The breakthrough moment Daniel Craig had with Paul Newman: “We can do this”
It was a long slog from drama school to Hollywood stardom for Daniel Craig. As a kid, he was transfixed by movies like Blade Runner and Quest for Fire, and he began to split his free time between rugby and theatre. When he was 16, he moved to London to join the National Youth Theatre, and from there, he attended the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. After gaining some attention for playing a neo-Nazi in the 1992 film The Power of One, he had the opportunity to go to Hollywood and seek fame and fortune in the American film industry.
This might have seemed like a big break, but Craig quickly discovered that he had no interest in the work he was being offered there, and after playing a few small roles on television, he packed it up and moved back to England. When theatre director and recent Oscar winner Sam Mendes approached him about a role in his second feature film, Road to Perdition, the young actor leapt at the chance.
The only trouble was, Road to Perdition was a far cry from the small-budget British films that Craig was used to. Its stars were Paul Newman and Tom Hanks, two of the most famous and beloved human beings on the planet, in the acting world or otherwise. Craig was petrified about it, but he also knew that he had to step up and make the most of the opportunity.
In a conversation on the Smartless podcast in 2024, he said, “I felt terrified and all of those things, but like, you’re here now. You better deliver.” The thing that ended up calming his nerves was Newman. He didn’t offer any concrete advice or tell him to take a long, cleansing breath, he simply showed a level of actorly professionalism and work ethic that Craig could identify with.
“Watching him work, you realise, ‘Oh God, he’s an actor,’” the future Bond star said. On a personal level, they didn’t really connect. Newman just wanted to talk about the love of his life, car racing. Craig had precisely zero insights on this topic, so he was never really able to relate to the star off-camera. But when they were acting together, things were different.
“Watching and working with him, I had a language I could speak to him in because I’m an actor, he’s an actor…’ Craig said. He remembered watching the star struggle to find his character and work through challenging scenes. “I was like, ‘We can do this, we can make this happen,’” he recalled. “‘We’re playing.’”
The revelation that Newman had to work just as hard to create his performances helped Craig relax into the project, and although he didn’t play a huge part in the film, it was his breakthrough role. Shortly thereafter, he was starring in the Matthew Vaughan thriller Layer Cake, followed by the Steven Spielberg historical thriller Munich.
For nearly two decades, Craig was defined by his role as James Bond, and it’s only in the past few years that he’s been able to branch out into more lighthearted movies like Knives Out, or complex ones like Queer. As his early career demonstrates, however, he has always taken his craft seriously, and ‘playing’ with great actors like Newman is what he prefers.
