Gemma Arterton is fairly well-known, and an actress who can jump between indie projects and studio films with ease.
Her luck with quality blockbusters hasn’t been great, even as the films like “Clash of the Titans” and “Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” made decent coin. Daniel Craig’s second and most divisive Bond feature, “Quantum of Solace,” was one such film.
Though she had some roles before that, Arterton’s small part as the film’s secondary Bond girl Strawberry Fields is what really introduced her to the world. Recently she looked back on the role with The Sun and says she was criticized for accepting the opportunity and thinks it’s not entirely unfair:
“At the beginning of my career, I was poor as a church mouse and I was happy just to be able to work and earn a living. I still get criticism for accepting Quantum Of Solace, but I was 21, I had a student loan, and you, know, it was a Bond film. But as I got older I realised there was so much wrong with Bond women. Strawberry should have just said no, really, and worn flat shoes.”
The character, as opposed to the progressive lead Bond girl Camille Montes (Olga Kurylenko), was something of a regressive stereotype. In her few scenes, she engages in some familiar tropes including a seduction by Bond and meeting her death in a memorably grim fashion.
Arterton, currently in the FX/BBC series “Black Narcissus,” will return to the espionage world in the upcoming period piece “Kingsman” prequel “The King’s Man”.
