Halle Berry is busy promoting her new Netflix movie, The Union. My husband and I watched it last weekend. I liked it, but he did not. It followed the basic format of its genre and I correctly guessed the back-half of the movie’s plot twist within the first five minutes, lol. That was exactly what I was looking for in that movie and it hit its marks. Plus, I appreciated that almost every actor who was playing a spy in it was over 40.

Anyway, Halle did one of Wired’s Autocomplete Interviews, which features celebrities answering questions about themselves that have been taken from Google’s autocomplete search results. One of the questions Halle was asked was, “What James Bond movie was Halle Berry in?” (Halle played Bond Girl “Jinx” in Die Another Day.) In her answer, Halle responded with some high praise for Pierce Brosnan, who was playing Bond at the time. According to her, Pierce is such a wonderful human being that he restored her faith in men.

“What James Bond movie was Halle Berry in? That would be Die Another Day with Pierce Brosnan,” Berry said in the video, in response to a prompt derived from Google searches with her name. “He will always be my Bond, always.”

“I am a Pierce Brosnan fan. He restored my faith in men on that movie,” she added. “There couldn’t be a human who is more of a gentleman than Pierce Brosnan.”

Die Another Day marked Brosnan’s fourth and final turn playing British spy Bond. He first played the role in 1995’s GoldenEye, and Daniel Craig memorably took on the part following Brosnan, beginning with 2006’s Casino Royale. In Die Another Day, Berry played an American intelligence agent named Jinx. The movie released six months after Berry won her Academy Award for her role in 2001’s Monster’s Ball.

“Bond wasn’t on my wishlist, no, to be in one, but I loved the movies always,” Berry further recalled of making the movie while speaking with Wired. “But having been in one, I feel like I’m a part of cinematic history. Those movies are iconic, they will forever be a part of our history, and I’m really honored to have been part of one, especially with Pierce.”

Berry has noted Brosnan’s kindness towards her on the movie’s set in the past, including in 2020, when she shared during an appearance on The Tonight Show that Brosnan once saved her from choking while they filmed a scene together.

“I was supposed to be all sexy and and seduce him with a fig,” she said at the time. “And then he had to get up and do the Heimlich. So not sexy. You should’ve seen it — James Bond knows how to Heimlich.”

“He was there for me,” she added of Brosnan during that interview. “He will always be one of my favorite people in the whole world.”

Berry’s appearance in Die Another Day proved popular enough that the producers behind the Bond movies began working on a spinoff movie for her character, but as Variety reported in September 2020, the studio decided not to move forward with the idea.

“It was very disappointing. It was ahead of its time,” she told the outlet of the idea at that time. “Nobody was ready to sink that kind of money into a Black female action star. They just weren’t sure of its value. That’s where we were then.”

[From People]

I didn’t know that Halle has spoken about how great Pierce is before. That is crazy that he had to perform the Heimlich on her! I looked up what was going on in Halle’s life around the time that she was filming Die Another Day and she was married to Eric Benét at the time. I’m glad Pierce treated her with kindness and respect on set. In response to Halle’s comments, people have been sharing stories on Twitter about their positive experiences with Pierce, from randomly running into him while out and about to confirming that he’s “lovely” to crew members on set. In an age where so many actors have ended up being problematic, it’s really refreshing to hear stories of the good ones. Between Doug Emhoff, Gov. Walz, and now Pierce Brosnan, tonic masculinity is having quite the week.

Right now, Pierce is busy filming the film adaptation of one of my favorite new book series, “The Thursday Murder Club.” He’s playing Ron, which I wasn’t behind at first, but am absolutely willing to give him the benefit of the doubt now. I can’t wait for that movie, especially since we’re going to have to wait so long for book five.




Photos credit: London Features/Avalon, Anwar Hussein / Avalon, Look Press Agency/Look Press / Avalon, Peter Van der Berg/Avalon