Daniel Craig has admitted he regrets saying he would have “rather slashed my wrists” than play James Bond again, believing it made him sound “ungrateful”.
The actor made the remark in an interview back in 2015, after filming wrapped on the last 007 film Spectre, having broken his leg during the shoot.
Reflecting on the remark now that he is actually leaving the movie franchise, Daniel insisted he was joking when he said it.
He told Radio Times: “To be completely honest, I was thinking: I don’t know if I can do another one of these.
“I finished filming Spectre with a broken leg.
“To your point about being in my 50s now, I thought, ‘Do I have this in me? Do I want to go through all of this?’ I needed a break.”
He added: “But a little more skill in the answer might have been better.
“I was joking, but it came across as ungrateful.”
Bond producer Barbara Broccoli took responsibility for Daniel making the comment, saying they had put him on a press tour too soon after the shoot.
“That was our fault, she said. “It had been a long shoot. He’d had an injury. And then we said, ‘Why don’t you just do a week of press at the end of the shoot?’
“This would be like saying to somebody, when they’ve run a marathon, as they cross the finish line, ‘When are you running your next one?’ It was our fault.”
Daniel, who debuted as Bond in 2006′s Casino Royale, is set to make his last appearance as the spy in the upcoming No Time To Die, which is released later this month.
The film has been pushed back multiple times – it was originally slated for release in November 2019, but was rescheduled for April 2020 after the departure of director Danny Boyle.
The coronavirus pandemic then moved the release date a further two times.
Daniel was seen choking up on the set of the film after shooting his final scenes in a clip taken from the Apple TV+ documentary Being James Bond.
The actor held back tears as he gave an emotional speech to the cast and crew, in which he called working with them “one of the greatest honours of my life”.
The full interview with Daniel Craig appears in this week’s issue of Radio Times, on sale now. No Time To Die is released in UK cinemas on 30 September.