The director who issued a warning to ‘Bond girls’: “I wouldn’t recommend it”
It’s a tough one being a Bond girl. On the one hand, you get to be on the big screen in a global movie playing to millions opposite a very handsome leading man, but on the other hand, certainly up until this century, you would also be reduced to at best eye candy and lumbered with a name that was usually a fairly poor play on words like ‘Pussy Galore’.
Things in the James Bond world have certainly changed for the better in recent years, with the likes of Halle Berry and Michelle Yeoh giving fine performances in the movies and Ana de Armas proving she could dispatch bad guys every bit as well as her famous Secret Service counterpart in No Time to Die.
But for a very long time there was a well-established ‘Bond curse’ that would affect many of the women who landed roles opposite Sean Connery or Roger Moore, as they failed to land any acting jobs at all after appearing in the big-budget flicks.
It was a phenomenon that continued right up to the ’90s and early 2000s, in fact, with producers often struggling to find leading women willing to take part in the films. Reportedly, Eva Green had to be convinced that starring in Casino Royale would be a good idea, especially as it represented a complete reboot of the series with a brand new Bond in the form of Daniel Craig.
British Director John Glen directed five Bond movies during the 1980s, including Octopussy and A View to a Kill, and he certainly doesn’t subscribe to the idea that becoming a Bond girl is a good idea. He once said: “Being a Bond girl is a very difficult task and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.” British actress Tanya Roberts, who starred in A View to a Kill, said she couldn’t find work for some 30 years after making the movie in 1985.
She confessed: “I sort of felt like every girl who’d ever been a Bond Girl had seen their career go nowhere, so I was a little cautious. I remember I said to my agent: ‘No one ever works after they get a Bond movie.’ And they said to me: ‘Are you kidding? Glenn Close would do it if she could.'”
But still, as the search for a Bond to fill Daniel Craig’s shoes continues with a new movie in development, there will still be just as much clamour to play the female roles given the heritage, the sexiness and the enduring appeal of 007 as a brand.
With director Denis Villeneuve on board, it may well be worth looking at actresses he has favoured in the past, including Zendaya and Emily Blunt – although de Armas is ruled out, given she’s already done one. Besides which, she’s currently doing her own thing in her own franchise, battering an array of thugs in the John Wick spin-off Ballerina.
In the meantime, check out the first footage from the upcoming James Bond video game 007 First Light, the first in a decade, being produced by Amazon, MGM and IO Interactive. With a completely new Bond storyline and set in the modern day with a younger Bond, the game aims to bring the most immersive 007 experience to fans yet, with a host of familiar characters including ‘M’, ‘Q’ and Moneypenny.
