Danny Boyle reveals why he quit 'Bond 25'

Danny Boyle has said that it was disagreement with producers over working with his long-time writing partner John Hodge that led him to walk away from Bond 25.

Boyle signed up to direct the movie in March last year, along with Hodge, who’d written an original story for the franchise, but by August he had stepped down, citing ‘creative differences’.

True Detective director Cary Fukunaga later took over the job, but now Boyle has spoken a little about what happened.

Read more: Has the Bond 25 working title been leaked?

“I learned quite a lot about myself working with Bond. I work in partnership with writers and I am not prepared to break it up,” he told Empire.

“We were working very, very well, but they didn’t want to go down that route. So we decided to part company, and it would be unfair of me to say what it was because I don’t know what Cary is going to do.

“I got a very nice message from him and I gave him my best wishes… it is just a great shame.

“What John Hodge and I were doing, I thought, was really good. It wasn’t finished, but it could have been really good.

“You have to believe in your process and part of that is the partnership I have with a writer. It’s like saying ‘Hey, we are going to give you a different editor…’ Those fundamental partnerships are vital.”

Boyle has worked with Hodge on many films, from his breakthrough Shallow Grave to the sequel to Trainspotting.

A number of rumours emerged around why Boyle and Hodge quit the movie, including Boyle’s choice of a potential villain.

It was also rumoured that the pair wanted to kill Daniel Craig’s Bond off at the end of the movie, and Boyle’s comments don’t necessarily dispute that possibility.

Read more: 007 will drive a £250,000 electric car in Bond 25

After leaving the production, writers Neal Purvis and Robert Wade returned to the fold, having penned every Bond movie since The World Is Not Enough through to 2015’s Spectre.

Writer and director Paul Haggis then worked on a re-write of the script, as did Scott Z. Burns.

It’s now thought that Bohemian Rhapsody star Rami Malek is circling the role of the movie’s villain, with Lea Seydoux, Naomie Harris, Ben Whishaw and Ralph Fiennes all reprising their roles.

Bond 25 – thought to be using the working title Eclipse – is due out in April, 2020.