Daniel Craig is camping out in the basement of an old Greek tobacco factory: report
More Hollywood movie magic (or what passes for it) comes to Athens
Got a light?
Daniel Craig, the actor, is reportedly in Athens for a film shoot. The work in progress will also star Cillian Murphy and Michelle Williams and is a project from Damien Chazelle and Olivia Hamilton's Wild Chickens Productions.
According to multiple reports, this week the old Public Tobacco Factory was the scene of portions of the filming. Reports also indicate the former factory’s basement has gotten a prison-set do-over; aforementioned thespians (or at least 58-year-old Craig) have reportedly gone underground for a spelll, so to speak, as the filming gets under way.
This comes as Greece and Athens in particular have proven to be popular choices for Hollywood cinéastes. It also comes at a time when viewership for awards shows like the Oscars is at a historic ebb, and Hollywood seems hellbent on churning out One Boring Movie After Another.
Having Daniel Craig in your cast is no guarantee a movie is going to hold your interest after the first 20 minutes — see every Bond movie he was in (and probably why, checks cashed, he couldn’t wait to do almost anything else).
Our guess is that director Christopher Nolan had a “role” in persuading the 49-year-old Murphy to take on a project in Greece, given that he directed him in Oppenheimer and recently wrapped shooting of portions of the forthcoming overhyped The Odyssey in Greece.
After the Athens scenes are done, filming is reportedly moving to Corfu.
It remains our view that more movies filmed in Greece ought to be Greek stories. If that sounds stodgy, too bad, because there is some precedent for this: for many, many years, the French government decreed that French radio stations could play American music, but were also obligated, by law, to ensure a certain percentage of music was French.
That is prudent. It almost beggars belief that an actor of such repute as Brad Pitt would spend weeks in historic Hydra filming a movie about a…broken marriage? Because there were no fantastic Greek stories that hatched in Hydra that could have made for some actually dramatic material?
Of course there were, and are. But take it from someone who was raised aux alentours of the Hollywood Hills: La La Land be pretty, yeah, but shallow.
