Q: So after doing your first, were you automatically attached? Were you totally in love with being Bond?

DANIEL: I think I went into it as open minded as I possibly could. Once I'd made the decision to do it, that was it. There was no point in half-assedly going into this.

Q: Do you see your Bond as different from the others?

DANIEL: I'm a lover of the old lines. I love the Bond lines, I love the martini lines, I love the characters Q and Moneypenny-- but we need to deserve the right to have them. We can't just drop them in as gags. I know it's surprising, but there is a generation of people who haven't seen a Bond movie. They have no idea what it is. I want to entertain them as much as anyone else.

Q: With as many films as there are in the Bond canon, there are a lot of traps to fall into. What choices have you made to avoid falling into self-parody?

DANIEL:  I don't know, but I'm hoping to fall into a little self-parody very soon. I love the black humor of this. I love that there's a relief. There's a huge action sequence, and you have a quip. I've kind of played this very seriously, this role, but only because I think it needed to be played [that way] after “Casino”, because it needed to be sorted out. We need some gags, I know that, but they need to be written, and they need to be kind of formed. I remember on the first one, we had to have the Mike Myers klaxon. Because he tipped up the whole thing [in “Austin Powers”]-- every Bond gag was sort of ripped to pieces. We had to go away from that.

Q: Do you think in the third film you'll go for a lighter approach?

DANIEL: I think we can do anything. I would like to certainly introduce Q and Moneypenny. I would like to introduce them as real characters. I would, personally, like to give them to really solid actors and say 'Make it up. Forget what's been done. Make something up that we can relate to.' I want to spend the first 40 minutes of the next movie on the beach, with a cocktail, just relaxing. I think we can do anything we want. I mean, not go into space.

Q: How is the physical training for this different from your regular routine?

DANIEL: The regular routine, I mean, I go to the gym a couple of times a week to try and keep myself just breathing. But when I'm doing a Bond movie, it's seven days a week. But I don't know any other way of doing it.

Q: Do you have a count of how many Bond related scars you have?

DANIEL: I have a couple. I'm not trying to be macho, I promise you. It happens. The joke of it is, I got 8 stitches in my face in a really kind of asinine fight sequence. I just caught a shoe in the face. But I've been jumping off cranes and not doing anything to myself. I think it's at the end of the movie, we got tired, and I just forgot to flinch.

Q: It looks like that would be part of the fun of the character, being that physical.

DANIEL: There's something that's in me that says there's a movie tradition that says the actor should do the stunt. It goes back to Buster Keaton, it goes back to all those guys. I feel there's a tradition there. I don't do them all, I really don't. I don't want the audience to snap out at the wrong moment. The excitement kind of grows.

Q: When you sat down and watched all of the Bond movies back to back, when you finished the last movie, where did that leave you as an actor? What are you looking for?

DANIEL: Just in case we missed something. Genuinely, I don't want to miss anything. So me of those movies were great, some of them were not so great. Certainly the early ones, the style of them set the mood for movies, not just Bond movies, but set the style of movies from then on in the 60s. There was a Hollywood tradition of making a stylish glamorous movie, and then a grittiness that was starting to come into movie. The Bond movies went on location. It's bad enough trying to film on location, with a film crew. God knows what it was like then, trying to transport people all around the world. But they did it. And it's on the screen. It feels like it.  I went to Bond movies when I was a kid, because, God, he's in the Florida Everglades. It took you to these places. There's a mood that's there that should pervade. Once I've seen it, I've got, OK, I've got that, I'll go do what we do now. Hopefully it's just rubbed off on me a bit.

Q: So it becomes backstory for you?

DANIEL: It's not backstory, no. The backstory, I mean, I went to the back story on Bond. He's an Eaton-eductated orphan who kind of bashed his way through he navy. There's no modern equivalent now. Eaton educated is something I'm certainly not. I wanted to make him part of the modern world, that there's a possibility he could be this, and a possibility he could be that. The Fleming character doesn't exist anymore. He's definitely stuck somewhere in the 50s. 60 cigarettes a day, and a breakfast of four Bloody Marys and scrambled eggs-- as nice as that is, it's not going to get you through the day. It's going to kill you eventually.

Q: Was there a deliberate effort to make this movie more feminist-conscious?

DANIEL: It wasn't--no. That would be some sort of cynical move. That's not the way I make movies, it's certainly not way Marc Forster makes movie. But we took the story on-- he'd fallen in love, been betrayed. To jump in bed with 12 women, it just would kind have been wrong. It wouldn't have fit the story. And the fact that he does have this flirt and lovey thing with Fields, and she's killed immediately. The whole relationship with M becomes stronger. It's not going to stop him. I think the opposite. He's still going to enjoy life. That whole character's James Bond, he lives life at the limit, and it's hopefully sexy. So suddenly he's with the right person, and a like-minded thinking woman, and he's going to jump into bed with them. It's part of the James Bond tradition. The fact that Judi's there as this matriarchal figure, we can really play around with it. She can say, 'You fuck it up. I'll do it.' And it's really good. We can still be misogynistic, but she smacks him down. And it's justifiable.

Q: So it's a little acknowledgement?

DANIEL: Definitely.

Q: What's surprised you most about being on this international, crazy-huge scale?

DANIEL: Every day. I don't know. I'm trying to enjoy all of it, I really am. Whether it's the way I've been brought up, whether it's the way I look at life-- Barbara always says it's the Irish in me that's looking at the glass as half-empty. I'm like, well, this is going to be the last one we do together. that's the way I get myself through it. The idea of how many more movies do you want to make. Well of course I want to make another movie. Of course I want to make another Bond movie. But I'm realistic. Who knows? I'm just trying to get as much out of it as I can. But it's surprising how well they've gone down. Who could know?

Q: I'm sure it's opened doors as far as other roles and whatnot.

DANIEL: I'm definitely having more conversation. I don't know whether they'll ever be put into practice. Good scripts are hard to find. I know that for sure. There's not some secret locked cupboard somewhere where it's like [angelic, hallelujah noises] you go 'Ah, they're here!' You've got to kind of go looking for good stories. That I continue to do.

Q: Marc is quite exceptional, and I'm wondering whether you formed a relationship that will go on to another project, beyond Bond?

DANIEL: I hope so. I really do. I don't know what that would be, but I would love to. I wanted to work with him anyway, but we crossed over like this.

Q: What do you think he brought to Bond that's special?

DANIEL: If you look at his film, they're incred ibly varied. If you were to separate them and show them blindly to people, I think they would probably say they were different directors. He loves making films. He and I discussed this. We started, going, whatever happens, we need to make a Bond movie that will stand, and will look and feel like nothing else but have its roots in the old movies. The discussions we had were incredibly positive about what we were doing, as opposed to being, there's this huge behemoth of a thing that we've got to muscle our way through. We said, no, this has got to look beautiful, it's got to stand out as something classic. But kick ass-- sorry. It's my selling point, I can't help myself. But it has to have those elements in it, and his aesthetic is great. He wants to make beautiful movies.

Q: How did he communicate to you your part as an actor?

DANIEL: We didn't talk a lot during filming. We talked solidly for two and a half months, probably, every day about the part. We rewrote things, we tried to bash it into shape the way we felt it should be, the stories we wanted to tell, what the parts of it. It's difficult with an action movie. With Casino we had a solid story, we had a novel. With an action movie that's just off the bat, you've got to choose some big statements. And our statements were love, friendship, loyalty. And we said, OK, these are the things that we'll stick to. And lets make it about that, and around that we put the rest of the story. But during the film we talked so much about it....we would nod at each other, and just sort of go 'It's OK. We've got it.' And if something would go wrong we would stop and discuss it, but it didn't happen often.

Q: You've got all these crazy locations and the physical activity. How do you come down from this experience?

DANIEL: I go straight to Italy. Straight to-- we stayed in a little house down in the south of Italy, and ate myself stupid. Vodka and tonics for breakfast. What time is it? Cocktail hour! That's important. You have to get obsessive. The thing is with moviemaking, I fight with it sometimes, and people talk about 'Oh, the value of this business,' but when you're making movies you've got to get obsessive. It's hard work. You're intensely working for six months on these movies, and it's every single day basically, and if you don't get obsessive on it you'll wander off. It's a waste of time. I have to kind of shut the door, do things. Read books, watch movies. Just sort of completely away. And I've got very good friends who just take me down a peg. 'Shut the fuck up!' 'But I'm Bond!'

Q: When you signed up for this you knew what you were getting into. Whenever you say something, it's that James Bond said it. Does it still surprise you, how intense it is?

DANIEL: Of course it has. It has surprised me. You could never guess it. That example is perfect. That's exactly.  "Did I say that? I didn't mean that." The other day, someone came up and said what about Thor, and I went "What about Thor? I turned it down." I have no idea about Thor! I just was having a joke, Then it was, "Daniel Craig turns Thor down!" I have to watch. It's a pain, but...

Q: What's next for you?

DANIEL: I've done this film with Ed Zwick, “Defiance”, which comes out next year. Hopefully we'll be bringing it here sometime in January or February. And a holiday, genuinely just a holiday. once we've done this and we've fixed it out, I've got to go and just get on with life.

Q: Do you have children?

DANIEL: I do, I have a daughter.

Q: Is there any idea at this point when another Bond would start up?

DANIEL: No. There's lots to discuss before we get into that. I would be up for getting involved now. I think everybody's just a bit-- it's the end of the process now. getting it out is the major deal. We love each other, but we get sick of the sight of each other too. 'Go away! You go enjoy your family, I'll enjoy mine. We'll come back and talk when the time comes.'

Q: Given your druthers, if you could choose, is there a part or character you would like to play?

DANIEL: No, I never have looked at it like that. I've always just looked-- you read stuff, and you kind of get it, and you say 'That's something interesting.' That's with the Ed Zwick thing. The story came along to me, I hadn't heard of it, and I just felt, 'Ok, whatever we do with this movie, however good or bad it is or whatever it is, the story needs telling.' That's how I approach stuff. There's no king or something that I want to play, or hero in history. I don't look at it like that. Especially because I like heroes that are flawed.

"Quantum of Solace" opens in theaters November 14.