ASTON MARTINS, SHARP suits and dry martinis – they’re the hallmarks of James Bond’s ice-cool on-screen persona.
But it appears Sony’s new line of smartphones didn’t quite make the grade. Despite being offered $5 million to hold one of the company’s new Xperia Z4 phones in the latest film instalment, Spectre, star Daniel Craig pushed back because “James Bond only uses the best”.
Leaked Sony emails revealed the electronics giant offered the fee to Craig on top of an $18 million advertising commitment for the film and $5 million “production budget”.
But in the first message from October, recently published by Wikileaks, there was also talk of cutting the reluctant Craig out of the deal – and instead paying a $4 million product-placement fee straight to Bond producer Barbara Broccoli.
It was suggested the leftover $1 million could instead be used to hire “Q” – the tech genius played by Ben Whishaw.
(Broccoli’s) fee would have to include the right for Sony to use the 007 marks including the barrel, but no Daniel,” the message from Sony Pictures marketing exec George Leon said.
A later email, from Columbia Pictures president Andrew Gumpert, said Sony’s smartphone rival Samsung came in with its own offer – a “fixed placement fee” of $5 million with a possible advertising commitment of $50 million.
But he added that “beyond the $$ factor” there was the “creative factor”, with both director Sam Mendes and Craig unhappy with the Sony phone option.
The thinking, subjectively/objectively is that James Bond only uses the ‘best’, and in their minds, the Sony phone is not the ‘best’,” the email said.
Having said that, David said if Sony made a fair market offer, that Barbara, armed with a ‘solid’ financial proposal would go to work on Sam and Daniel and get this pushed through creatively. He obviously can’t guarantee that result (and he said as much), but he seemed very genuine and forthright on our call.”
It wasn’t clear from the messages what deal was struck, but it appeared the sides eventually reached an agreement with a third email chain including specifications for six units of a black “Bond phone”. A 4.6″ Sony Z3 was suggested as “the 1st candidate”.
The film is being made by Columbia Pictures, a subsidiary of Sony Pictures, and is due for release in November. Until then, over to you Bond.
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