Actor Idris Elba has reportedly turned down the offer to star in the next James Bond film but during a recent interview, he got candid with fellow celebrities about all the efforts to push him to take on the role.

During the Friday edition of The Shop, Elba was a guest alongside Drew Barrymore and Kyrie Irving.

Elba playing the legendary British spy eventually became the topic of discussion, an idea everyone in the room, aside from Elba, seemed excited about.

“If it’s not you, I don’t wanna see it,” Barrymore said supportively.

The Shop’s creator, Paul Rivera jumped in to say, “There’s been a ton of chatter out there that the role was offered. Not offered. You wanted it — didn’t want it. There was a conversation. Wasn’t a conversation. What can you, if anything say about it?”

“Let me throw the question out to you guys,” Elba said. “If you are of the agreement that you think that I should play it, can you ask yourselves why and really answer why you think I should play it?”

Barrymore was first to give her case as to why Elba should take the role.

For me, the great art of art itself is being this beautiful hybrid model that has utter cohesion. Can you be strong and charming and sexy and seem like a friend, be intimidating? How many characteristics can one person embody, but be utterly unique at the same time. You are that.

Co-host of The Shop, Maverick Carter, jumped in next to share his thoughts.

I was just gonna say, cause you’re handsome and cool and English.

But Elba wanted to push deeper into the conversation and pivoted the question to the idea that race was the biggest factor behind the hype.

“Do you think that there’s a nostalgia — and be honest, there’s a nostalgia to the idea. I shouldn’t say nostalgia. There’s an allure to the idea of me being the first Black man to play that character?”

Carter agreed but Barrymore insisted it was more about the qualities of Elba’s acting than anything else.

“For me, it’s you. It’s also, there’s another characteristic that you don’t embody, which for me is my number one, ‘I gotta go’ characteristic, which is smug. I fucking hate smug more than anything in the world. And you don’t carry that,” Barrymore said.

“And yet you have every confidence and capability in the world, but you’re devoid of the one that alienates people, I feel the most. I like people who bring people in. I do not wanna be pushed away and sit there and think I have to like this. Bring me in. You bring people in and you are not desperate or pandering whatsoever,” Barrymore celebrated.

Then Carter turned the tables back toward Elba, asking him if he really wanted to play the role he’s been rumored to have turned down.

“It is not a goal for my career,” Elba said bluntly. “I don’t think that, you know, playing Bond will satisfy some of my personal goals.”

“It will definitely satisfy the will of a nation. I’m not gonna lie, every corner of the world I go and I’m talking about different cultures. They always go ‘Bond,'” he said pointing his finger at himself.

“And I feel it is beyond me at this junction. It’s beyond me. You know, it’s not a question of, should I, do I, will I, it is what the will of the nation dictates sometimes,” he added.

“I’m not that guy, but in everyone’s world I might be. And that — job done, because the truth is, you know, a lot of people are really seeing Idris playing Bond as the ‘alternative Bond.’ And as long as that alternative is existing, that’s great for the growth of fucking casting,” he concluded.

It was reported earlier last month that Elba walked away from negotiations to play James Bond after Daniel Craig, who played the character in five films, left the franchise.

Listen above via The Shop.

The post WATCH: Idris Elba Confronts Fellow Celebs About Why They Want Him to be Cast as James Bond, Asks if It’s Just Because of Race first appeared on Mediaite.

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