{"id":3178,"date":"2026-07-10T19:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T14:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=3178"},"modified":"2026-07-10T19:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T14:54:15","slug":"debbie-mcwilliams-ex-007-casting-director-sticks-to-her-guns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=3178","title":{"rendered":"Debbie McWilliams, Ex-007 Casting Director, Sticks to Her Guns"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<!-- do not apply CSS styles to this element! --><\/p>\n<div class=\"pmc-paywall\">\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t<a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/debbie-mcwilliams\/\" id=\"auto-tag_debbie-mcwilliams\" data-tag=\"debbie-mcwilliams\">Debbie McWilliams<\/a>, who cast the last 14 <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/james-bond\/\" id=\"auto-tag_james-bond\" data-tag=\"james-bond\">James Bond<\/a> films, has stuck to her guns when it comes to her view that <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/007\/\" id=\"auto-tag_007\" data-tag=\"007\">007<\/a> should be white and male.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tSpeaking at the <a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/karlovy-vary-film-festival\/\" id=\"auto-tag_karlovy-vary-film-festival\" data-tag=\"karlovy-vary-film-festival\">Karlovy Vary Film Festival<\/a> Friday in an onstage interview, the casting director was asked by an audience member whether the spy could be a woman or a person of color. \u201cNot in my opinion. No,\u201d she responded firmly. \u201cIan Fleming wrote a character, and that\u2019s the character that stays. That\u2019s what I think. I mean, other people might think otherwise, but I don\u2019t think that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tWith McWilliams having retired before Amazon\u2019s acquisition of the Bond franchise, the search for the next 007 actor falls to casting director Nina Gold and director Denis Villeneuve. However, McWilliams still has strong views on the subject as the question and answer session at the Czech festival demonstrated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tMore to follow.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Debbie McWilliams, who cast the last 14 James Bond films, has stuck to her guns when it comes to her view that 007 should be white and male. Speaking at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival Friday in an onstage interview, the casting director was asked by an audience member whether the spy could be a&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3179,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/variety.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Debbie-McWilliams.jpg?w=1000&h=563&crop=1","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3178\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}