Shaken and stirred

Today I get to wax poetic on dissatisfied stars.

Sound like fun?

When asked by Britain’s Time Out entertainment magazine over breakfast if he would like to play 007 again, Daniel Craig (most recent James Bond incarnation) replied that he would “rather break this glass and slit my wrists.”

What?

Perhaps he was just “in character” for his next acting role as an incredibly hyperbolic idiot.

Maybe that conjecture was a bit harsh.

Look, I know doing anything over and over again can get repetitious. I am also pretty sure Mr. Craig has been injured doing stunts for his part portraying the coolest British spy ever.

But to say you would really rather end your life than play James freaking Bond?

Possibly the whole thing has just left him shaken and even *gasp* stirred.

Maybe traveling to exotic locations around the world is getting too draining on the poor thespian.

Maybe having your name be a household word is just grating. It surely wasn’t before his stint as Britain’s top secret agent.

I might be tempted to say the current Mr. Bond feels he isn’t getting paid enough—but Daniel got paid a whopping 31 million pounds for his role in the last Bond flick, “Skyfall.” That works out to be about 3.9 million gallons American. That’s a lot of juice!

I would think he got as much or more for the recently released 007 feature, “Spectre.”

If Mr. Craig had said that he was just getting tired of the part and would like to move on to different roles I would not have batted an eye. But the statement he did make made me shake my head.

Maybe that’s what he really meant—but didn’t have a script handy to properly frame his words.

I think we have most likely all made off-the-cuff remarks that sound ridiculous even to us later on.

Craig did sound impressed with the thunderous response he got from an American talk show audience when he recently asked them if he should play Bond again.

Maybe he will reconsider self-destruction.

Another actor that has disappointed me with comments made to the media is Idris Elba.

When I first saw Elba in “Thor,” I thought: “Now there’s a guy I would like to meet and talk to. He seems like a nice guy.”

Since then, I have seen him in various other parts and have been pretty impressed with both his acting ability and gravitas.

But he did later go on to say that playing Heimdall in the Marvel movies in general was “torture” that “it ripped my heart out.”

And I am not even taking those quotes too far out of context.

The gist of his complaint is that he would rather play people like Nelson Mandela as he did in the movie “Mandela” than play a fictional character with a huge helmet and contact lenses.

Elba later added in an interview with The Telegraph, “I was like, this is torture, man. I don’t want to do this. My agent said, ‘You have to, it’s part of the deal’.”

Again, what the hell?

You are an actor.

You get paid lots of money to play a character.

You signed a contract.

Be professional.

I get that Elba wants to play impactful real people, but most actors seem to want to play Shakespearian roles too—and you really can’t get much more grander a character than that of a Norse god.

As far as “real” goes, there is at least one group that is outraged that a black man (Did I mention Idris is black? Sorry, didn’t seem important) was playing the sentry of Asgard.

So, in a real way, Elba’s portrayal as a member of the Asgardian pantheon has positively affected racial stereotypes and had the added benefit that it agitated some jackass racists.

My message to these actors is this: Try to remember who you were before the fame. Try to remember how hard it was to break into the business you had to have loved at some point.

As the saying goes, “There are no small parts, only small actors.”

These guys don’t even have small parts. They have larger-than-life roles that they should be very thankful indeed to have.

But hey, these are English guys.

Maybe it’s a cultural thing.

Then there are several Americans that whine about the good fortune they have had too.

I don’t know, but I tend to be pretty happy even when things aren’t going my way because I know things can always be worse.

Why should I worry anyway? Situations have a way of working themselves out.

We could all stand to take a good look at our lots and be grateful for the things that have gone right in our lives and try to learn from the tribulations we have experienced.

Maybe it would help if we had a national day to reflect on things we should be thankful for …