The Sinking Ship


Pierce Brosnan, on returning to Bond

This is a work in progress.


Here you will find quotes from Pierce Brosnan on returning to the role of James Bond
Keep in mind that the Daniel Craig wasn’t officially named until October 14th 2005.

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(Oct 17, 2005)
Pierce Brosnan thinks Bond producers will regret dropping him

Former 007 star Pierce Brosnan is convinced James Bond producers are already regretting their decision to replace him with younger star Daniel Craig.

The Irish actor, 52, was heartbroken at being dropped from the role of the suave superspy, and he is certain movie bosses have made a huge mistake
.

He says, "Whether they made the right choice, who knows? They're probably scared s**tless, thinking, 'What have we done?'"

British actor Craig, who is the first blond Bond, was officially named as Brosnan's replacement at a London press conference on Friday (14 October 05).
 


(October 7th 2005)
BATTLE ROYALE
As James Bond producers struggle with casting troubles, ousted Brosnan offers a solution: himself

“Casino Royale,” the new James Bond film, is three months away from commencing filming, and after months of wrangling, producers still haven’t found an actor to slip into 007’s shoulder holster.

But the man who was fired from the role, Pierce Brosnan, said Friday that producers could solve their $150 million problem simply by picking up the phone.

They know where to find me,” Brosnan said. “Would I go back if they asked me back? Sure I’d go back.

In an exclusive interview with The Chronicle, Brosnan, who has made no secret of the anger he felt at producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli for being dumped after starring in four successful films that revitalized the Bond franchise, now says he is ready to put bad feelings aside to go on one more mission.

No question; it’s unfinished business,” said Brosnan, who was in Mill Valley to introduce “The Matador,” which opened the Mill Valley Film Festival. “It feels that way.”

The 52-year-old Brosnan, who assumed the role in 1995’s “GoldenEye,” the first Bond film after a six-year hiatus, and appeared in the last entry, “Die Another Day” (2002), was dropped from the role in the summer of 2004 by Wilson and Broccoli, who reportedly wanted to attract a younger audience with a more youthful Bond.

They just changed their minds; they had a different take on it one day,” Brosnan said. “I was invited back to do the fifth and I was very happy. … And the phone just (rang) one day and negotiations stopped. To this day I’m not sure why.

I was terribly upset. It was a real body blow. I thought I’d made some good inroads with the character and felt a sense of ownership after having played him four times, it was a sense of ease and confidence. I was looking forward to making it edgier and grittier — and for all of that to go down in one phone call was highly disappointing.

But as the months progressed, two things happened. First, Clive Owen, thought to be the first choice to succeed Brosnan, flatly turned down the role. Currently, “Layer Cake” star Daniel Craig and “Fantastic Four” villain Julian McMahon are currently thought to be the frontrunners; many others have tested.

Second, MGM has been taken over by Sony. Amy Pascal, chair of Sony Pictures, has convened two “007 summits,” according to the British newspaper Sunday Times. The Bond franchise is the studio’s most profitable commodity, and at a time of corporate and box-office uncertainty, rumors persist that the studio would prefer a proven winner in the role.

Brosnan’s four films have grossed a combined $1.45 billion worldwide.

Brosnan thinks the producers and Sony might have painted themselves into a corner. But after his very public sacking, how could he go back?

The answer, it seems, is a friendship that goes back a quarter of a century. Brosnan first met the Broccoli family in 1980, when his first wife, the late Cassandra Harris, was a Bond girl in “For Your Eyes Only.” He was thought to be the heir apparent to Roger Moore in the late ’80s, but his NBC contract with the series “Remington Steele” precluded the move; Timothy Dalton assumed the role for two financially disappointing films before the series took a hiatus.

When MGM and original Bond producer Albert R. Broccoli restarted the series in 1995, Brosnan was ready. Broccoli died in 1996, and his stepson, Wilson, and daughter Barbara assumed stewardship of the series.

“Michael and Barbara, our families have known each other for many, many years — it’s very hard to talk about their feelings or why they had a crisis of confidence in doing a fifth,” Brosnan said. “There have been preposterous ideas that I was asking for $40 million and $30 million, which is not true. There was certainly a salary there that was not out of the ballpark, that other men and women have received for the same (type of film).

Brosnan begins shooting “Seraphim Falls,” a Civil War film with co-star Liam Neeson, next week, and has a full slate scheduled for 2006, including a sequel to his most successful non-Bond film, “The Thomas Crown Affair.”

However, Brosnan said he’d clear his schedule for “Casino Royale,” in which he would be reunited with “GoldenEye” director Martin Campbell.

Everything’s movable and doable, Brosnan said. “Nothing’s set in stone.


(September 12th 2005)
Pierce Brosnan Set For James Bond Return

Expecting someone else? As the saying goes in Bond-lore, "never say never"!

The turf war over the casting of James Bond for the forthcoming movie "Casino Royale" is about to end. If the trade press reports are anything to go by, Sony, who took over MGM earlier in the year, have been turning down candidates for the "vacant" 007 role proposed by the producers right, left and centre.

The casting of 007 is down to four people: Amy Pascal (Sony), Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli (Eon Productions producers), and Martin Campbell (director of "Casino Royale"). Each party have had their favourites, and due to the much reported failure to find a suitable replacement by the producers, despite their wide reaching casting calls, Sony has come to the inevitable conclusion: if it's not broke, don't fix it.


Pierce Brosnan has been hinting to the media over the past few days that the situation has changed and he was willing to step back into the tuxedo for a fifth and final time - if the call from the producers came.

Following his `Editors Special Award` earlier this month, Brosnan gave an interview with GQ that revealed the true state of affairs.

On the subject of his pay demands for a fifth movie, which was over hyped and overblown by the tabloid press to a staggering figure of £20m ($35m USD), Brosnan set the record straight: "Twenty million? Oh no, rubbish. Oh for God's sake. Bollocks. No way. No, it was a handsome figure of maybe £10 million or something like that. Given what the films make it was a spit in the bucket. I wasn't being greedy. The age issue? Bollocks to that, too."

MI6 exclusively reported back in February that the figure Brosnan was allegedly asking for was actually £10m ($17m USD) - a figure now confirmed by Brosnan himself and not that staggering considering he was reportedly paid around $16.5m USD (~£10m) for "Die Another Day". The "too old" rumours which first started in the tabloid press and internet sites back in February 2004 have also been quashed many times.

So what do Sony think about their newly acquired franchise being stalled due to the vacant lead role?

Brosnan candidly explained, "Sony are pulling their hair out over it, apparently. I was in their offices just a few weeks ago pitching Thomas Crown 2. They said, "come back" and I said "it's not up to me, guys."

"I think I was caught up between the egos of the producers and the studios, really. They (the producers) didn't know whether to go younger, they didn't know what to do, period. I don't know what the truth is. It could be as honest as that, but it seems strange, especially as each film made more and more money."


But Eon Producers have been silent on the whole affair ever since the first headlines speculated that Brosnan's tenure as 007 was over. "Maybe it's all a big, clever ploy just to bang the drum. We've seen it over the years with Sean and Roger" said Brosnan in the GQ interview.

Latest News
MI6 has learned that Pierce Brosnan is now the top contender for the role of James Bond in "Casino Royale" after all, due to studio pressure and the lack of an obvious candidate to replace him. No date has been set for an official announcement on the role, but news it imminent.

The major shooting location for "Casino Royale" will move to an Atlantic island off the east coast of the USA, and not South Africa as originally planned. Pre-production is on schedule and filming is still set to commence in early January 2006.
 


(March 24 2004)

Pierce Brosnan Talks On 'James Bond 21'

Pierce Brosnan talked frankly to The Sun newspaper in which he accuses the producers of ruining the movies with too many special effects and not enough plot.

Screenwriters revealed they were suffering from writer’s block and had not finished the script. And a source at MGM studios has admitted the Bond film is in “disarray”.

Pierce believes part of the problem is that the series has advanced so much technically that the creators don’t know what to do next.

He says: “The bar for these movies was raised so high with the last one (Die Another Day) and they don’t seem to know how to improve on it.

“They don’t have a script or a director so the rumours that we will begin filming in the autumn are just rumours.”

Brosnan also complains that the producers do not show more imagination in expanding the movies with more plot and characters.

He says: “They’re too scared. They feel they have to top themselves in a genre which is just spectacle and a huge bang for your buck. But I think you can have your cake and eat it.

“You can have real character work, a character storyline and a thriller aspect and all the kinds of quips, asides, the explosions and the women.”

But he says the producers opened talks with him on making the next movie — then he heard nothing.

Brosnan says: “It is nowhere near a done deal — but they know where to find me.

I was prepared to do a fifth film and then walk away and we had started negotiations.

I want to follow through but conversations and telephone calls have dried up.

We started talking about the fifth so this paralysis that has set in is rather surprising.

“The producers have reached an impasse as far as I can tell. They don’t know what to do.

“So, for me, it’s business as usual. I shall just carry on with creating work for myself.

I certainly would love to do a fifth Bond and then bow out but if this last one is to be my last, then so be it. My contract is up. They can do it or not.

He claims the producers want to remake Casino Royale, first made by a rival company in 1967, after finally securing the rights to it.

But he is furious that they have decided not to make a film of the original book, just to use the title.

Brosnan rages: “That’s ludicrous. It’s so damn crazy! That’s absolutely sheer lunacy because Casino Royale is the blueprint of the Bond character.

“You find out more about James Bond in that book than in any of the other books.”
More On 'Casino Royale'...
 


 
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Revised: 03/04/07.