Glance over the names of the rumoured James Bond contenders, and aren’t they all, well, a bit starry? Oscar nominee Jacob Elordi? Paparazzi magnet and recent Dua Lipa betrothed Callum Turner? Future cinematic John Lennon, Harris Dickinson? All attractive propositions from a headline-grabbing perspective, but maybe wrong for a role designed to be slippery and mysterious – and which, bar Roger Moore at the time he was cast as 007 in 1972, has always been filled by an actor who was vaguely recognisable but wasn’t yet super-duper famous.
Retired casting director Debbie McWilliams, who helped put Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig in the tuxedo over the years, certainly agreed, telling The Independent in June that “it is absolutely essential that [Bond] retains a total enigma,” adding: “I don’t want to see [Elordi, Turner, Dickinson et al] as Bond because we now know so much about them. We want to know as little about them personally as possible, because that’s what spies are. We don’t need to know where he goes shopping or who his parents are, or where he lives … He’s licensed to kill, and we have to believe that he can do that. If you don’t, then you’ve lost the audience.”
And this also chimes with reports last year that filmmaker Denis Villeneuve, who will allegedly be finalising his Bond following a series of screen tests with different actors in August, is looking for “an unknown” Brit possibly in his late twenties or early thirties to play 007. Which probably rules out the Paul Mescals of the world.
So, with that in mind, we’ve gathered together a list of actually realistic contenders for the role, some based on mysterious appearances in the betting odds, others based on my own (probably incorrect but pfft) intuition.
Tom Francis
Perhaps Tom Francis just has a very good publicist who knows how to raise their client’s profile, or the Olivier-award winning actor has zoomed up the bookies’ odds because he’s actually in for a chance here. We first saw his name linked to the role in May, in a Variety news item that claimed the West End leading man (who you may remember from Jamie Lloyd’s Sunset Boulevard redo) had auditioned for Bond.
Francis, who briefly appeared as a hunky acting school student in that terrible George Clooney movie Jay Kelly last year, is maybe a bit too pretty for Bond – those big pearly whites, that curtain hair! But he’s 27 (so fits perfectly in Villeneuve’s alleged requirements) and has been acclaimed enough so far to be a promising acting commodity but not so famous that he wouldn’t be seen as a bit of a “discovery” for the Bond-makers.
Arty Froushan
This 33-year-old American-born (gasp!) but UK-raised actor, who you might recognise from the London revival of the American Psycho musical last year, looks a bit like what Grok would spit out if you asked it to build a new James Bond. Or if you were tasked with drawing Jon Hamm from memory. Which is to say that Froushan at least has the right look. He’s also floated around a bit over the past few years, appearing on the Disney+ show Daredevil: Born Again as a villainous henchman, and starring in the last Downton Abbey movie. Maybe!
Anthony Boyle
The 32-year-old Irish actor leads Netflix’s House of Guinness, which was created by screenwriter Steven Knight, the very same man who is scripting the new James Bond. So… there’s a connection there. He also has that slightly cryptic and haunted look that would fit 007, and seems on the verge of a major breakout – his new film, the coming-of-ager I See Buildings Fall Like Lightning, earned rave reviews at this year’s Cannes, and he was one of the stars of Apple TV’s mini-series Masters of the Air in 2024, which was a bit of a hotbed of up-and-coming thesps, from Austin Butler to Barry Keoghan to – ooh, look here – Callum Turner.
Callum Turner
OK, I know I threw the 36-year-old Turner in with the far-too-famous-for-this names at the top of this article, but I’d be lying if I didn’t think there was still a chance he could be involved. Turner isn’t quite at the heights of professional success where he’d turn down the chance to be Bond (there are shades of Daniel Craig’s pre-Bond career in that he’s buzzy but not yet a household name), and certainly looks the part. But chances are there’s just a bit too much celebrity noise around him at the moment – mainly courtesy of his high-profile recent wedding to Dua Lipa – that it might turn off Villeneuve. Still, I’m putting him here just in case.
Cosmo Jarvis
So remember that Variety news item about Tom Francis that we mentioned earlier? Buried in there was mention of the, um, “gruff heartthrob” Cosmo Jarvis, the 36-year-old American-born (gasp!) but UK-raised star of Shōgun. But (twist!) his reps told the industry paper that he is “not in contention” for the role. But you would say that, wouldn’t you? Jarvis is probably the most visually distinct realistic contender here, being that he could convincingly break every one of the men in this list in two. And he’s also a very good actor, having stolen scenes in the Florence Pugh star-making movie Lady Macbeth (2016) and in last year’s Alex Garland-directed combat film Warfare. I wouldn’t count him out, no matter what his team says.
Nicholas Galitzine
Potentially also too pretty, but the 31-year-old Brit has been conspicuously absent from much of the Bond rumour mill, which is a bit strange, isn’t it? Working in his favour is that he’s incredibly tight with Bond makers Amazon/MGM, having worked with them on basically his entire career so far – in 2021’s Cinderella, 2023’s Bottoms and Red, White & Royal Blue, last year’s Anne Hathaway romance The Idea of You, and this year’s The Sheep Detectives and Masters of the Universe. He’s an in-house fave, so it would be very surprising if he wasn’t at least given the chance to screen test.
Jack Lowden
Henry Cavill, if you remember, auditioned for James Bond in 2004 alongside Daniel Craig, then proceeded to dance around the industry for years without getting a real breakout role until 2013’s Superman movie Man of Steel. I bring up Cavill because Jack Lowden, the 36-year-old Scot who is also known as Mr Saoirse Ronan, has a strong whiff of the Cavills about him. He’s been mentioned as a possible Bond for a while, and could theoretically work in the part, and has seemed perpetually on the cusp of stardom for much of his career. His role as a fledgling MI5 agent on Apple TV’s espionage drama Slow Horses could spoil his chances, though – there, he’s meant to be a bit of a ropey spy who’s always getting himself into ridiculous situations, so taking him seriously might be a struggle.
Noah Jupe
At 21 years old, Noah Jupe – who you might know from A Quiet Place, Hamnet and this year’s Romeo & Juliet in the West End – is potentially just way too young for this. However, one of the many often contradictory rumours circling about Villeneuve’s Bond is that it will take place either at the very beginning of 007’s espionage career, or even in spy school itself. And Amazon will want someone who could more or less grow into the role. Jupe is also a bit of a recent favourite of casting director Nina Gold, who is leading the Bond auditions and has cast Jupe in three movies in the past two years (Hamnet, where he played the stage thesp playing Shakespeare’s son, and the forthcoming The Death of Robin Hood and & Sons).
Harry Lawtey
I wouldn’t put an enormous amount of stock in the Nina Gold connection, if I’m being totally honest, seeing as she basically casts everything big and British. But Gold did cast the 29-year-old Industry star in Sam Mendes’s forthcoming Beatles biopics (he plays the band’s original bass player Stuart Sutcliffe) and he has a rogue-ish, debonair charisma that could work for 007. I can’t see him not auditioning at the very least.
Leo Woodall
The unstoppable rise of One Day’s Leo Woodall remains one of the great mysteries of our time – why was he so wooden in Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy?? – but you could argue that his recent run of movies has been one long audition for 007. The 29-year-old showed off lots of muscular sensitivity in the well-reviewed heist movie Tuner recently, and led Apple TV’s espionage thriller Prime Target to strong reviews last year, too. Coming up is the Sydney Sweeney period comedy The Custom of the Country, which was cast by… ooh look, Nina Gold!
Patrick Gibson
Wouldn’t it be funny if the new James Bond was hiding in plain sight this whole time? The 31-year-old Irish actor – who appeared on Netflix’s The OA and played a young Michael C Hall on the prequel series Dexter: Original Sin – currently lends his likeness and voice to the video game 007 First Light, so is au fait with the ins and outs of the character and the Bond audition room. Interestingly, Gibson himself has never explicitly said whether or not he’s in the mix for the IRL Bond. Asked by Radio Times whether he agreed with comments made by his First Light co-star Lennie James that he’d be perfect for the films, Gibson merely replied: “Big love to Lennie for that … That was just really, very kind of him to say that.” Way to dodge the question, Paddy!
