T his weekend, the identity of the next James Bond is finally expected to be known – to the insiders, at least. According to reports, a number of youngish British actors – definitely three, possibly five – will have their final screen tests.
To say it has been a long time coming is an understatement. It is five years since Daniel Craig was killed in a hail of missiles at the end of No Time to Die, and in that time – even long before it – a swarm of actors have been tipped to replace him, only to age out of the role due to a combination of indecisiveness and cutthroat backstage corporate shenanigans. Whoever is declared to be 007 will be joining the franchise after what is likely to be the longest fallow period in the franchise’s 64-year history.
As such, this is kind of a big weekend. Let’s run through what we know so far.
If three actors are to screen test for Bond this weekend, then they are Callum Turner, Josh O’Connor and Jack Lowden. If there are more – some outlets state that one other actor might be participating, others two – then they won’t include Jack O’Connell or Jacob Elordi , who are both out of the race for one reason or another.
The identity of the other actors are not yet known. Let’s take an uneducated guess and assume that one of them is a Beatle (the best fit is Harris Dickinson) and another one is more famous but less suitable (like Tom Cruise).
Outlets are reporting that the screen test will encompass three main elements: stunts, camera presence and dialogue. These are all equally important for a modern Bond. Remove stunts from the equation and your film will be boring. Remove camera presence and you’re likely to end up with a George Lazenby type, who has the potential to fluff what would otherwise be an all-timer. Remove dialogue and you’re left with Quantum of Solace, and God knows we don’t need another one of those.
You could argue that Jack Lowden is the frontrunner, if only because the first scene of the first episode of Slow Horses was a pretty good Bond audition in itself. It was, you’ll remember, a race against time sprint through an airport and train station, on foot and in a car, complete with hand-to-hand combat and gun play. And it was very good indeed. Working against him is the sense that he’s a bit too much of a teddy bear for a sociopath like Bond. Plus the fact that he has spent every subsequent scene of Slow Horses doing a pretty good Simon Pegg impression.
Callum Turner would seem to make a sexier Bond, partly because he was able to conjure chemistry from the very silly sex purge movie One Night Only , and partly because he’s married to Dua Lipa, who would almost certainly get the role of Bond Girl Who Dies First if he were cast.
I still think Josh O’Connor would be the best fit, though. He looks good in a tux, as anyone who has seen The Crown will testify. He is very good at convincingly delivering absolute nonsense, as anyone who has seen Disclosure Day will testify. However, his best-known stunt work must be the long scene in The Mastermind in which he slowly climbs up and down a ladder several times in a row.
Now, this is all well and good for a traditional Bond film. But we’re talking about an Amazon Bond film, directed by Denis Villeneuve . This means that more will be asked of whoever gets the role, and the screen tests are the perfect way to see if they can pull it off.
For example, which of the finalists will best be able to carry their voice in such a way that it isn’t drowned out by all the seat-rumbling full-volume honking noises that Villeneuve will almost certainly use instead of a traditional soundtrack? Which of the actors will most convincingly be able to interact with a side character created with the express purpose of carrying their own spin-off series, to better sustain cross-media IP synergy? Which of them will least overtly die on the inside during the scene in which an Amazon drone delivers them a gun? That is the stuff that will really make or break James Bond going forward.
