Tarantino’s Lost Projects: ‘Casino Royale’

Almost more interesting than the films Quentin Tarantino has chosen to do are the ones he has either been rumored to be behind or has stated himself that he would like to do.   In honor of Quentin Tarantino week here on the site, we thought it was time to go back and look over some of these lost projects.   Some of them never got past the concept stage.   Some might even still be lingering somewhere in the back of QT’s mind.

Let’s start the discussion on today’s film with a quote from our favorite director:

Someday I’m going to get   the rights to do ‘Casino Royale,’ the first James Bond novel, and do it the right way. I really wanted it to be my followup to ‘Pulp Fiction’ and do it with Pierce Brosnan, but have it take place after the events of ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ – after Bond’s wife, Tracy, has been killed. “I want Bond to be in mourning when he falls in love with Vesper Lynd, the woman in the novel. From what I know of Brosnan and read in interviews, I think he’d want to go in the direction I’d want to take Bond, though I’m not certain producers of the series would agree.

This quote came in October of 2003 in an interview Tarantino did with The New York Daily News.   The director even claimed to have been working behind the scenes with the Fleming family.   Still, Tarantino expressed a belief that producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli were hesitant to move their beloved franchise away from the action-oriented style to a more character-driven one.

In 2004, Tarantino had this to say to Sci-Fi Wire:

I don’t see that they have anything to lose at all.   They’ve got this gigantic franchise, they can’t do anything wrong with it. Pierce Brosnan’s only going to do one more movie for them, if that, so if he stayed on to do one more with me, let’s just this one year go my way and do it a little differently. I won’t do anything that will ruin the series.

Wouldn’t it be great to have a James Bond movie that didn’t cost $115 million and only cost $40 million or something like that?   You know it’s going to make its money back, and we [would] all do good. Maybe we win the critics this time, then you’re back in business the way you were before.

In that piece, Tarantino also expressed interest in making the new ‘Casino Royale’ adaptation a period piece, setting it in the swinging ’60s.

Of course, “certain producers” agreed that ‘Casino Royale’ was the way to go with the Bond franchise.   They just didn’t agree that Tarantino was the right choice to helm it.   In 2005, it was announced that Martin Campbell would be directing the next James Bond film, and that it would, in fact, be a reboot of the franchise starting with ‘Casino Royale.’

Needless to say, Tarantino believed his idea had been stolen.

I’m annoyed that the James Bond producers never even called me up to talk to me about it because I can tell you they would not be making ‘Casino Royale’ if I hadn’t talked about it first.

They should have called me. Especially since they are taking my idea and they are taking the publicity I gave them towards that idea. They should have at least out of courtesy had coffee with me.

Whether the Bond franchise rebooted with ‘Casino Royale’ had anything to do with Tarantino’s involvement with trying to get the film made remains to be revealed.   It does seem quite coincidental that the producers on the film went the direction they did after the long trek Tarantino took trying to get it made his way.   Who knows what a Tarantino written and directed James Bond film might have looked and sounded like?   We may never know.

Tomorrow’s Tarantino Lost Project: His remake of ‘The 36th Chamber of Shaolin’