The next James Bond movie reportedly will hand off the 007 title to someone else — another secret agent played by black actress Lashana Lynch.
The Mail on Sunday reports that (spoiler alert!) Bond retires from MI6, and his license to kill is handed off to the newcomer, along with its iconic agent number.
The change reportedly resulted from the involvement of “Fleabag” writer Phoebe Waller-Bridge with the script.
“There is a pivotal scene at the start of the film where M says ‘Come in 007,’ and in walks Lashana,” said the Mail’s source, who described the event as “a popcorn-dropping moment. Bond is still Bond but he’s been replaced as 007 by this stunning woman.”
Lynch is best known as pilot Marie Rambeau from this year’s “Captain Marvel” film and also appeared on the ABC series “Still Star-Crossed.”
Waller-Bridge, an ascendant British actress and writer who also worked on the first season of “Killing Eve,” was hired to polish the script for the 25th Bond film, scheduled for release in April.
“There’s been a lot of talk about whether or not [the Bond franchise] is relevant now because of who he is and the way he treats women,” she told Deadline. “I think that’s bollocks. I think he’s absolutely relevant now. It has just got to grow. It has just got to evolve, and the important thing is that the film treats the women properly. He doesn’t have to. He needs to be true to this character.”
The still untitled Bond film, currently being shot in Italy and England, is the first in the franchise for director Cary Joji Fukunaga (“True Detective,” “Beasts of No Nation”). It is scheduled for release in April 2020.
