And in related news......................
by JoJo Moyes
With the future of Metro Goldwyn Mayer looking decidedly shaky, producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson announced this week that they were shelving the 23rd Bond film until MGM's financial problems were resolved.
Craig said diplomatically that he had "every faith" in the decision. But industry insiders say that by the time shooting begins – 2012 at the earliest - Craig may walk, or worse, be considered "past it". William Hill yesterday offered odds of 8/1 that we have already seen the last of him as Bond.
I admit that when he was first mooted for the part, I was less than enthusiastic. How could festering Geordie Peacock from Our Friends In The North inhabit that iconic tuxedo with grace and élan? How could that thuggish visage expertly seduce women with ridiculously suggestive names? For this was a man apparently known even to his friends as "Mr Potato Head".
Fool that I was! For even as he emerged from the shadows in the opening scenes of Casino Royale I was a lost thing. By the time he broke the waves in those little blue trunks I may have inadvertently – and for the first time in my life – uttered the phrase "Hubba hubba". When he held Vesper Lynd brokenly in his arms, it was frankly a bit embarrassing being in the same room as my actual husband. And I know there are women nodding as they read this, because they have told me.
Casino Royale, it is fair to say, is not a date movie. Not unless your husband looks, sounds and behaves like Daniel Craig as James Bond.
It takes a serious dose of raw machismo to remain the object of female desire even while having one's testicles flayed from under a chair, but Craig managed it. Men liked his rough quality, the slight coarsening of the Bond franchise. Women just… yes, well. I think we've covered that.
Craig didn't look like the Bonds we had become used to; the slightly Man At C&A look of Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton and even Piers Brosnan's Bonds. (Go on, imagine them in a belted woollen cardigan, and you'll see what I mean).
This was a Bond who wasn't going to lift an eyebrow and shake a martini at another assassination attempt. He would brood, look bruised, and then pursue vengeance in a way that was frankly scary.
And he completely revitalised Bond, remaining the finest thing in the critically less well-received follow-up, Quantum of Solace.
So surely we can't let him be James for just one film longer than George Lazenby? Surely this, rather than bankers' huge bonuses or grounded aeroplanes, will propel protesters on to the streets?
As novelist Milly Johnson says: "He was the one I couldn't visualise as Bond. Now I can't see anyone else."
Yes, a lot of it is about sex appeal, but that is half the point of Bond. That's why women watch. How many female viewers do you hear getting wound up about who is going to star in the next Bourne Identity? So, who are the runners and riders being lined up to replace Craig?
Top odds go to someone called Sam Worthington – who apparently starred in Avatar. Orlando Bloom and Jude Law (12/1 and 33/1) are both terribly pretty, but can you really see them spitting blood and teeth to protect their woman? And then, at 100/1 we have Alex Reid. Yup, the self-styled Reidinator, and gurning love-puppy of Katie Price. It's enough to make you head for Iceland.
So come on, Ms Broccoli. Sort out the studio issues, and give us back Mr Craig. Failing that, I'll be voting for whichever political party promises a bail-out of MGM. I think it's a vote-winner.
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