{"id":791881,"date":"2026-07-10T18:19:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T18:19:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/791881\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T18:19:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T18:19:13","slug":"debbie-mcwilliams-ex-007-casting-director-sticks-to-her-guns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/791881\/","title":{"rendered":"Debbie McWilliams, Ex-007 Casting Director, Sticks to Her Guns"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tDebbie McWilliams<\/a>, who cast the last 14 James Bond<\/a> films, has stuck to her guns when it comes to her view that 007<\/a> should be white and male, as he was in Ian Fleming\u2019s 007 books. However, she confessed Friday that she\u2019s never read a Bond novel.<\/p>\n

\n\tSpeaking at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival<\/a> in an onstage interview moderated by Variety, the casting director was asked by an audience member whether the spy could be a woman or a person of color. \u201cNot in my opinion. No,\u201d she responded firmly. \u201cIan Fleming wrote a character, and that\u2019s the character that stays. That\u2019s what I think. I mean, other people might think otherwise, but I don\u2019t think that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWith McWilliams having retired before Amazon\u2019s acquisition of the Bond franchise, the search for the next 007 actor falls to casting director Nina Gold and director Denis Villeneuve. However, McWilliams still has strong views on the subject as the question and answer session at the Czech festival demonstrated.<\/p>\n

\n\t McWilliams was asked whether, when she cast previous Bonds, such as Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig, there was any specific characteristic that she was looking for. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWell, I mean, I\u2019ve said this several times before, but part of his job description is license to kill. So you\u2019ve got to think that he could pick a gun up and shoot you,\u201d McWilliams said. \u201cSo he\u2019s got to have a kind of threat about him, you know. I\u2019m not sure that Pierce Brosnan had that particularly, but he kind of embodied a different side of him. He was very good looking and suave, and all the rest of it. And Daniel sort of changed that somewhat into the fact that you, you know \u2026 he was much tougher.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe added, \u201cThere\u2019s no set rule. It\u2019s whoever fits the bill, frankly, and it will be different for different directors and different producers. And, you know, it\u2019s about to change dramatically, is all I can say. And I\u2019m not sure whether I\u2019ll be paying my money to go and see it or not. But there isn\u2019t an easy answer to that question.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMcWilliams explained how Craig came to be cast as 007 in Martin Campbell\u2019s \u201cCasino Royale.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt took a long time, and I scoured the world pretty much. And the story had changed quite a bit from the very first meeting that we all had together,\u201d she said. \u201cThe idea was that it was to start Bond at the very beginning, and so we saw a lot of young actors, and tested some, and then I kind of went out all around the place, Australia to New Zealand, to here, there and everywhere. And I knew Daniel quite well because I\u2019d seen him in pretty much everything he\u2019d ever done, and nobody was particularly interested. And then the film \u2018Layer Cake\u2019 came out, and Barbara Broccoli said, \u2018I think we\u2019d better meet him.\u2019 And so I said, \u2018Are you sure? I\u2019m not sure that he\u2019s quite right for this.\u2019 And she said, \u2018No, no, no. I want to meet him.\u2019 So we met him, and he was quite reluctant, I have to say. It wasn\u2019t something that he leapt at, but anyway, eventually he agreed, and so we started off.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe casting of Eva Green as Vesper Lynd in \u201cCasino Royale\u201d met with resistance, she said.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThere was hesitation and reluctance from everybody for everything, to be honest with you. Martin Campbell, who directed it, wasn\u2019t keen on her at all. He just went, \u2018Oh, she\u2019s a model,\u2019 and I said, \u2018No, she\u2019s not. She\u2019s a real proper bona fide actress.\u2019 Anyway, eventually we got her to come out here [to the Czech Republic], and she screen tested, and she was so nervous it was almost unbearable, and so I pleaded with them to get her back and to start all over again, and, you know, actually take time with her and rehearse with her, and do her hair and makeup and all the rest of it, and so the second test she nailed it. But none of these things have ever been easy, I have to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tVariety asked to what extent, with a film like \u201cCasino Royale,\u201d which is based on a specific book, she would go back to the book for thoughts on who to cast, or whether she just stuck to the script.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cGuess what?\u201d McWilliams responded. \u201cI\u2019ve never read a James Bond book in my life. It always has to be based on the script, and, you know, as the time went on, the scripts bore no relation to the books at all. You know, they made all the films of the books, so it was always script based.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cCasino Royale\u201d was shot partly in Karlovy Vary \u2014 in particular, the casino scenes \u2014 and McWilliams explained how she insisted that all the cast learn how to play poker to ensure a high level of realism.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWell, a kind of gauntlet was thrown down at the very beginning. As soon as I read the script, I thought, \u2018Well, you know, the whole denouement was this amazing poker game,\u2019 and so I started going around visiting casinos to see how it worked, and I told one of the guys in this place what we were doing, and he went, \u2018You will never get it right.\u2019 I said, \u2018I beg your pardon.\u2019 He said, \u2018No, nobody ever gets it right in films.\u2019 So I thought, \u2018Well, okay, we\u2019re going to.\u2019 And, in fact, Michael Wilson, who\u2019s one of the producers, is a huge poker fan, and so he started to teach me. And then, as each actor was cast, we\u2019d all just sit down and start playing poker. And when we were in Prague, everybody became completely obsessed with it. And so, at lunchtime, sitting in the corridor in the studio, we\u2019d all be playing poker. It was really funny. I can\u2019t remember anything about it now, but it was good fun at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAsked to share her thoughts on Method actors, McWilliams was open to casting them, but would defer to the director, as ever. \u201cI haven\u2019t had a huge experience of them, I have to say. I think it will very much depend on who the director is. I mean, you know, when you read about how Daniel Day-Lewis ate with his feet and painted with his feet, and never stood outside his character, only certain directors would probably tolerate that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAnd Jeremy Strong in \u2018Succession\u2019 is known to be a Method actor, but to meet as a person he\u2019s absolutely delightful. I mean, I don\u2019t think I\u2019d go out of my way necessarily to cast a Method actor, but you can\u2019t legislate really. It\u2019s the director who has to make the final decision, and if he\u2019s happy and he knows in advance that \u2026 you know, we ought to do a bit of research to know whether somebody\u2019s going to be very Method or not \u2026 so it just depends on them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMcWilliams gave Day-Lewis his break when she cast him in Stephen Frears\u2019 \u201cMy Beautiful Laundrette,\u201d but he wasn\u2019t her first choice for the role, she told the audience. Her preference was Gary Oldman, so when she was casting Frears\u2019 \u201cPrick Up Your Ears,\u201d it was Oldman who they turned to.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI wasn\u2019t that sure that Daniel was actually right for [\u2018My Beautiful Laundrette\u2019]. I mean, I knew him, and I had met him when he was at drama school, and had seen him in various different plays in the theater [\u2026] and we auditioned lots and lots of people. And in fact, one of the actors who I was particularly keen on was Gary Oldman, who to me seemed to fit into the part much more than Daniel. Gary was a real kind of geezer [British slang for a streetwise guy], and Daniel\u2019s from a very aristocratic family.\u201d But Frears wasn\u2019t convinced by Oldman. \u201cHe then said, \u2018Okay, who is the very best young English actor?\u2019 And I said, \u2018Well, without a doubt, it\u2019s Daniel Day-Lewis. And he said, \u2018Well, okay, let\u2019s have him then.’\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Debbie McWilliams, who cast the last 14 James Bond films, has stuck to her guns when it comes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":791882,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[34942,64,63,372973,134,30108,347914,344],"class_list":["post-791881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-34942","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-debbie-mcwilliams","tag-entertainment","tag-james-bond","tag-karlovy-vary-film-festival","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=791881"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791881\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/791882"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=791881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=791881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=791881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}