After the departure of Roger Moore as James Bond, the hunt was on for the next 007. A number of actors were being considered to be James Bond #4, but it was Charles Dance who was actively talked out of even auditioning out of fear it would kill his career.
Dance, Charles Dance recently told The Guardian that his odds of playing James Bond were cut off immediately by his agent before the actor could even get the chance to truly consider it, let alone turn it down as some rumors suggested. “Of course I didn’t turn down James Bond! What happened was, my agent called and said: ‘I urge you not to do it. Just think how you’ll feel if you don’t get it. It will kill your career stone-dead.’ She was probably right. If I’d got it, I would have probably fucked it up.”
And so Charles Dance didn’t land the James Bond role in 1987’s The Living Daylight, with it instead going to Timothy Dalton, who stuck around for just two entries (hey, he beat George Lazenby!). Others in consideration were Sam Neill and even Pierce Brosnan, who of course later played 007 in four entries. The hunt for the next Bond is still on following Daniel Craig’s tenure ending with 2021’s No Time to Die. Charles Dance may never play James Bond, but his big screen debut was actually in 1981’s For Your Eyes Only, starring Moore, the man he was talked out of trying to replace. (For what it’s worth, his turn as a Bond-esque villain in Last Action Hero, complete with interchangeable glass eye lenses ripe for explosion, is one of this writer’s favorite antagonists in ‘90s action cinema.)
Now 76, Charles Dance hasn’t slowed down one bit since concluding his run as Tyrion Lannister on Game of Thrones in 2015. Of note, he played Sir Roderick Burgress in Netflix’s adaptation of The Sandman (read our 9/10 review here!) and can now be seen in Paramount+’s Rabbit Hole alongside Kiefer Sutherland.
How do you think Charles Dance would have done as James Bond in the 1980s? Let us know your thoughts below!
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