conventionally attractive type, he doesn’t have jet black hair, he’s not 6ft 2. But he just oozes raw, masculine screen presence, and I think he could make a great Craig/Connery sort of Bond.
One redditor told me that the Producers will likely to announce the next Bond on the Global James Bond Day in October.
This is what he said (quoted):
" Doubt it. If it comes this year (big if) it’ll likely be on Bond day."
Do you guys believe that they will announce it on the James Bond Day in October?
Yeah he's a total man's man in it; all of them save for Dalton feel like they possess total self-confidence, but he does take it to the next level. What I like is that it's pretty much the only film where we're shown that Bond is actually wrong to be that self confident- he messes up on quite a large scale. And yet we the audience never dislike him for it; it's a pretty good trick.
Yep, I agree there; I think once Rogue Heroes is shown we'll hear a lot more of him being suggested.
I don't think it means very much to them and I would imagine they'll announce the new Bond just when they're ready to, but I guess it's possible they could try and do it 60 years to the day. But as Herr Stockman says, they'll most likely have a director and script first.
No.
I personally believe that they have a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff to get through before they get to the actor and they won't manage that by October. My biggest prediciton is that Michael G. Wilson is going to step down now that the Oscars happened NTTD's lifecycle is over. The other big thing is figuring out where and how they are going to shoot the next film(s). Most of Pinewood is leased to Disney for 10 years and Shepperton now is basically booked out by Netflix on the one side and Amazon's TV arm on the other who probably have specific plans for it and Eon can't just butt in there for a year. So they'll have to figure all of that out. Go abroad, build a new studio, who knows?
Then they usually have at least a story idea in mind and have picked a director for the film who then directs the screentests. Some big decisions need to be taken before they figure that one out (including where and when to shoot).
They've said they haven't really started on any of that during the postponement of NTTD, which you can either believe or not. The big red flag is that there is no sign of a sub-company having been set up for the next film. Production companies do that for accounting purposes. All the people that are hired for the film - from director, writers and actors down to the caterer - are contracted to that sub-company. So no "Bond 26 plc", means noone is getting payed to work on the new film.
BB and whoever her producing partner is probably take meetings with people pitching them stuff and I don't know enough about film financing to definitively say there is no way for them to f.e. pay someone for a script treatment out of the general EON budget or something like that, but by the time you get to hiring a director, renting out studio space and putting together a skeleton crew to film screentests they'll surely want that accounting structure in place.
Such a company would have to be publicly filed with UK company house, which is how we know that BB and the other usual suspects haven't registered a new company, even under a codename (I'm pretty sure they can't just use an old one to throw journalists off). That in turn brings me pack to the MGW of it all: I suspect he won't be involved in the new film, ergo he won't be a director of the new company, ergo filing it without him would let the cat out of the bag that he is retiring and who takes over for him.
So MGW retirement announcement first, then a lot of legal and accounting behind the scenes stuff and then a director announcement and then an actor announcement. That won't happen in 6 months. (Plus, all of this is before we get into whether MGM is going to stall this entire process until their structures have been overhauled by Amazon, which I consider to be likely.)
I've only ever seen a bit of O'Connell in Godless. Can he also do the light stuff that Craig did? We often talk about Craig as this bruiser. The blunt instrument. The buff Bond. But to me (one of) the key moment of his Bond is this in Casino Royale:
The fun and joy he emits at the end of the train scene is - to me - fundamental to his Bond. He isn't above it all the way Moore and Brosnan were, but he surely has a lot of fun with it. Another favourite sequence is him and Mathis arriving in Bolivia in QoS. "We're teachers on sabbatical and we've just won the lottery." and all that. He's not angry. He's not alloof. He doesn't put Agent Fields down. He is charming her. In my book that is something other than raw alpha male energy.
@thelivingroyale I haven't seen O'Connell in anything myself, I'll check out what he's like in Rogue Heroes. No doubt his odds will tumble at the bookies, being on a BBC series will do that for you
I'm guessing you found him from watching Vikings: Valhalla? A few pages ago I suggested Leo Suter from that show (who plays Harald Sigurdsson) as a possibility. I thought about Freegard for Bond too when I saw him in the show, but I don't like how he looks as much without the beard. His face is too round or something. I think he'd make a great villain though. He's great in Vikings: Valhalla.
I even think Sam Corlett (who plays Leif Erikson in the show) looks like he could be a Bond, even though he's only 26 and Australian:
I'd be thrilled if the actor were announced this October, as that would mean B26 should be ready to commence filming in say, January for a November 2023 release date.
That was roughly the timeframe for CR back in 2005/2006: announce the new Bond in October, commence production in January, release it in November.
However, there's no part of me that believes ANY thought or development will begin on the next film for quite some time.
He's handsome. He's believable when he make a joke or a quip (he has a sense of humor), he's believable when he's emotional, human or falling in love, and he's believable when he's gritty and serious, but the most important of all, he's also believable when making espionage things, spying. He also have the charisma, like Connery.
He's the absolute leading man.
Absolutely, he is a leading man and has the vital intangible, charisma. “Extraction” was fantastic; I’m looking forward to now filming sequel.
As far as the criticism that he’s too muscular, like Cavill, Hemsworth trains up to his Thor weight; naturally he is much lighter and has a lean athletic build. He is definitely worth a look.
True and Hemsworth, he can be charming if he wants to be, he can also be raw looking if he wants to be, that masculinity. I think he is a much better actor than Cavill.
He is the new Hugh Jackman choice really, in that he'd perhaps be a slightly boring choice because it wouldn't be EON presenting us with a new star who we'd never really seen much of before (which they've done a few times); but equally he'd be more than up to the job and would play it very well.
The only problem I think is that he's never quite mastered the accent for my money! :)
Obviously
My top 5 is still
1. Fassbender
2. Hardy
3. Hiddleston
4. Hemsworth
5. Cavill
if we are going younger/unknown
1. Jack Bannon
2. Nicholas holt
are my top 2 and its hard to kind of go from there as I don't know O'connell etc but from the photos i have seen they look fine
Anyway, next up among the male actors from "acceptable countries" are Tom Holland (13), Daniel Radcliffe (20), Rupert Grint (24), Benedryl Cumbersnatch (27), Hiddlestone (32), Paul Bettany (33) and I'll leave it at that.
Out of those Hemsworth is clearly the pick for me, although I now have a morbid fascination with Daniel Radcliffe as James Bond.
Has Hemsworth ever done a serious English accent? Thor doesn't count. I've only seen Rush dubbed. How's he in that?
*Has anyone ever compiled a list, btw? We've had English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish and Australian, so I guess those are fair game in the future? Nowadays, I'm pretty sure everyone agrees US-American is out (eventhough Cubby seems to have been open on that and we'll forget about Craig's naturalization). They should be native English-speaking, I guess? What about Canada? New Zealand? All of the African and Asian Commonwealth nations and the Caribbean? Is it about nationality, country of birth, country he was raised in?
As I remember it was pretty much the same accent; he wasn't very much like Hunt.
NTTD had a budget of about £300 million and didn't quite break even. They'll need to go for a budget of about £185 - 200 million for the next one, spend more time on the script/story and strip things back. Hemsworth's salary is over £15 million a film. That's a huge chunk of money that could be put to better use. A lesser known actor won't get as high a salary as this, at least not for their first one. And no, viewers won't automatically see the film or return to it just to see a major star in the role of Bond. In all likelihood Hemsworth won't be a particularly good fit for the role anyway, and if viewers don't gel with the lead actor playing Bond you have an underperforming film. They don't want that after NTTD. It'd be a major risk casting him. Remember, the guy is Thor. He's busy. Bond requires an actor to be committed and ideally not bouncing between two major franchises that are routinely filming.
Like others have said, it's probably a case where the director and creative team will be announced first, then we'll get our Bond. I think they'll have a list of actors ready to audition, but I'm sure Broccoli is aware after SP and NTTD that the script being locked early is a must. No rewrites on set, no rushed last minute creative decisions. The script must be air tight.