Half-siblings and producers Michael Wilson and Barbara Broccoli called up Pierce and promptly fired him as James Bond.
He had no warning. It was 2004, and Pierce was thrilled to return to the set and work on Casino Royale, but he was blindsided to learn he wouldn’t be coming back.
Pierce discussed in a book titled Some Kind of Hero: The Remarkable Story of the James Bond Films how it all unfolded and that Barbara cried on the other line as he was fired.
“Michael was stoic and he said, ‘You were a great James Bond. Thank you very much’ and I said, ‘Thank you very much. Goodbye.’ “That was it. I was utterly shocked and just kicked to the curb with the way it went down.”
Pierce was ultimately replaced with Daniel Craig in Casino Royale and that was the end of his 007 days.
Despite being let go in such an unexpected way, Pierce maintains everything turned out alright in the end.
