As the release of Daniel Craig’s final turn as James Bond nears, talk has renewed over the future of the character. In a new interview with Radio Times, Craig was asked whether a woman should get a chance to star in the titular role.
“The answer to that is very simple,” Craig responded. “There should simply be better parts for women and actors of colour. Why should a woman play James Bond when there should be a part just as good as James Bond, but for a woman?”
Craig’s comments are in line with what James Bond producer Barbara Broccoli said when asked a similar question in an interview last year. “He can be of any color, but he is male,” Broccoli asserted. “I believe we should be creating new characters for women — strong female characters. ‘’m not particularly interested in taking a male character and having a woman play it. I think women are far more interesting than that.”
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To that point, in the upcoming Bond film No Time to Die, Lashana Lynch plays a new character who takes over Bond’s secret agent number after he retires from MI6. Eventually, Craig’s Bond returns to service and crosses paths with Lynch’s character.
After a prolonged delay due to the pandemic, No Time to Die is slated to premiere in the UK on September 30th, followed by a US release on October 8th. While we know for sure it will be Craig’s last time portraying Bond, Broccoli and her half-brother Michael G. Wilson, have remained mum about his successor.
Aside from ruling out a female Bond, all Broccoli and her half-brother, Michael G. Wilson, have said about the search is that they’ll be casting a very wide net. “You think of [Bond] as being from Britain or the Commonwealth, but Britain is a very diverse place,” said Wilson, who inherited the cinematic rights alongside Barbara from their father, producer Albert “Cubby” Broccoli. The commonwealth consists of a collection of over 50 countries, mostly ex-British colonies, that includes the likes of Canada and Australia as well as India and great swathes of Africa.
