Back in May 2018, fans of the James Bond film series got excited when it was confirmed that Academy Award-winning director Danny Boyle will direct the next adventure of Agent 007. Several months later, however, Boyle decided to exit the project with “creative differences” being cited as the main reason for the decision.
Now, after the dust settled, the Slumdog Millionaire director decided to clarify these “creative differences” in a recent interview and explain why he really quit James Bond 25.
According to Boyle, he made a script with John Hodge (Trainspotting) and wanted to do that version of the movie, while the studio and James Bond producers had different ideas. Since the 62-year-old director didn’t want to bail out on Hodge, the pair decided to leave the project together.
“I learned quite a lot about myself with Bond. I work in partnership with writers and I am not prepared to break it up,” said Boyle. “We were working very, very well but they didn’t want to go down that route with us. So we decided to part company, and it would be unfair to say what it was because I don’t know what Cary [Fukunaga] is going to do. I got a very nice message from him and I gave him my best wishes. It is just a great shame. What John [Hodge] and I were doing, I thought, was really good. It wasn’t finished, but it could have been really good. You have to believe in your process and part of that is the partnership I have with a writer. It is like someone coming and saying, ‘Hey, we are going to give you a different editor.’ Those fundamental partnerships are vital.”
After Danny Boyle left, Cary Fukunaga (Beasts of No Nation, True Detective) was hired to take over the directorial reigns on James Bond 25. The movie is set for release on April 8, 2020, with Rami Malek (Bohemian Rhapsody) joining the project as a villain.
