This year’s Cannes has been a publicity blitz for The Golden Compass and New Line kindly invited BridgeToTheStars.net to interview the major stars of the film. Roundtables were held with Dakota Blue Richards, Daniel Craig, Eva Green, Sam Elliot and director Chris Weitz. The print journalists there asked most of the questions, but we were lucky to get a few in to each member of the cast. As the only fans there, ours were the ones asking about the books!

We start our interview reports with Daniel Craig and will be posting the 4 other interviews over the next few days – so look out for those! Daniel was very dapper for the occasion, turned out in his purple shirt and with a flower in his jacket. He exhibited a habit of frequently fondling his ear during the talk.

We captured full audio of the interviews, which turned out surprisingly legible – the quality is not broadcast material, but it’s perfectly listenable and well worth doing so to hear the stars in their own voices. Press the play button on the player above (below the image), or click here to download the file directly. (BttS’ question is at 11.03)

The full transcript of the interview is below: we recommend listening and having the words ready to read at the same time.

Daniel Craig roundtable

Journalist: So what is it like, what about this time, it’s quite, maybe the first time-

Daniel Craig: -good to be here. (laughter)

Journalist: Is this really the first time in your career to play with such a young girl and to play together with a daemon and so on? That is very interesting? It does appear you are less relaxed compared with the press conference.

Daniel Craig: I’m less relaxed?

Journalist: No, no more relaxed.

Daniel Craig: Well, ’cause that was really nerve-wracking. I am a very.. it’s the first time I’ve worked with so much special effects; I’ve not actually done very much. But I mean, there’s always a certain aspect in big movies that you’re going to do, but not like this. It’s been a great experience; but I’ve been lucky enough that my character’s quite aloof. He doesn’t have to have major conversations with his daemon. I have a connection with the bears and I have.. I mean, it’s an acting job; I’ve been doing it a long time – imagining people who aren’t there has never been particularly difficult for me. I don’t know whether that’s a good thing.. (laughter)

And you know, I don’t know if you’ve met Dakota yet, but she’s a piece of work.

Journalist: The first time I interviewed you was for a production back in November.

Daniel Craig: Ah there you go. It was another lifetime ago.

Journalist: I was a little worried about you. Are you fine?

Daniel Craig: I’m surviving. It’s been a great year. We made a great movie [Bond: Casino Royale] last year and lots of people went to see it and they seemed to like it. It’s very simplistic, but it kind of feels like that.

Journalist: Was it a triumph to have these incredible figures of box offices etc, after all what you went through in the beginning?

Daniel Craig: Honestly, I knew we had a good film. I knew we had a good film. I couldn’t predict that it was going to do that well at the box office, nobody could; I think everybody was surprised. But I just knew that we’d all put in enough work and we’d all put in enough into making the movie that.. I didn’t feel that.. The triumph itself was making the film we made the film and we made it well. So everything else after that was a bonus. How santicmonious. (laughs) I was really happy. It was really good news when those figures came in.

Journalist: You didn’t know how big your Bond was going to be when you start.. not start shooting, but when you signed for this film, so this is probably going to be a franchise as well. Now Chris [Weitz] just told us that now what’s quite a stretch logistically to fit your shooting days in your Bond schedule. So for the next few years, if this [TGC] is going to be a franchise as well, you have two franchises and you want to do some other stuff as well; how are you going to cope with that?

Daniel Craig: There’s time. And if there isn’t there isn’t. I love going to work. I mean, as long as I’m not doing too much that it becomes a bore. What’s great about.. these films will be spaced and.. there’s going to be time, we’ll figure it out.

Journalist: Practically how many days of shooting does..?

Daniel Craig: Oh well I mean, Bond’s 6 months of shooting. So that’s half the year. And then another 3 months at the end of the year to advertise the movie. There’s a couple of months in there to squeeze in something, which is what I did with this [TGC]. But this year’s free, so this year is.. you know I don’t start shooting [Bond] until the end of the year or the beginning of next year, so I’ve got 12 months to think of something else.

Journalist: Do you want to do smaller things in those 12 months?

Daniel Craig: I’m doing something, I kick off with something next week – a film called Flashbacks of a Fool, it’s rather cool, which is being directed by a friend of mine in South Africa. And that’s much.. no animals, one explosion!

Journalist: Do you prefer that?

Daniel Craig: I don’t know. I like working, seriously. If it’s good enough, I will do it. And I’ve got time. I’m not very good at not doing things.

Journalist: Because you’re in danger of becoming an action hero.

Daniel Craig: Do you think? Oh well. There’s worse things.

Journalist: I know you said before you’d like to do some other films, by a British director, do you know that he’s looking for English and American actors now?

Daniel Craig: No I do. I do know, yeah. I looked him up immediately. Had a long chat, hopefully have a future-

Journalist: -after this project, or..?

Daniel Craig: We talked about it. But there was timing issues and things, so.. I like him very much; I hope he bears me in mind should he-

Journalist: -next time.

Journalist: Is that something that’s still possible? When you have your status now – whether you like it or not – can you still do, let’s say, a film with a movie ~inaudible~; or a smaller part in a big film like Munich. Is that still possible?

Daniel Craig: I don’t see why not. I think it’s.. if it isn’t it it’ll be sad. But I’m doing it. I mean I’m already, this movie, I’m playing not a huge part in this – but it’s an intrinsic part of the story. I’m doing a small movie, ten days shooting on next week. I haven’t considered the possibility of it not being a problem. If it becomes one, I’ll react to it.

Journalist: From just this morning, [I] started to doubt whether all the subversiness of Pullman’s novel is going to be there. Was that part of the attraction for you?

Daniel Craig: For me? Yes. It was very much part of it. I hope I managed to put a bit of that in there with what I’m doing. He’s [Pullman’s] a very subversive human being – a very intelligent, lovely human being, but he’s got a big subversive streak. Very appealing.

It’s the debate the books raise that I find so interesting. And I know they’ve been accused of being anti-religious, I don’t actually agree with that – I think it’s quite the opposite really, they believe in faith and they believe in all the original Christian ideas of love and charity. If it [the film] raises a debate about organised religion, that can’t be a bad thing.

Journalist: The institutions of religion rather than the people.

Daniel Craig: Yeah, the institutions. That’s exactly.. I’d much rather use that; thank you for that. (laughing)

Journalist: Have you spent a lot of time with Pullman?

Daniel Craig: I have. We’ve had a couple of – fairly – sober evenings. I was a big fan of his obviously because I’d read the books. And he is.. the books. He’s got a lot of energy and desire and feels very passionately about what he writes about. Very appealing.

Journalist: Isn’t it inevitable to clean the material of too much [religious] issues? Especially if you’re thinking of the American market?

Daniel Craig: I don’t think we should worry about it. I really don’t. Because actually, the books, that’s not the central theme of the books. The central theme of the books is the journey of this young girl and how she deals with the problems of going there. And that really is – and I’m not trying to deflect the press ~inaudible~. I think that it’s.. look, this is personally, I don’t think there’s a problem. I really don’t think there’s a problem with this debate. I think it’s a very healthy thing to talk about and if we do raise controversy in the States then we should deal with it.

Journalist: Are you ready for it? I mean you’re such a-

Daniel Craig: -oh I personally am. I’ve got no problem. I’m very clear on the way I think about these things. And I don’t want the movies apologising for any of it. It’s a film against oppression. And there’s nothing wrong with that picture.

Journalist: What is your first fantasy-

Daniel Craig: -can’t get into that!

Journalist: -story.

Daniel Craig: -oh.

Journalist: What is your first fantasy film that you have been seeing?

Daniel Craig: I read Tolkein when I was a child. I still read Lord of the Rings occassionally. It’s one of the books that I revisit. But I revisit these books [HDM]. They’re kind of great.. I take, you know, you have a holiday and you have two weeks, they’re kind of easy books to pick up and just plow through.

Cinema experiences, it’s the Wizard of Oz. I’m not that old, but it was still playing in cinemas when I was a kid. And you could still go and see it.

Journalist: What is the relationship between you and Nicole Kidman in this role? In this film? It’s very like a magic ~inaudible~

Daniel Craig: No, we’re the mother and father of Lyra. We never married.

Journalist: So is it like-

Daniel Craig: I killed her husband.

Journalist: Ohh. ~inaudible~ Or you know, night ~inaudible~

Daniel Craig: Oh her? Her character. She’s kind of complicated and powerful and provocative and sexy and that’s just Nicole. But she’s, it’s a really good part for her and she plays it very beautifully.

Journalist: What about The Invasion?

Daniel Craig: That’s coming out in.. July, I think. It’s been a while; we did some extra scenes on that, there was a delay on that.

Journalist: How’s working with Oliver Hirschbiegel?

Daniel Craig: How was it working? Downfall’s one of my favourite movies; it’s a very special movie. Good man.

Journalist: How’s the physical maintenance compared to what you had to do for Bond?

Daniel Craig: Walk into a room, walk out of it. It’s a great relief. Well, except we’ve been doing these shots – we’ve been up in Switzerland doing these extra scenes. I’ve been sliding down my arse on a glacier for the past week and it’s been quite.. It’s been fantastic. We were literally helicoptered up there and spending the day up on a glacier filming some chase sequences. We’re using it as being the North Pole and around northern Scandinavia.

Journalist: Your Parkour training came in handy there did it?

Daniel Craig: My Parkour? I don’t have any Parkour training. The guy that I was chasing knew how to Parkour; I didn’t, I kept on falling on my face.

BridgeToTheStars: Can I ask about that extra scene at all; because your character’s not really in the first book much – is that an extra scene-?

Daniel Craig: It was kind of originally mooted, only because of storytelling. And it’s obviously an adaptation of a book, so you can really only take so much out of the book and go with it. What shooting the extra scene has been about is having a different place to go to, so when you’re watching the movie, we can intercut between one aspect of the story and another aspect of the story. So there was always an idea to do this scene.

BridgeToTheStars: It sounds like it’s more another action scene.

Daniel Craig: It’s become something like that, but it’s something that Philip actually was very keen to get in; he’d sort of said, within the movie, he kind of felt that we needed to sort of remember where Lord Asriel was – being chased around the North pole by Samoyed bandits.

Journalist: We have to ask this question-

Daniel Craig: -You don’t have to. No-one has to do anything. (laughter) That’s what these books say.

Journalist: We try to do our talking because otherwise the Authority-

Daniel Craig: -You’re the Magisterium, I understand.

Journalist: So um, one might suspect that when you have a big star, that has a major part in the next few episodes – but if I understood correctly, not so big a part here.. “We have Daniel Craig now, we need an extra scene” ?

Daniel Craig: I don’t think that’s really going to be a problem. Once you’ve seen the movie it’s not going to be a problem. I play a part – I’m part of this movie – and the movie will stand up with or without me, I know that. This isn’t my movie, this is Dakota’s movie. I’m part of it, a small but fairly important part. I like to think so.

Journalist: Can you tell us a little bit more about your part? Because I haven’t read the books, but you’re apparently a bit of a hero and a villain at the same time.

Daniel Craig: It’s complicated. He’s Lyra’s father, but he’s sort of given.. Lyra’s parents have given their child to this college in Oxford, which is in a parallel universe to ours, but very similar in lots of ways. He has a desire to open up the heavens so that knowledge and understanding can float between the worlds and we’ll understand the world sort of scientifically I suppose. Because he’s a scientist; we’ll understand the world better and freer for it.

Whereas Nicole’s character, Mrs Coulter, plays someone who belongs to an organised religion or authority that wants to shut everything down, because if everyone free-thinking then things are going to go tits-up really quickly. Which is.. I mean it’s very badly put, but that’s kind of how I view the story.

Journalist: Enlightenment?

Daniel Craig: Enlightenment? Yeah, whatever way you twist it. Lord Asriel’s way of looking at enlightenment. He.. he.. Enlightment at what cost? That would be the best way of putting it. Because he actually believes that a few people – it doesn’t matter whether a few people die in the process. His mind is good and his heart may be is not in the right place.

Journalist: Can you ~inaudible~ [question?] all sorts of hero, more with the Bond movie or The Golden Compass?

Daniel Craig: I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about that. (laughs) Thank you very much.