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English? Try telling Sir Sean that. Or Fleming for that matter - thought Bond was half Scottish and half Swiss?
I'm not sure Brozza ever convinced as British - not for me at least. He was always too mid-Atlantic. No one in the UK speaks like that.
Laz is borderline. I give him a break because I love his performance so much.
Bond was half Scottish and half Swiss, but essentially brought up as an Englishman. I'm sure Connery could understand that, especially as we are now talking about Dev Patel who is English with Indian heritage.
I never said English in terms of the Character (but Fleming was English and MI6 is based here - Bond also fights for Queen and Country and we, the English formed the United Kingdom)? Before anyone jumps on this comment, Scotland (technically) has been under British rule since 1707.
I'm well aware of the Scottish and half Swiss Bond Heritage, but ok a British Institution. I stand corrected.
None of the above detracts from the fact that the character is white. Dev Patel (as an example) is British Asian and thus unsuitable. The trick is in the name too....Bond - Traditional English name dating back many 100's of years no doubt, Patel is of most commonly of Indian origin I am sure.
Olivia Colman's Odds To Play James Bond Have Just Been Massively Slashed .
As a freshly-minted Oscar winner and Hollywood’s new favourite Brit, Olivia Colman will have the pick of roles for the foreseeable future. With that in mind, she should probably pursue the job that will annoy the largest amount of Twitter egg avatars all at once.
We’re talking about Bond, of course. In the 48 hours since she beat Glenn Close to the Best Actress gong, Colman’s chances of inheriting Daniel Craig's blood-soaked tux have been slashed to 20/1.
Unlikely, sure – but the idea isn’t without its merits. Many fans feel the next Bond should inherit more of the earlier movies’ wit and humour, something Colman is more than capable of pulling off.
That’s not to mention her gritty turns in the shows like The Night Manager and Accused. She also wore a tuxedo in public once, which automatically puts her in the Bond race anyway. That’s just how it works, sorry.
Plus: imagine all the poorly-attended protests and incandescent, widely-ignored petitions. It would be brilliant.
It goes without saying that she still lags some way behind figures like Tom Hardy and Richard Madden in the race. The odds of her turning up in Bond 25 in any capacity are much better though, standing at 5/2.
That being said, Betway’s Alan Alger believes she’s destined to take over Jodie Whittaker as Doctor Who.
Alger said: “Olivia Colman’s win at the Oscars completed a remarkable journey for the British actress and, if the past few months are anything to go by, she’s set for plenty more success.“
Even if she doesn’t get her 00s, her national treasure status is in no doubt. Her teary speech at the Academy Awards received a standing ovation, and she’s already got a huge year ahead of her with the Fleabag and The Crown on the horizon.
Bond should stay white as craig is get this WHITE
Sorry if bond changes skin color then the code name theorists win
True. So true.
If Bond changes skin colour then that's me finished with it.
Me too. It’s bad enough he’s blonde nowadays. Saved by Craig’s charisma and quality as an actor. But no more blondes, please, nor ginger, nor anything other than Fleming’s general description of the character.
Damn!!??!! ;)
Well, if you mean timelords who reincarnate, yes. But Bond is an ever so slightly different character.
Me too. I wouldn’t watch it.....I’d boycott it.
Agreed!
So no Roger Moore then?
If you're going to have James Bond operate in the 21st century, you are going to automatically lose something of the original essence of the character. The Bond of the Craig and Brosnan films is already different in many ways from Fleming's original or Connery's.
English no longer means white, and no decent English institution in the 21st century is race exclusionary. The Othello argument is weak. Putting aside the fact that the role was played by white actors for almost 400 years, race is an integral part of Othello's identity and integral to the story, and he's treated differently on account of it. How often does that happen in a Bond movie? Race was only an important part of Bond's identity when Britishness still implied whiteness.
I am not in favor of changing Bond's race just for PC's sake or for the sake of racial engineering. But if there is an actor who is British (or at least from the British commonwealth, like Lazenby), and has the suaveness and toughness required for the role, then he should not be excluded from consideration because of his race. That would be against the old fashioned British values of fair play and common sense.
Still, the chances of an Etonite who happened to be too good at sports, too restless to study and there on the benefit of a rich family member beeing other then white is easily too far fetched. I'm not saying it will Always be like that, but for now it's a bit too improbable.
Personally I don't like what they've done with Felix, but that one was lost after Dr. No anyway. Now he happens to be an ally from the CIA. He has nothing in common with Fleming's Felix.
Great post. +1.
Good point. They certainly aren’t Bond or Fleming purists that’s for sure.
It would be far-fetched if Eton has an exclusively white student body, and from what I understand, at the moment it definitely doesn't, even excluding the number of foreign-born students. Britain has its share of rich non-white folks, like other multi-cultural societies.
And yet there are plenty of Black people with "white" names. And one of the "non-white" actors suggested for the role has the rather white-sounding name of Henry Golding. There multiple ways for a non-white or racially mixed person to end up with a white-sounding name.
Furthermore, not even Fleming's Bond had his ethnicty set in stone. Before Connery, Fleming exclusively referred to the character as English, with not a hint of Scottishness. And the films have hardly been consistently faithful to Fleming.
As I said earlier, my primary concern is that the best qualified British actor should receive the role, regardless of his race. Bringing up Shaft is pointless, since that character is defined by his race in a way that Bond isn't, unless one still regards Britishness as inseparable from whiteness.
That's not the point. The point is that the author who created the character did so on very specific terms and details. Harry Potter isn't Black because JK Rowling described him as caucasian. So did Fleming for Bond. It's not a question fo Britishness, it's a simple question of characterisation by the author.
Whiteness isn't anything but superficial characterization in most cases, and Rowling herself attacked the critics of the stage casting of a black actress as Hermione as "a bunch of racists."
And so far not a single James Bond has looked like Hoagy Carmichael, unless one thinks all whites look alike. Had Fleming been charge of selecting the screen Bond, he probably wouldn't have chosen Connery, who didn't quite fit his "template." Nor have the James Bond films been tremendously faithful to Fleming's vision in other respects. It's no surprise that 66 years ago a white author writing in a predominantly white country envisioned a white hero. The country has changed, along with the world, and the films have always kept up with the times.
The Bond films have never strictly followed Fleming's template, and if were Fleming writing today his work would be different. Today race is not an important part of that template--it's no more important than whether a Bond actor has a comma of hair or a facial scar. It doesn't affect his character and the genuinely important attributes given to him by Fleming: his patriotism, bravery, occasional melancholy, enjoyment of luxury but need for a challenge, his determination to live life to the full, etc. But being British will always be a core part of his identity, and unless you think it's impossible to nonwhite and proudly British, then the race of the actor who plays a modern James Bond is inconsequential. Back in 1953, this wouldn't have been the case. But Bond films are made for the audiences of today. Saying it would go against Fleming's original vision means ignoring all the innumerable times the films have been untrue to it.
Your bad faith characterization of those who disagree with you adds even less.