Jamie Dornan says he 'never wants to be an action star' after Bond rumours
The Irish star plays his most action-heavy role to date in Netflix's Heart of Stone, but he says he likes to have variety in the parts he picks.
This interview took place prior to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike.
Jamie Dornan has long been one of the stars linked to the vacant James Bond role, and his name could well be thrown back into the ring after the release of the upcoming Netflix film Heart of Stone.
The film – which also stars Gal Gadot, Alia Bhatt, and Sophie Okonedo – is by some distance his most-action heavy role to date, with Dornan taking on the role of Parker, the head of an MI6 team.
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But it seems that Dornan might not be too keen to revisit the British secret service on a more regular basis, with the actor recently explaining to RadioTimes.com that he doesn't foresee himself as a consistent action star.
“I love doing it, but you know – I've said this sort of thing before – I wouldn't want to do that movie after movie after movie," he explained.
"I had a great time doing it, and I love exploring that. But that's because I sort of feel the whole point of being an actor is that you do get to explore all these different worlds and genres and play in those worlds.
"I've been lucky so far, in my career, I have had a pretty varied career in terms of the genres I have ended up in from very, you know, heavy drama to very silly comedy and sort of everything in between. And this is an area that I hadn't spent any time in."
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He further explained that he'd previously had action scripts sent his way that he didn't think were the right fit, but Heart of Stone had "all the elements that were enticing" to him.
"But I wouldn't ever want to be an action star," he concluded. "I have no interest in that.”
Given the rather all-consuming nature of playing Bond, this would appear to suggest that starring as 007 is not high on Dornan's agenda, and indeed in a recent interview with Total Film, he said that he didn't give the rumours "a huge amount of thought".
"I’ve been in that conversation for a good couple of years now. Sometimes I’m more in that conversation than other times. It tends to be if you have a movie coming out," he said.
"I imagine that if people are making noise about [Heart of Stone] when it comes out on Netflix, and hopefully lots of people are watching it, then you enter that conversation again in a bigger way than you were before the movie came out.
"If people want to have your name, that’s cool. I just am not one of those people who give it a huge amount of thought."
Heart of Stone will be released on Netflix on 11th August 2023. Sign up for Netflix from £6.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.
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Authors
Patrick Cremona is the Senior Film Writer at Radio Times, and looks after all the latest film releases both in cinemas and on streaming. He has been with the website since October 2019, and in that time has interviewed a host of big name stars and reviewed a diverse range of movies.
