Across the road from the five-star London hotel where Pierce Brosnan is staying, a white Rolls-Royce is parked by the pavement. Its registration plate is 007. Is he being stalked, or just haunted by Bond? “I’ll be haunted for the rest of my life by Bond,” Brosnan says with a chuckle. “Perhaps haunted is not the right word, but I’ll certainly be one of the Bonds, and I’m very proud to have been part of that legacy.”
This is very much the official Brosnan line on the iconic role that propelled him on to the Hollywood A list. I first met him 12 years ago, on the set of the first of his four Bond adventures, GoldenEye. Then in his early forties, Brosnan was all affable charm and smooth-skinned good looks. Since then he has acquired an army of characterful wrinkles, and grey hair that he no longer tries to hide. There’s also a sense of confidence emanating from him in a way it didn’t back then. Perhaps you need to save the world a few times to look this assured.
“Without doubt there’s a certain maturing of me as an actor, in terms of confidence, style of acting and performance,” he agrees. “Casting my mind back to GoldenEye, it was quietly terrifying just going in and playing that role when I'd seen other men fall down — or not quite hit the right mark with it. Also, Bond had been in the doldrums for a number of years. But there was also exhilaration. A pure adrenalin rush every day.”
Having made his mark as the Bond for a generation of young filmgoers, Brosnan is now facing the challenge that awaits everyone who leaves Bond behind. What do I do now? In Brosnan’s case, the problem was rather thrust upon him. In 2004, he left his Hawaii home to make After the Sunset in Nassau, confident that he would return as Bond for a fifth and final time, only to be replaced while on location. Although he has claimed not to be bitter about the producers ’ decision to cast a younger man in Daniel Craig, there’s still a feeling of loss in his voice whenever Bond is mentioned.
Which makes Brosnan’s first post-Bond release all the more intriguing. The Matador is the seventh film from Irish Dreamtime, the company founded by Brosnan and the producer Beau St Clair. In it, Brosnan plays a professional hitman on the verge of a nervous breakdown who befriends an American businessman and, for the first time in years, starts to share his lonely existence. It sounds serious, but it’s very funny, with some terrific one-liners.
“Some of the dialogue has a snap, a punch and a rhythm that allow you to get behind it and whack it home,” Bronsnan says, “instead of standing there with your a*** hanging out giving some limp line after, you know, whatever.”
We are back on Bond again, and straying from the official line. Indeed, if you were tempted to read anything into The Matador, it would be that this is Brosnan sticking two fingers up at Bond. This, his performance suggests, is what a professional killer is like. Rather than cool or heroic, it’s a lonely, meaningless life. Is that a fair assessment?
“Yes, I suppose so. Even when I was playing Bond, you never felt like you were portraying a real man, because they never wrote it like that. They held it so tightly, they were so terrified of being adventurous. They shied away from the guts and the glory that could be there.”
His voice, tinged with regret, trails off into thoughtfulness. His time as 007 is never far away. Later, when talking about the Broccoli family, the dynasty behind the franchise, he says, through gritted teeth: “It definitely is a ‘Family’. Cubby set the benchmark which Michael and Barbara have carried on.”
Even though the part in The Matador is a departure for Brosnan, there have been suggestions that, as originally written, his hitman Julian was even more of a wild character, more overtly bisexual and promiscuous than in the finished film.
“I was cast in it,” recalls Brosnan, “and one weekend I had a crisis of confidence. I began to worry that I really was making a very sharp left turn, that I was going to lose whatever audience I had. We went back to it, did some filleting — and that’s the movie you have now. I wanted to make it more ambivalent, ambiguous. In the script as written he was more gay. I mean, he’s try-sexual really. He’ll try anything. It’s great making this change and rattling the cage and deconstructing what’s gone before, but I didn’t want to bludgeon people with it.”
This is the difficulty facing any actor who leaves behind the role that helped to construct his or her public image. You want to break free of the shackles, yet can’t afford to alienate your fan base. It’s not enough to want to manage your career as an actor. You also have to manage the brand you have become. But “that’s not entirely true,” says Brosnan. “If I was scared of doing The Matador because I thought it would hurt my image, paralysis would set in.”
Nevertheless, Brosnan’s announced future film roles — as a retired safecracker (Instant Karma), a family man at the centre of a kidnap drama (Butterfly on a Wheel), a second stint as the art thief Thomas Crown (The Topkapi Affair) and a civil war colonel (Seraphim Falls) — suggest a man carefully navigating a gradual curve, rather than a “sharp left turn”.
“There is an arc forming,” he says. “There is some sense of performance or character that I’m leading myself to. There are performances inside me that I haven’t tapped, facets of my character I haven’t shown.”
There’s also the chance that Brosnan might join in the current flight from Hollywood to the stage on this side of the Atlantic. “Michael Colgan at the Gate (in Dublin) is always offering me Pinter, Pinter, Pinter, which is something that I love watching but has always terrified me as an actor. Perhaps one day . . . we’ll see.”
Back in the here and now, Brosnan is relishing the uncertainties that the future holds. Given the talent for comedy he shows in The Matador, I suggest, he could reinvent himself as Leslie Nielsen did, turning a career of straight heroes into comedy overnight with the Naked Gun series.
Brosnan laughs. “I would love that. Playing Bond was a bit like that, running along with the delightful Halle Berry chasing an enormous plane. It’s half a hair from spoof the whole time. You could tip it over so easily.”
Pierce Brosnan may not think he’s haunted by Bond, but the ghost is never far from the table. The Matador is a promising start, but full exorcism still seems a way off.
LICENCE REVOKED - WHERE DID ALL THE BONDS GO?
Sean Connery
Quit the role not once, but three times. Currently enjoys God-like status.
George Lazenby
Stormed out after On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969). Has a lucrative sideline in voiceovers for Japanese anime and video games.
Roger Moore
Hasn’t really been trying since A View to a Kill (1985). Now concentrates on his fine work for Unicef.
Timothy Dalton
A regular on TV and on stage, triumphant in the National's adaptation of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials.
