I haven’t even kept up with all of the drama from the Bond 25 set, but every time I see a new headline, I become more convinced that A) the production is cursed and B) all of the drama will make a very good Vanity Fair article or perhaps even a Hollywood Reporter cover story at some point. Daniel Craig got injured in the first weeks of production, they’ve already had a million mishaps and delays, the production is already over budget and I simply don’t trust the screenwriters or director Cary Fukunaga anymore. But I’m strangely not worried at all at the choice of villain for Bond 25: they hired Rami Malek shortly after he won the Best Actor Oscar this year, and apparently Rami only had one request:

When Rami Malek was asked to play the villain in the ­latest 007 movie he had to think twice before ­accepting the role. Rami wanted a cast-iron guarantee from the film-makers first: he simply wanted an assurance from director Cary Fukunaga that the villain he would play would NOT be a religious fundamentalist or an Arabic-speaking terrorist.

Because Rami’s pride in his Egyptian heritage and culture is, he says “the fabric of who I am”.

“It’s a great character and I’m very excited,” explains Rami. “But that was one thing that I discussed with Cary. I said, ‘We cannot identify him with any act of terrorism reflecting an ideology or a religion. That’s not ­something I would entertain, so if that is why I am your choice then you can count me out’. But that was clearly not his vision. So he’s a very different kind of terrorist. It’s another extremely clever script from the people who have figured out exactly what people want in those movies. But I feel a substantial weight on my shoulders. I mean, Bond is ­something that we all grow up with.”

[From The Daily Mirror]

Rami is a first-generation American, and both of his parents were Egyptian émigrés. Rami was born in LA. Also: Rami and his family are Coptic Orthodox Christians, and they spoke Arabic at home. Which I didn’t know – I didn’t know that Rami speaks Arabic too. I’ve heard him talk about what it means to him to be Egyptian AND American though, and seriously – it was a good call that he cleared that up before he signed on to Bond 25. Weirdly, James Bond films are not really known for the most basic-bitch stereotypes when it comes to villains. I mean, you can still see and feel the thread of British colonialism in Bond movies, especially the older ones, but the villains are rarely “stock Arab terrorist” or “stock IRA dude” or “stock mustache-twirling Russian.”

Photos courtesy of WENN.