Trade press speculate on what triggered Broccoli to sell up
27-Feb-2025 • Bond News
The Hollywood Reporter is amongst the many trade press articles trying to figure out why, after all these years, Barbara Broccoli yielded control of the family business to Amazon.
In their latest piece, they offer two theories:
Theory one: After producing nine Bond films over 30 years, starting with GoldenEye in 1995, Broccoli no longer has the stomach or stamina for another years-long Bond production marathon. Although she’s famously adroit at dispatching meddlesome film executives — something she mastered early on with MGM — Broccoli is said to have grown tired of that as well and clearly hit a wall with her new partners at Amazon, whom she recently described in a Wall Street Journal interview as “fucking idiots.” Those choice words, in retrospect, were probably a clue she’d had enough and was ready to bolt.
Theory two: Jeff Bezos made her an offer she couldn’t refuse. “He read her quote in the Journal and got on the phone and said, ‘I don’t care what it costs, get rid of her,’ ” is what one source familiar with the franchise hears is what happened, confirming that it ended up costing Bezos something like one billion dollars.
“To tell you the truth,” the source tells THR, “nobody knows why Barbara did it. It doesn’t make sense.”
