Many actors that didn’t end up playing James Bond had brushes with playing the part, but perhaps none came closer than the late Sam Neill, who came close to slipping on the tux in the mid-eighties. After Roger Moore departed the franchise following A View to a Kill, the hunt was on for another actor to take the part.
While many know the story about how Pierce Brosnan was originally signed for the role, only to lose it to Timothy Dalton at the last minute, Sam Neill came pretty close to being hired, with him doing a pretty convincing screen-test. Check it out:
At the time, Neill probably seemed like a shoo-in, with him having starring in the influential British series, Reilly: Ace of Spies, in which he played a very Bond-like part (and the series was also directed by future Bond-helmer Martin Campbell). Even still, Neill, who allowed footage of his audition to be included on The Living Daylights Blu-ray, admitted years ago to CinemaBlend that he was very reluctant to even audition for the role.
“I did that with extreme reluctance. I think that was the last thing I allowed my then agent to bully me into. Because I said to her, ‘Listen, I do not want to be James Bond. And I particularly don’t want to be that James Bond that everybody says, ‘Look, there’s James Bond in the corner of the restaurant. He’s the one I don’t like.’ So I turn up to Pinewood, I do this audition, the entire thing was mortifying, and luckily I never heard from them.”
When interviewed for the 2000 documentary Inside The Living Daylights, James Bond series producer Michael G. Wilson recalled Neill’s potential as 007, saying:
“All of us were impressed with Sam Neill, and very much wanted to use him. He’d been very successful as Reilly: Ace of Spies. Like a lot of things in life, it was a close race.”
Even though playing 007 is the type of role that could make one’s career, it’s easy to see why Neill might have been reluctant to play the part as it has the tendency to pigeonhole someone. Once you play Bond, the public will always see you that way.
Had things worked out and he’d gotten The Living Daylights, Neill wouldn’t have starred in Jurassic Park – the movie which guaranteed his big screen immortality. Considering the way his career worked out, one has to imagine that Neill was pretty happy that his flirtation with 007 didn’t amount to anything.
Do you think Sam Neill would have been a good James Bond? Let us know in the comments.