According to the newspaper, part of the Bray Studios, near London, had been completely sealed off, with access reserved only for people carrying a special pass. No bags or mobile phones were allowed in the audition room. The scripts were protected by watermarks and printed using a special red ink designed to prevent any reproduction by photography or photocopying.
Director Denis Villeneuve, casting director Nina Gold, screenwriter Steven Knight, as well as producers Amy Pascal and David Heyman, attended the tests.
Clues about the tone of the next James Bond?
The four actors in contention, Callum Turner, Jack Lowden, Josh O’Connor and Robert Pattinson, performed several scenes taken from From Russia with Love, GoldenEye and Casino Royale, before undergoing a physical test. No scene from the screenplay written by Steven Knight was used.
The choice of these sequences could in fact provide some clues about the tone the next Bond will adopt. GoldenEye and Casino Royale marked the respective debuts of Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig in the role of 007. As for From Russia with Love, it remains one of the darkest episodes in the saga, but also one of the closest to the spirit of Ian Fleming’s novels. Enough to raise hopes for a return to a Bond who is tougher, more realistic and less gadget-driven. In other words, on paper, this new incarnation looks rather promising.
Tests viewed by Jeff Bezos himself
The auditions were filmed by a team reduced to two people, responsible respectively for the image and the sound. The recordings were then physically transported by plane from London to Los Angeles to be viewed by Mike Hopkins, head of Amazon MGM Studios, and Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.
Sean Connery would reportedly be Jeff Bezos’s preferred James Bond actor. The Daily Mail thus puts forward the hypothesis that Jack Lowden would once again be one of the main favorites to take over the role, notably because of his Scottish origins. An argument that still seems a little thin for separating the contenders.
Meanwhile, the producers would have begun contacting actresses who could portray the next James Bond Girls. Filming is expected to begin in spring 2027 and continue through the rest of the year, with a theatrical release scheduled for November 2028.