Sam Mendes Originally Thought Daniel Craig as James Bond was a “terrible idea”
Earlier today, the first full-length trailer for the twenty-forth James Bond movie, Spectre, was released online. Director Sam Mendes recently stated he thinks Spectre will likely be his final Bond movie. Now, the filmmaker has been discussing his initial reaction to hearing the news that Daniel Craig had been cast as 007 when the franchise was relaunched with Casino Royale back in 2006.
"I had cast Daniel Craig in this film I made in Chicago called Road To Perdition about 15 years ago, and it was his first big American film. The role of Bond came up four or five years later and I was called by Entertainment Weekly, a showbiz publication, and they said ‘your old friend and collaborator Daniel Craig has been suggested as Bond, what do you think?’ and I said ‘terrible idea – he shouldn’t do it’. For me at the time I thought Bond had become the opposite of what Daniel is – a slightly disengaged, urbane jokey eyebrow-raising, you know, a pastiche in a way, and I felt Daniel’s reality and his passion and honesty as an actor would not work. But of course the franchise adapted to work with Daniel and when I saw Casino Royale, I thought it was a fantastic piece of casting. And it was that that got me re-interested in Bond as a movie."
