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Former Bond girl actress Gemma Arterton isn’t sure the spy franchise is ready for a female protagonist.
“Isn’t a female James Bond like Mary Poppins being played by a man?” the actor told The Times. “They talk about it, but I think people would find it too outrageous. Sometimes you just have to respect the tradition.”
Arterton played Strawberry Fields in 2008’s Bond installment, Quantum of Solace. The film was Daniel Craig’s second time playing James Bond and the franchise’s 22nd installment overall. Strawberry Fields is a consular employee who Bond seduces in Bolivia.
“I don’t regret doing a Bond film, but I am perplexed why it has followed me around,” Arterton added. “I was only in the film for five minutes.”
Elsewhere in the interview, the actress defined herself as “really scruffy” and said she was therefore “surprised that [a pin-up] was the way I was viewed for a long time. It didn’t sit well with me, because I really don’t see myself in that way. I was doing those roles because they were the ones I was offered.”
As she’s gotten older, the parts have “become more interesting,” Arterton said. Last year, for example, she starred opposite Ian McKellen in The Critic, which was released at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2023 and in U.K. theaters in September 2024.
Arterton said she’s spoken to McKellen since he fell onstage during a performance of Henry IV at London’s Noël Coward Theatre in June.
“It was a big fall, and obviously he’s an older gentleman,” Arterton said. Though McKellen said at the time of the fall that he would make a full recovery, he eventually withdrew from the remaining performances of the play.
“He’s taking time out to recover,” Arterton continued. “He’s such a Peter Pan. He’s so young at heart. It was a bit of a wake-up call.”
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