Gemma Arterton has some thoughts on the idea of a female James Bond.
The British actor, who famously starred opposite Daniel Craig in 2008’s “Quantum of Solace” as ill-fated Bond girl Strawberry Fields, doesn’t think a female 007 would work.
“Isn’t a female James Bond like Mary Poppins being played by a man?” Arterton told U.K.’s The Times in an article published Tuesday. “They talk about it, but I think people would find it too outrageous. Sometimes you just have to respect the tradition.”
Tradition has certainly stood firm amid the yearslong discourse surrounding a female Bond, as even franchise producer Barbara Broccoli — who has been in charge of casting the coveted role since 1995 — revealed during Craig’s tenure that it’ll “probably” never happen.
“He was written as a male and I think he’ll probably stay as a male,” Broccoli told The Guardian in 2018. “And that’s fine. We don’t have to turn male characters into women. Let’s just create more female characters and make the story fit those female characters.”
Craig espoused the exact same view ahead of his final Bond outing, “No Time to Die,” and told Radio Times magazine that there should simply be “better parts for women and actors of color” when asked if he’d support “a more diverse” actor to replace him.
The franchise appeared to dip its toes into both territories when rumors emerged in 2019 that Lashana Lynch was going to take the reins, only for her character in “No Time to Die” to be revealed as just another 007-coded agent — but not quite Bond.
Fan campaigns for Idris Elba, meanwhile, were ruined by racist backlash.
Kirsty Wigglesworth/Associated Press
While former Bond star Pierce Brosnan previously endorsed the idea of a female 007, telling The Hollywood Reporter in 2019 that “we’ve watched the guys do it for the last 40 years,” he recently lobbied for “Oppenheimer” star Cillian Murphy to take the role.
Arterton said Tuesday that she doesn’t regret her Bond girl past — although she has previously criticized “Quantum” for making her character so open to Bond’s sexual advances — but is still “perplexed” at how often it comes up despite only being in the film “for five minutes.”
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In 2020, the actor revealed her reason for taking the job.
“I was poor as a church mouse and I was happy just to be able to work and earn a living,” Arterton told The Sun. “I still get criticism for accepting ‘Quantum of Solace,’ but I was 21, I had a student loan, and you, know, it was a Bond film.”
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