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James Bond has been portrayed by many actors over the years, and Harry Potter star Ralph Fiennes could’ve been one of them. But the actor ended up losing the role to Pierce Brosnan, who he felt might’ve been the better choice.
Pierce Brosnan both lost and won his role as James Bond
Brosnan had his turn playing the MI6 agent after Timothy Dalton left the project. Audiences would first see the actor in the role in the 1995 film Goldeneye. From there, Brosnan would go on to portray the character three more times. His last James Bond film was 2002’s Die Another Day.
Even though he already had a long career as the 007 agent, fans might have been able to see Brosnan’s Bond earlier. He was originally tapped to play the character during his early days in the TV series Remington Steele. But the show stood in the way of Brosnan’s casting at the time.
“I’d done all the photos with the iconic gun pose and my late wife and I were about to toast our new life with a bottle of Cristal when my agent called and said: ‘It’s fallen through.’ It was because I couldn’t get out of Remington Steele,” Brosnan told The Guardian in a 2019 interview.
So when he was called up to do Bond after Dalton’s stint with the character, Brosnan was understandably a bit skeptical.
“I heard rumblings that the part was available but ignored them because I didn’t want to put myself back in that emotional vortex. Then I met the producers Cubby and Barbara Broccoli and, a week later, they called and said: ‘You’re in,’” he said.
Ralph Fiennes thought he would’ve been a terrible James Bond if he was cast instead of Pierce Brosnan
Before Brosnan ended up in the role, Fiennes was briefly considered for James Bond. But talks about him being the next 007 didn’t seem to go past the conversation stage.
“There was a conversation that was great and a meeting with Cubby Broccoli, that was terrific,’” Fiennes once told The Telegraph. “I think that’s all I can say, except that it didn’t lead to anything on both sides. I don’t think I felt ready to commit and I think they were looking at Pierce.”
In hindsight, Fiennes felt it was the right call to cast Brosnan instead.
“I think I would’ve been a terrible Bond, actually,” he added. “I think I’m happier playing M. And I think Daniel Craig is a brilliant Bond.”
Why Ralph Fiennes fought with Sam Mendes about his M character
Beginning with Skyfall, Fiennes would become the handler for Daniel Craig’s James Bond as the character M. Originally, he was attracted to the movie because he was simply a fan of Craig’s Bond. Hearing director Sam Mendes would helm the project also interested Fiennes even further. But he soon discovered that Mendes had some new ideas in mind for M in the sequel that led to a couple of disagreements.
“I think I can say now that I had to fight off an attempt by Sam in Spectre to make M – I said, ‘I don’t want to play M and then you turn around and make him the bad guy. M is never the bad guy,’” Fiennes once said on Happy Sad Confused. “So I had to have some pretty intense discussions with Sam saying, ‘This is not flying with me.’ … It was like he was Blofeld or something, but that was a red line.”
