Since No Time to Die is his last outing at James Bond, Daniel Craig is trying to be less angsty during the promotion. You know he feels relief at the fact that he never has to do anything like this ever again, but still… he’s grumpy about everything, because that’s his nature. Craig sat down with the NY Times to chat about Bond, the future of the franchise, Knives Out and how he’ll probably be known as the Grumpy Bond. Some highlights:

How emotional he was at the end of filming: “I don’t show myself to the world as much as maybe people would like, but that’s my choice. It’s got me probably into trouble and has made people make up their own minds about me. But I’m an incredibly emotional human being. I’m an actor. I mean, that’s what I do for a living. And the clip you’re talking about is the end of 15 years of my life that I’ve put everything I can into. I would be some kind of sociopath not to get a little bit choked up at the end of that. Hopefully, I’m no sociopath.

The viral “ladies and gentlemen, the Weeknd” clip: “They [post that every Friday]? It’s amazing. I don’t know what that is, but thank you. That’s lovely. I suppose I’d have to have social media to know what that was all about.”

His return to Broadway to play Macbeth: “It’s the only other Shakespeare play I’ve read. No, it’s always been one of my favorites. It’s very difficult. It’s fast-paced and not particularly long. There’s an opportunity to do something. Broadway has taken such a kicking, like every other industry, and to do something spectacular and magical and weird, to try to get that on Broadway and help out and give it as much of a boost as possible — I know we can do a wonderful production. There will be plenty of things going on, on Broadway next year, and I wanted to join in.

How does one prepare to play Macbeth? “You learn the lines. We’ve got lots and lots of ideas, all of which are just in the conversation stage right now. We workshop the play for two weeks in November and then we’ll start rehearsals in the new year. Hopefully in those two weeks we’ll nail some of these ideas down. And then you just go from there. Thank God we’ve got Sam Gold and Ruth [Negga].

Competing with the Denzel Washington/Macbeth film: “God forbid I was ever in competition with Denzel Washington. Jesus. I don’t consider myself worthy. That doesn’t come into it. They’re going to be very different, clearly, but I don’t worry about those sorts of things. The more, the better.

[From The NY Times]

He also said some words about Knives Out, basically that he was fine now that he was part of another franchise. Probably because the Knives Out franchise is just kind of fun – it’s not like he has to do long, involved action sequences or fly a helicopter or whatever. He can just ACT. I like that he thinks the “ladies and gentlemen” SNL clip is “lovely,” because it is. It’s just a harmless little thing that people enjoy. And “hopefully, I’m no sociopath” is kind of a crazy thing to say, right? “BTW, I’m not a sociopath, fingers crossed!”

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— ladies and gentlemen, the weekend 😌 (@CraigWeekend) October 1, 2021

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.