



Three time Felix Leiter Jeffrey Wright was born on 7th December 1965 in Washington DC.
Starting out on stage, Wright’s first major film role was opposite Harrison Ford in Presumed Innocent (1990), leading to many movie appearances. He appeared as Felix Leiter in Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace.

Mads Mikkelsen, who played Le Chiffre in Casino Royale, was born in Copenhagen on 22nd November 1965.

Tuesday 14th November 2006 marked the Royal World Première of Daniel Craig’s eagerly awaited Bond debut, Casino Royale, in the presence of Queen Elizabeth II.
After a certain element of the fan base railed against Craig as Pierce Brosnan’s successor and the British tabloid press went after him with a vengeance it must have been satisfying when early reviews were overwhelmingly positive. The majority of fans were overjoyed with the renaissance of Bond under Daniel Craig.
The première took place at three cinemas in London’s Leicester Square, the Odeon, the Empire and the Leicester Square Theatre. I was lucky enough to tread the red (and purple) carpet at the première.

Angela Scoular, who Ruby in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969), was born in London on 8th November 1945. She also appeared in the 1967 version of Casino Royale as Buttercup.

Martin Campbell, who directed Goldeneye and Casino Royale and hence introduced both Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig as 007, was born on 24th October 1943 in New Zealand.
Campbell’s other work includes directing episodes of the cult British TV series The Professionals, while film work includes two Zorro films with Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones, as well as an adaptation of DC Comics’ Green Lantern.

Daniel Craig was announced as the new James Bond on 14th October 2005.
Producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson introduced the rather nervous Craig at an event on HMS Belfast on the Thames. Craig arrived on a speedboat accompanied by the Royal Marines and immediately came under attack by part of the fan base, as well as a sustained attack by the UK tabloid press throughout the filming of Casino Royale.
Of course, Craig got to have the last laugh as Casino Royale was a huge success.

Robert Wade, who with writing partner Neal Purvis has worked on each Bond film since The World Is Not Enough (1999, with Bruce Feirstein), was born in South Wales on 16th September 1961.
Following their work on Skyfall it was announced that the screen writing duo were retiring from the Bond films. However, they were hired to work on problems with John Logan’s script for SPECTRE in 2014. On SPECTRE Purvis and Wade received credits for the story, along with John Logan, and screenplay, alongside both Logan and Jez Butterworth.

Caterina Murino, who played Solange Dimitrios in Casino Royale, was born in Cagliari on the Italian island of Sardinia on 15th September 1977.
Photo: Caterina Murino by PM – Il Piccolo Missionario. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.