Daniel Craig admits he ‘locked himself in and closed his curtains’ as he couldn’t cope with James Bond fame
IN 15 years as 007, Daniel Craig has enjoyed all the highs of being the world’s most famous super-spy – but he says the role is not always what it is cracked up to be.
The actor has revealed he struggled with the pressures of taking over as James Bond from Pierce Brosnan, saying he often felt “physically and mentally under siege”.
In his only major interview before he bows out as 007, Daniel admits he was initially reluctant to accept the gig, insisting he told film bosses: “I would not know what to do with it.”
Sitting alongside producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson for new Apple TV documentary Being James Bond, he tells how he got so drunk on martinis — 007’s tipple of choice — after landing the role that he had a three-day hangover.
And when he was finally announced as the sixth cinematic Bond in 2005, he stayed up all night reading the negative reactions.
Daniel, 53, adds: “I read everything, because that is what happens if you do that. And it was tough — really tough and hate-filled.
“I woke up the following morning, and I went f*** it. I know the film is going to be good. I knew we were doing something really special.”
The turning point for the concerned cast and crew of Casino Royale came when a paparazzi photographer snatched the first image of Daniel as 007, emerging from a Barbados beach in tight blue trunks.
Barbara explains: “I remember Daniel coming out of the water and the whole crew going, ‘Oh my God’.
‘Weird arty movies’
“And there was a pap shot which changed the whole idea of what Daniel’s Bond was going to be like. He was suddenly the coolest guy on Earth.”
Daniel laughs as he is replayed the scene, and says: “Look at those t*ts.” He admits he was not prepared for the fame or scrutiny that came with such an iconic role.
He says: “My personal life was affected by being that famous all of a sudden.
Most read in Showbiz
“I used to lock myself in and close the curtains, I was in cloud cuckoo land. I was physically and mentally under siege.
“I didn’t like the newfound level of fame. It was Hugh Jackman who helped me to come to terms with it and appreciate it.”
Producer Barbara, who had first seen Daniel in 1996 TV series Our Friends In The North, insists she was determined to hire him for the movie despite his reluctance.
She says: “I always thought whenever he was on the screen you could not watch anyone else. He is lit from within. It was clear he is a movie star and a great actor to boot.”
I was going to get the script, read it, and say ‘thanks but no’. But little did I know, it was Casino Royale.
Michael adds: “At that time in his career he was not thought of as a leading man, more a great supporting actor. Barbara and I could see he was actually a leading man.”
Daniel had never considered becoming Bond, saying: “As far as I was concerned I was already more successful than I would ever be as an actor — I did not have a cool persona.
“Pierce had done Remington Steele, Roger Moore had done The Saint — they had done these parts where people had gone, ‘That’s James Bond’.
“I had done weird arty movies. It was a harder sell. And I didn’t really want to do it, because I thought I wouldn’t know what to do with it.
“I was going to get the script, read it, and say, ‘Thanks but no’.
“But little did I know, it was Casino Royale. The story was solid, the script was solid.”
At the audition process, MGM chiefs did not believe Daniel was the man with a licence to thrill.
Barbara adds: “Michael and I really wanted him, but the biggest problem was that he didn’t want to do it. He came into the office, and I said to Michael afterwards, ‘He wants to do it’.
“We were determined to have him. We kept freaking the studio out as they kept trying to get us to meet other people.”
She refused to budge and called Daniel personally to tell him he’d landed the gig, as the actor recalls: “She just went, ‘Over to you kiddo’. And I grabbed a bottle of vodka, vermouth, a cocktail shaker and went back to my apartment and started mixing myself vodka martinis.
“It was my first bit of exercise. I had a hangover for three days.”
Daniel vowed to build muscle with a personal trainer, saying: “I had to look like I could do the role.
“I met a PT while smoking a rollie and eating a bacon sandwich, but I said to him, ‘I want to change’. And we did — it was seven days a week from then on.”
Despite being in peak fitness, Daniel endured the excruciating pain and psychological trauma of injuring himself during filming.
Second movie Quantum Of Solace was also hampered by a 100-day Hollywood writers’ strike and a script that “was not that great”.
He adds: “I basically volunteered for every stunt and with hindsight that was a bad mistake because I got badly hurt. I was overwhelmed.” In terms of cinematic success, Oscar-winning Skyfall, in 2012, made up for Quantum’s downfalls, and it is also home to one of Barbara’s most memorable scenes.
When villain Raoul Silva, played by Javier Bardem, caresses 007’s thigh while the spy is bound to a chair, he asks: “You’re trying to remember your training now. What’s the regulation to cover this? Well, first time for everything I guess.” But in a win for diversity, Bond replies: “What makes you think this is my first time?”
Barbara was proud to have secured the scene despite studio bosses demanding they cut the line.
She says: “We said ‘no, no, no’. We resisted. And I remember on the night of the world premiere — just the whole place erupted with that line.”
It was also an “emotional” time for Daniel, as he had to bid farewell to co-star Dame Judi Dench after her character M was killed off after three movies together.
And yet there were more injuries. Daniel broke his leg while filming 2015’s Spectre, but insists: “I had a lot of fun on that movie but part of the problem was that I broke my leg. We had to choose whether we could shut down for nine months and I could have an operation, or I could crack on with the movie. I didn’t want to shut down.
“So I wore a bionic leg for the rest of the film, which was not the greatest way to do a Bond movie. It was massively distracting for me.” He adds: “At the beginning of the movie I was walking on a ledge 100ft above a Mexico City street, I am literally going, ‘Don’t give, don’t give way’. I have a wire on, but it is very traumatic. I am trying to be cool but my leg is shot.”
Barbara adds: “He could barely walk. I was looking at him wondering how he was managing this.”
‘Incredibly proud’
It was this physical toll that led Daniel, then 47, to remark that he would rather “slash my wrists” than play Bond again following Spectre’s release in 2015.
On being persuaded to reprise the role for No Time To Die, which will make him the longest-serving actor as 007, Daniel says: “I do not want to go on about how hard Spectre was, but I needed a break. I needed to switch off.
“I genuinely felt psychologically at the end of that film too old. Barbara drives a hard bargain. I don’t think I was ever going to get away with leaving after Spectre.”
Barbara adds: “There is still unfinished business. There is still a story to tell. So we started out this time that we have to go for broke.”
The magnitude of leaving the role dawned on Daniel during his farewell speech to crew after filming wrapped on No Time To Die, which finally hits cinemas on September 30, almost two years later than planned.
He says: “My tenure is what it is, but it is only part of something bigger. I look back at the films and am incredibly proud of every one of them. Leaving this role is not easy.
“I can be as brazen and blasé about it as I like, but it is still tough to walk away from. And it is not about money and fame.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
“I am incredibly fortunate to have been able to do this. But I think it is OK now [to leave the role], and it’s because we did this movie.”
- Being James Bond is on Apple TV.
