Ever since Daniel Craig said he'd rather slit his own wrists than do another James Bond movie—an eye-popping statement that sparked a debate about who should take over once Craig retires from the role—people have suggested that maybe, as odd as it might seem, a woman should play the world's most famous spy. But the most powerful person in the James Bond universe is already a woman. And she's decided a man should play 007.
"Bond is male," Barbara Broccoli told
The Guardian last year. "He's a male character. He was written as a male and I think he'll probably stay as a male. 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."
Broccoli heads up Eon Productions, the company that's been making Bond films since Sean Connery first adopted the role in 1962's
Dr. No, and is the daughter of Albert "Cubby" Broccoli, the producer who bought the screen rights to Ian Fleming's James Bond novels.
For Broccoli, James Bond is the family business and she grew up surrounded by 007. One of her first memories is being on the set of 1967's
You Only Live Twice in Japan, she says in the book
Movie Moguls Speak. And heading to Pinewood Studios, the now iconic facility where portions of the Bond films are filmed, was commonplace.
"As I child, I remember going to Pinewood Studios just outside London quite a lot. My sister and I used to go on Friday afternoons after school," she says in the book. "Being in my father's office was great, too, because I got to see him work first hand. So, I began my learning process of producing at a young age."
Now, everything Bond related runs through Broccoli, from the details of the next movie to who will be the next 007.
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