James Bond Update: Amazon & Eon at ‘Impasse’ Over Future of 007 Movies

The future of the James Bond franchise is currently in limbo as Amazon and Barbara Broccoli’s Eon Productions are reportedly at an impasse.

The last James Bond movie, No Time to Die, was released in 2021. Marking Daniel Craig’s last outing as 007, attention has now turned toward who will be cast as the world-famous spy next and when another installment of Bond movies will be released.

According to The Wall Street Journal, it might be a good while before anything comes to fruition.

“Nearly three years after Amazon acquired the right to release Bond movies through its $6.5 billion purchase of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studio, the relationship between the family that oversees the franchise and the e-commerce giant has all but collapsed,” The Wall Street Journal’s story reads. “The decaying partnership has scuttled any near-term hope of a new Bond film—a black eye for Amazon’s ambitions in Hollywood, since at the time of the MGM sale, the Bond franchise represented a significant share of the $6.5 billion the company paid for the studio.

“When it comes to Bond’s future, the power lies in the hands of Barbara Broccoli, who inherited the control from her father, Albert ‘Cubby’ Broccoli, and who for 30 years has decided when a new Bond movie can go into production. She has told friends she doesn’t trust algorithm-centric Amazon with a character she helped to mythologize through big-screen storytelling and gut instinct. This fall, she characterized the status of a new movie in dire terms—no script, no story, and no new Bond. To friends, Broccoli has characterized her thoughts on Amazon this way: ‘These people are f— idiots’”

What else do we know about the James Bond situation between Amazon and Eon?

The Wall Street Journal spoke to over 20 people who are familiar with the feud between Broccoli and Amazon. Despite having acquired MGM, Amazon is unable to make any new Bond movies or projects without Broccoli’s involvement.

Eon Productions told The Wall Street Journal that Broccoli and other members of the family had no comment about the matter.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Broccoli had reservations about the MGM/Amazon deal; however, she “didn’t want to complicate what many in Hollywood viewed as a massive payout for MGM’s owners—plus, she and her family would retain final say over all creative matters, including who plays Bond.”

Amazon has since presented Broccoli with a number of ideas for Bond spin-offs, reimaginings, and more. 

“[Amazon’s Mike] Hopkins assigned the delicate task of managing the relationship to one of his top entertainment executives, Jennifer Salke, a former NBCUniversal executive who has run Amazon Studios since 2018. Broccoli was irked in one early meeting when Salke referred to James Bond by a dreaded word: ‘content.’ Using such a sterile term, one friend reflected, was like a ‘death knell’ to Broccoli.”

At this time, no new Bond movie or project has been officially announced.

Source: Comingsoon.net