Steven Spielberg joined “The Rest Is Entertainment” podcast on his “Disclosure Day” press tour and opened up about his repeated failed makes an attempt to direct a James Bond film. The Oscar winner made a private plea to franchise producer Cubby Broccoli after “Jaws” grew to become a blockbuster sensation, however Spielberg was turned down.
“I approached Cubby after ‘Jaws’ was a big hit,” Spielberg mentioned. “I’d always wanted to make a James Bond film from the day I saw ‘Dr. No,’ so I called Cubby after ‘Jaws’ and volunteered. I said, ‘If you need a director, I would love to direct one.’ And he said no.”
Broccoli referred to as Spielberg a couple of years later after the discharge of “Close Encounters of a Third Kind” as a result of he wished to make use of the film’s well-known five-note musical melody in a scene in “Moonraker.”
“I said, ‘I’ll make you a deal. I’ll give you permission to use the five notes if you let me direct a Bond film.’ And he said no. But I gave him the five notes anyway,” Spielberg remembered. “So they consistently turned me down – at least, Broccoli did. He never explained why he wasn’t letting me into the Bond family.”
“When I told that story to George Lucas in 1977, when we were in Hawaii together getting ready for the release of ‘Star Wars: A New Hope,’ he said, ‘I have something better than Bond. It’s called Indiana Smith,’ which is what it was called at the time,” the director continued. “He told me the premise of the Indiana Jones series, and that’s how I got that job. So if they ever asked me to make a Bond film now, my answer would be: ‘You can’t afford me.’”
Bond is much from the one mega-franchise Spielberg flirted with over time. The director was additionally concerned with helming “Harry Potter” however needed to flip down a proposal for the film for the sake of elevating his household.
“There were several films I chose not to make,” Spielberg mentioned in a 2023 interview. “I chose to turn down the first ‘Harry Potter’ to basically spend that next year and a half with my family, my young kids growing up. So I’d sacrificed a great franchise, which today looking back I’m very happy to have done, to be with my family.”
“Disclosure Day” opens in theaters June 12. Hearken to Spielberg’s full interview on “The Rest Is Entertainment” podcast here.
