Brosnan done with 007: Pierce pal
HOLLYWOOD — Pierce Brosnan is finished with James Bond, according to his friend, neighbour and one-time 007 co-star, Michael Madsen.
“Pierce lives right down the beach from me. Our kids play together,” Madsen said during interviews for his own new movie, Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill: Vol. 1.
“And he told me he doesn’t want to do another one.
“I also heard that they bought him out. I really don’t know but an impasse is an impasse.”
Madsen said he was told that Brosnan will be replaced with an Australian, although he did not know who and could not confirm if it was Hugh Jackman, who has been touted as a possible future Bond. So has Englishman Clive Owen.
Madsen’s comments seem to put in stone something that Brosnan has only hinted at. The Irish-born actor admitted last month that, while he was willing to do his fifth Bond picture if the filmmakers could get a decent script written and find a director for the project, the negotiations were not going well. Neither was the script development.
“We’ve reached an impasse with the producers,” Brosnan said in March. “They seem to be paralyzed and cannot move forward. If they want me, they know where to find me.
“I was prepared to do a fifth film and then walk away. I made that very clear to the producers. We had started negotiations and I want to follow through, but conversations and telephone calls have dried up.”
Madsen said he himself is interested in the new Bond because he was supposed to get a role in it. He last worked with Brosnan as Bond in Lee Tamahori’s Die Another Day (2002), playing Damian Falco. Now Madsen is wary.
“Well, I was going to do it with Pierce but, now that Pierce is out of the Bond picture, I don’t know what is going to happen. If (producer) Barbara Broccoli calls me up and says: ‘Michael, I want you to be in the James Bond picture,’ I’ll probably go do it, but I’m not going to call her.
“I don’t know the new Bond guy. I’ve never seen anything he’s done. I don’t even know what he looks like. I can’t remember the guy’s name. I would have to feel like he’s going to be a good Bond for me to want to do it.”
Madsen, who plays the assassin Sidewinder in the Kill Bill films, said that watching Brosnan on Die Another Day taught him how torturous it is for the star on a 007 set.
“You know, making a Bond film is not an easy thing to do. That’s a heavy shoot, man. That’s a long, long, big, big, heavy thing. The Bond thing is a tremendously gigantic production and the last one was hugely successful.
“For Pierce, that was the fourth one that he did. He’s tired, man. You know, he’s James Bond. He doesn’t have to do another one. Why would you? Why would you bother?”
BROSNAN’S BOND YEARS: Pierce Brosnan, who will be 51 on May 16, reinvigorated the James Bond franchise with GoldenEye (1995) and continued with Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), The World Is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2002). His final 007 credit may end up being the 2004 video game, James Bond 007: Everything Or Nothing, which features Brosnan’s voice.
Categories