The casting of the new James Bond is the biggest story in Hollywood at the moment. The sheer amount of disinformation and exaggeration that has accompanied snippets of news about the production of a new 007 adventure is remarkable, even by the standards of La La Land. Ever since the Bond franchise was purchased by Amazon, taken out of the restrictive hands of Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson, and placed in the care of Amy Pascal and David Heyman, the question of who’s doing what has been a source of fascination.
The hiring of Dune’s Denis Villeneuve to direct was broadly seen as a smart, auteur-ish move; the decision to entrust the script to Peaky Blinders’ Steven Knight, who has written an awful lot of bad films and television series, less so. But most of the chatter has revolved around The Man Who Will Be Bond. Who will be handed the opportunity to say the immortal words “Bond…James Bond” when the character finally returns to the screen?
Well, although nothing has been confirmed, two names have emerged over the past couple of weeks that seem broadly in line with the new ethos that Villeneuve and Knight appear to be embracing. The first, and less interesting, was Callum Turner, who has had good parts in Masters of the Air and the recent Eternity, but seemed like the kind of uninspired casting for the part that has been hyped up in the press (and by eager agents and managers keen to add a zero onto his quote for other roles) many times before. But the second name, who has apparently met with Villeneuve to discuss the part in greater detail, is none other than man-of-the-moment and current Oscar hopeful Jacob Elordi.
Obviously, rumors of Elordi’s interest in the part – and vice versa – are just that presently, and it would be presumptuous to assume that, just because a meeting has taken place between director and actor, the part has been offered to him. Yet Villeneuve has always had good instincts when it comes to offbeat casting – who else might have considered Emily Blunt for the role of a hard-bitten FBI agent in Sicario, or Timothée Chalamet for the lead in Dune? – and while the handsome and charismatic Elordi is undeniably a leading man in the making, he has yet to make the step up to the A-list status that becoming 007 automatically connotes on any actor.
Elordi, however, is one of the most interesting figures in contemporary Hollywood, more so because he’s both Australian and extraordinarily tall at 6 foot 6 inches; only an inch shorter than Stephen Merchant, whose towering physique has seen the comic actor cast in roles that are anything but heroic.
Elordi, however, has built a reputation both for range and interest that saw him escape the straightjacket of teen romantic comedies early in his career for the more interesting territory of Euphoria – returning any moment for its sure-to-be-controversial and now star-stuffed third season – for auteur-driven work that has seen him collaborate with the likes of Sofia Coppola, Guillermo del Toro and Ridley Scott. He was one of the few redeeming features in Saltburn – and proved that he could do moneyed charm and a convincing English accent in the process – and is deservedly Oscar-nominated for his sublime work in Frankenstein as the Creature, stealing the show from the rest of the cast in the process.
If he is to be cast as Bond, there will be some grumbling that he is too tall and too good-looking to be convincing (exactly the opposite complaints were made about Daniel Craig when his casting was announced before Casino Royale). His Australian heritage may be seen as difficult, given the character’s decidedly British origins, although the Antipodean George Lazenby was cast in the one-and-done On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Yet it’s potentially exciting to see an actor of his caliber in the role, and it restores a sense of excitement for the project that diminished when Knight’s involvement was announced.
There remains, however, one potential obstacle. Elordi’s next big film, released in a few weeks, is a reunion with his Saltburn director Emerald Fennell on Wuthering Heights, in which he plays Heathcliff. Everything about the picture so far, from test screening reports to breathless interviews with its star Margot Robbie, suggests that there will be more discourse about it, and its lead actors, than anything else this year. If Elordi emerges unscathed, or even enhanced, from the controversy, then I imagine that the Bond role will be offered to him on a plate. Yet if Fennell has dropped the ball on this one, and Robbie and Elordi become laughing stocks rather than figures of idolatry, then Callum Turner might be advised to keep his iPhone fully charged and connected to Wi-Fi for a while yet.
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