BOND 24 updates! Massive rewrites, Sam Smith to sing theme, Lea Seydoux to star?

The last major piece of news we had heard about the next James Bond film was that franchise regulars Neal Purvis and Robert Wade (who co-penned The World Is Not Enough, Die Another Die and Casino Royale) had been brought in to punch up the joke factor in Skyfall writer John Logan’s script. But it seems the joke’s on us, as the Daily Mail is claiming that Purvis and Wade weren’t just upping the laughs and smoothing the edges on Logan’s effort, but were in fact called in after a “fire-alarm call” from director Sam Mendes and star Daniel Craig, and have done substantial rewrites to a script that was in a bit of shambles.

Purvis and Wade handed in their heavily revised version script to producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson last week , who were now apparently pleased enough to give it the green light and get the ball rolling in earnest.

That leads to the first bit of possible casting news, with Collider reporting a rumour that Mendes is looking at Blue Is the Warmest Color and Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol star Léa Seydoux for the film’s female lead. With Blue winning big at Cannes last year, Seydoux has a lot of critical momentum behind her currently. And besides for just being a fantastic actress with a magnetic screen presence, she also has tons of sex appeal. That’s a combination that saw Eva Green’s Vesper Lynd become one of, if not the best Bond Girl ever in Casino Royale, so history could be repeating itself here.

As for the details of her role, that’s still not clear, but a rumoured casting call report that was put up by Schmoes Know earlier in the year called for a “Lead Female (30-40) Attractive, sophisticated, cool and calm secret agent.” That certainly fits with Seydoux.

One of the biggest success of Skyfall (besides the record breaking amounts of money it made) was pop singer Adele’s Oscar-winning theme song. With the theme being as well received as it was, it’s understandable that the producers would want the Grammy winning songstress back again, but it’s being rumoured that Adele has rejected their offers to become only the second person, after the legendary Shirley Bassey, to perform a Bond theme song for more than one movie. There may be some other Bond history made though, as IndieWire is instead reporting a rumour that UK pop star Sam Smith may be in talks to sing the theme. If he does land the gig, it would make him the first openly gay singer to do so, and the first British male since Tom Jones’ vein-popping turn on Thunderball.

Only being familiar with one of Smith’s songs (and not even too big a fan of it, at that), I can’t honestly say as to how appropriate he is for this. I can, however, state quite confidently that he is no Adele, who I think we can all agree will always be the best choice.

With a UK release date of October 23, 2015, we should be getting some confirmations of these rumours, one way or another, as Bond 24 will need to start production soon.

Last Updated: August 13, 2014