What we may learn (or not) about Bond 24 this week

Bond 24 is expected to formally begin production late this week. Assuming that’s indeed the case, here’s a quick look and what we may, or may not, learn about the 24th James Bond film this week.

Title: Often with Bond films, the title is known as filming begins. Die Another Day was an exception, where the title didn’t come out until after production was well underway.

With Skyfall, THE FUSIBLE WEBSITE sniffed out the title after checking domain registrations. But that trick hasn’t been duplicated so far this time out. ODDS: 3-2

Crew members: Some crew members, including director of photography Hoyte van Hoytema and special effects man Chris Corbould, have publicly confirmed their involvement. When THE NOVEMBER 2011 PRESS RELEASE for Skyfall was issued, many of crew were mentioned. One notable exception was composer Thomas Newman, who was announced later. ODDS: even money

Cast: The actors joining Daniel Craig for his fourth 007 film will likely be mentioned. Who they may play is another thing entirely. Baz Bamigboye of the Daily Mail reported that Christoph Waltz was joining the cast. Later, the Mail on Sunday, a sister publication, said Waltz would play a certain character. Bamigboye wasn’t involved with that story.

Possibility: Waltz is announced but his character isn’t. That’s what happened with actor Ben Whishaw, cast as the new Q in Skyfall. Barbara Broccoli and Daniel Craig denied as late as spring 2012 that Whishaw was playing Q.

Writers: The only official announcement concerning who would script Bond 24 came in November 2012. That’s when MGM, during an investor call, disclosed that John Logan would write Bond 24 and Bond 25. This summer, the Daily Mail’s Bamigboye reported that director Sam Mendes summoned Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, who’d worked on five 007 scripts, to rework Logan’s Bond 24 draft.

Given Bamigboye’s record of 007 scoops being proven correct, it’s almost universally accepted this happened. But it hasn’t been confirmed officially. If a press release comes out this week, it will be interesting to see if a) Purvis and Wade are mentioned and b) if Logan’s name still is attached.

The guess here (and it’s only that) is a press release will say something like, “The screenplay is written by John Logan and Neal Purvis & Robert Wade.” If Logan’s name isn’t included that would indicate the Purvis & Wade rewrite was extremely extensive to the point of throwing out almost all of Logan’s material. If Purvis and Wade aren’t listed, that would make it appear they did more of a polish. For the record, Bamigboye has reported the Purvis-Wade draft was “substantially different” from Logan’s. ODDS: 3-2.