Report: Danny Boyle quit 'Bond 25' after disagreement over long-time writing partner

Danny Boyle reportedly quit Bond 25 because filmmakers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson wanted to use another writer other than Boyle’s longtime collaborator John Hodge.

According to The Daily Mail, Boyle refused and then walked.

Speculation has been rife around the reasons for Boyle’s shock departure last month, just weeks after it was announced he’d helm the 25th movie in the spy series.

Among the claims have been that he balked at plans to kill off 007 at the end of the movie, and also that his choice of villain, the Polish actor Tomasz Kot, had not been met with approval.

However, it now appears that it could have been all about Boyle’s loyalty to Hodge, with whom he’s worked on numerous movies, from his first film Shallow Grave right up to the recent T2 Trainspotting.

The Mail goes on to report that Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, who have written every Bond movie since 1999’s The World Is Not Enough, are now back on board.

“The Purvis and Wade treatment they wrote earlier was already signed off before the bromance with Danny Boyle and John Hodge began,” a Hollywood source told the paper.

Though a script may have been agreed upon, the movie, which is now expected to miss its November 2019 release slot, still needs a director.

It’s said that the shortlist is down to ’72 and Top Boy director Yann Demange, S.J. Clarkson, who is making the next Star Trek movie, and Bart Layton, who made Sundance hit American Animals.

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