English actor Daniel Craig, whose final outing as 007 was unveiled on Thursday, is the longest-serving James Bond—but perhaps not always the most enthusiastic.
The 51-year-old’s fifth movie as the British super spy is due for release early next year, 14 years after 2006’s Casino Royale.
There were initially doubts about the casting of the British actor—not least the fact he was blond.
But he brought both a new ruthlessness and an emotional vulnerability to the character that audiences have warmed to—and have proved box office gold.
For a while, it seemed that 2015’s Spectre would be his last outing as Ian Fleming’s super cool intelligence agent. Exhausted by a grueling shoot, he said he would “rather slash my wrists” than be Bond again.
The actor, who has required surgery on his shoulder and knees over the years due to injuries sustained by doing his own stunts, later said that he had just “needed a break.”
But his comments revealed at least an ambivalence about the all-consuming role from a man who guards his privacy closely.
When he was first named in 2005 to succeed Pierce Brosnan as the sixth incarnation of Bond, many questioned whether the blond-haired, blue-eyed, gym-sculpted Craig was the right man for the job. Even Sam Mendes, the director of Spectre who also worked with Craig on 2002’s Road To Perdition, was sceptical.
“I thought Bond had become the opposite of what Daniel is—a slightly disengaged, urbane, jokey, eyebrow-raising, you know, a pastiche in a way,” he told the BBC.
But the intensity Craig brings to the part has allowed the multi-million dollar franchise to be rebooted with a harder, more serious edge.
The late Roger Moore, who played Bond seven times between 1973 and 1985, called Craig the best Bond ever.