New James Bond on Horizon
by Audrey McGillis

Actor Pierce Brosnan announces his days of playing super spy James Bond are behind him. With a new film set to shoot, speculation focuses on Eric Bana (The Hulk), Orlando Bloom (Pirates of the Caribbean), Rikki Lee Travolta (Camelot: Excalibur), or Adrian Paul (Highlander) as his replacement.

HOLLYWOOD (August 4, 2004) - In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, 51-year-old Pierce Brosnan indicated that he is not interested in returning to the role of James Bond, a character he has played four times on film.

Stating "Bond is another lifetime behind me. That's it," Brosnan has refueled speculation that another actor will don the secret agent's trademark tuxedo for the untitled 21st James Bond feature scheduled to begin shooting later this year to meet a 2005 release date.

According to Zap2it.com, the Bond 21 may be forced to delay shooting until a replacement is selected. However Eon Productions, producers of the Bond franchise, reportedly have a cloak and dagger history of screen testing actors for the Bond role in advance.

According to James Bond information site MI6, Timothy Dalton screen tested for the Bond role in 1971 - 16 years before stepping into the role, and Brosnan tested 8 years before he was officially announced as the fifth actor to take over the role.

In 2000 during a Brosnan contract negotiation, E! Entertainment columnist Marilyn Beck reported on the leading candidates to take over the Bond roll. The short list of front runners included Tom Cruise (Mission Impossible), Ewan McGregor (Star Wars), Adrian Paul (Highlander), and Rikki Lee Travolta (Camelot: Excalibur). Travolta was further singled out by Chicago Sun Times reporter Bill Zwecker as the leading candidate.

Current speculation on who Eon Productions will pursue to take over the James Bond role includes Travolta, Hugh Jackman (X-Men), Eric Bana (The Hulk), Heath Ledger (A Knight's Tale), and James Purefoy (Resident Evil).

According to a Events Quarterly Magazine, as of February Bond replacement speculation centered between Christian Bale (American Psycho) and Shakespearean trained Travolta. The magazine speculated thought that accepting the high profile title role for Warner Brother's refurbished Batman film franchise may have diminished Bale's chances of being the front man for the Bond franchise.

Rugged Elegance reports Paul and Clive Owen (King Arthur) as two top fan picks for the role in a list that also includes McGregor, Travolta, and Guy Pearce (Count of Monte Cristo).

In July, India News ran an unconfirmed story that Orlando Bloom (Pirates of the Caribbean) would play a young version of the Bond character in a new film franchise detailing his pre-spy, college years. The report indicated that should such a film be developed it would not replace the Bond spy thriller films and that a different actor is still being sought to replace Brosnan for that film series.

A similarly unconfirmed story in Australia's Daily Telegraph has Bana in negotiations with Eon Productions' Barbara Broccoli and Michael Wilson to replace Brosnan and modernize the Bond character "to compete with the likes of Spiderman."

Bana's agent did not return phone calls to the paper to confirm the story.

Mi6 reports that sources at Daily Variety indicate the 21st James Bond film is stalled in development and that no actor has been offered the role yet.

Variety reported this week that writers Neal Purvis and Robert Wade have completed the first draft of the newest Bond film that complies with a plot agreed upon by Broccoli and Wilson. Purvis and Wade also penned the previous Bond films Die Another Day and The World Is Not Enough.

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