Why ‘Bond’ Mogul Barbara Broccoli Has Earned a License to Chill - Hollywood Reporter

For nearly three decades, the shockingly modest producer (and former Hollywood Reporter intern) has steered the James Bond franchise through multiple reinventions — including handpicking Daniel Craig — and now sits atop a 007 empire worth billions.

She took over The Hollywood Reporter at a very difficult time and steered it through very tricky waters,” Broccoli recalls of the woman who inherited the reins after her husband, THR founder William Wilkerson (whose editorials helped blacklist alleged communist sympathizers), died in 1962.

Though she had no idea at the time, Broccoli was poised to become a Hollywood torchbearer like Lansing and Wilkerson and leave an indelible mark on the film business.

For nearly three decades, she and half-brother Michael Wilson have controlled the James Bond franchise, the series of 25 spy films that kicked off in 1962 with Dr.

But Broccoli has remained steadfast in keeping the property from becoming diluted by TV series and film spinoffs.

“Sure, there are other main characters like M and Q and all that,” says Broccoli with a laugh as she settles into a plush couch in her London home.

“But we haven’t really wanted to make a Bond film without Bond.

Sporting a black short-sleeved sweater and black-rimmed glasses, Broccoli admits she is uncomfortable being profiled (“I’m pretty private and pretty shy,” she says. “I’m a behind-the-scenes person”) and bristles at the idea that she wields extraordinary power and control in an IP-obsessed entertainment landscape.

“Cubby” Broccoli and stage and film actress Dana Natol — who together acquired the Bond franchise as well as the property Chitty Chitty Bang Bang back in the 1960s.

Today, Broccoli and Wilson co-own with MGM Studios the copyright to all the Bond films and dictate any future content?

“She brought the character and the franchise into the modern era without compromising what’s entertaining about a Bond movie and very discreetly did away with some of the less inclusive things that were OK back in the ’70s,” says Universal chair Donna Langley, a Broccoli friend who worked with the producer on the latest Bond entry, this year’s No Time to Die.

As for Craig, who has worked with the producer on five Bond films beginning with 2006’s Casino Royale through No Time to Die, he sees Broccoli as very much in charge but willing to allow others to share in the decision-making.

As the youngest of four children in a mixed family — she and Wilson, 79, have the same mother but different fathers — she toggled between living in London and visiting exotic Bond locations.

Most people can’t boast of childhood memories involving Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire, like Broccoli can.

(“It was the ’60s and ’70s, so he was kind of a cool looking guy with a beard, long hair.”) But the elder Broccoli was already beginning to lean on his stepson for Bond legal advice.

“Michael was working as a lawyer and my parents relied on him for a lot,” Broccoli remembers.

With 1977’s The Spy Who Loved Me, which starred Roger Moore and featured the Carly Simon classic song “Nobody Does It Better,” Broccoli officially began working on the Bond franchise, captioning stills for the publicity team.

“There was a lot of pressure around that time because my dad was not well and wasn’t working on the film,” says Broccoli.

“It was also a time when the [Berlin] Wall had come down and the press was saying, ‘Well, the world’s in a safe place, and who needs James Bond?’ The world has not been in a safe place since then.

James Bond finally had a female boss with the introduction of M, played by Judi Dench.

And the Bond beauties began to evolve from one-dimensional stereotypes into fleshed-out characters like Michelle Yeoh’s Wai Lin in 1997’s Tomorrow Never Dies and Halle Berry’s Jinx in 2002’s Die Another Day.

“I think one of the successes of Bond is that it hasn’t been afraid to change with the times,” Broccoli says.

“Sometimes it got a little stuck in the time, but the books were written in the ’50s, the films started in ’60s.

“And this very attractive woman says, ‘Hello, Daniel.’ I was like, ‘Who the fuck is this?’ I had no idea who she was, which probably just amused her.

With the Craig era coming to an end with No Time to Die, Broccoli is poised to recalibrate again.

“I want to let this film play and really celebrate Daniel’s incredible achievement that he has done over 16 years,” she says.

“People always ask, ‘Oh, who’s the next James Bond?’ It’s like asking a bride as she’s going up to the altar who’s her next husband going to be.

For his part, Fukunaga says collaborating with Broccoli and Wilson was like nothing he had experienced before

“It’s something we’ve been working on for many, many years,” she says

(“She directed her first feature in 2018. She just shot a pilot. She’s doing another movie. She’s definitely headed for a film and writing career,” Broccoli adds.) She also adopted a 16-year-old boy

On this late November afternoon, Broccoli is bracing for some serious alone time

“I like to cook, watch movies, go on the Peloton bike when I’m feeling energetic,” she says