Add Roger Moore to a growing list of stars who are chiming in on the debate over whether or not a gay James Bond could ever happen.
The 88-year-old actor, who played 007 in seven films, beginning with "Live and Let Die" in 1973 through "A View to a Kill" in 1985, said a gay twist on the womanizing secret agent would be contradict the way the character was portrayed in Ian Fleming's original novels and short stories.
"I have heard people talk about how there should be a lady Bond or a gay Bond, but they wouldn’t be Bond for the simple reason that wasn’t what Ian Fleming wrote," Moore, currently the longest-running Bond, told the Daily Mail.
Keeping Bond as a straight, Caucasian man is "not about being homophobic or, for that matter, racist -- it is simply about being true to the character," he said.
Moore came under fire earlier this year when he told Paris Match in an interview that he felt that Bond should always be played by an "English-English" actor, as opposed to Idris Elba or American actor Cuba Gooding, Jr. Although some felt his comments had racist undertones, Moore insisted they had been taken out of context.
Still, other actors have shared similar sentiments about Bond being portrayed as a gay man. Pierce Brosnan told Details magazine in August that although he didn't have any personal qualms, he wasn't sure it would be a plausible move.
"I don't know how it would work," he said. "I don't think Barbara [Broccoli, the James Bond producer] would allow a gay Bond to happen in her lifetime. But it would certainly make for interesting viewing."
The current Bond, however, isn't opposed to the idea.
"Anything’s possible," Daniel Craig told Sky News, via Pink News. "You can do anything as long as it’s credible and it works. It doesn’t matter."
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