JAMES BOND REBORN
As suave superspy James Bond celebrates his 50th anniversary, Sandro Monetti asks two-time Bond director Martin Campbell about the past, present and future of the hit franchise
WHEN IT comes to directing James Bond films, nobody does it better than Martin Campbell. He brilliantly rebooted the spy franchise twice, making both Goldeneye and the first proper version of Casino Royale. Now, in the 50th anniversary year of the 007 films, the ultimate insider is revealing plenty of previously classified Bond secrets for your eyes only.
The first of them is how close Daniel Craig came to losing the part to fellow Briton Henry Cavill, who has since been cast as the next movie Superman.
Martin says: “Henry did a great screen test for Bond. So did Daniel, although he arrived for his looking really tired after a night flight from America where he was finishing up a movie called The Invasion. None of us making the casting decision were 100 per cent sure. I needed a couple of days to think about it. Over that weekend I saw Daniel’s film Layer Cake and he showed such terrific charm in that that it convinced me he should get the part.
“Perhaps Henry Cavill was too young for it then, he was 22 at the time we auditioned for Casino Royale, but maybe he
could still be James Bond in the future. After all, Pierce Brosnan did a great screen test only to eventually get the part years later.” (Pierce was offered the part in the Eighties but could not get released from his TV contract with Remington Steele so producers turned to Timothy Dalton).
Talking of Brosnan, Martin can finally reveal the circumstances behind Pierce’s departure from the 007 role after four films. He says it had to do, indirectly, with Pulp Fiction director Quentin Tarantino.
Martin, 68, says: “Casino Royale was not going to be the next film. They were developing another script but then, after a long battle, the Broccolis [the family behind the Bond franchise] suddenly got the film rights to the first Bond novel Casino Royale, despite Quentin Tarantino bidding against them.
“The script being developed, he says, was an original story in which James Bond isn’t the character we know today but someone younger and more screwed up. Pierce was getting on for 49 or something, and clearly too old to play the younger Bond so they decided to go in a different direction.”
As for Tarantino, he is still upset at losing out on the chance to put his stamp on the Bond franchise, saying: “It would have been my James Bond film and not a Cubby Broccoli Bond film and I would have done it with Pierce Brosnan.”
EIGHT actors were called to London to audition to replace Brosnan in Casino Royale. Among them was Sam Worthington, later to have a huge hit as the star of Avatar. New Zealander Martin says: “We tested them the same way all James Bond candidates are auditioned, with a scene out of From Russia With Love. It’s the one where 007 comes into the hotel room, takes his jacket off, takes his gun off, runs a bath, senses someone in his room, goes across the terrace, sees the Bond girl, sits down and has a sexy conversation with her. That scene has got all the elements of Bond; from the clean, economical movements to the seduction technique.
“I was very pleased with Daniel Craig. He looks great, is a terrific actor and could pull off the tougher and grittier portrayal needed that time round. The books had no humour in them and this was a more serious Bond.
“It didn’t matter to me that Daniel Craig wasn’t very well known internationally. After all Sean Connery, who I still LOST OUT: Henry Cavill, the next Superman, was maybe a little too young for Bond says Campbell