In 2026, the most locked-in James Bond project may not be the one getting the most attention. Amazon’s new reboot has spent the past year generating shortlist chatter, with casting director Nina Gold reportedly linked to younger names like Callum Turner, Jack Lowden, Jacob Elordi, and Paul Mescal, but the studio still has not announced its new 007 or put a release date on the calendar.
Meanwhile, in a much less discussed corner of the franchise, a fully cast and scripted Bond story has quietly come together and already recorded its villains. That project is Young Bond: SilverFin, Big Finish’s 16-episode audio drama adaptation of Charlie Higson’s 2005 novel. In its latest casting addition, Miriam Margolyes has joined the production as Cleek MacSawney, a role that was male in the original book. For anyone unfamiliar with the source material, Higson’s Young Bond novels were something of a phenomenon in mid-2000s YA publishing, following a teenage Bond through his Eton years in the early 1930s and selling millions of copies worldwide.
SilverFin, the first of them, throws the orphaned schoolboy into a mystery surrounding the sinister Lord Hellebore, his Scottish castle and the dark experiments hidden in the waters of Loch Silverfin. Big Finish, the audio house best known for keeping Doctor Who alive on CD through its wilderness years, is adapting the novel as roughly eight hours of full-cast drama across two box sets, with Isaac Rouse of The Crown voicing Bond after a search that reportedly drew over 500 auditions.
Higson himself joined the cast last week as classics tutor Michael Merriot, which tells you how hands-on the author has been with this version. Margolyes arrives as MacSawney, Lord Hellebore’s brutal enforcer on the estate. “Cleek is a violent, probably insane semi-criminal who works for Lord Hellebore on his estate in Scotland. You wouldn’t want to meet her on a dark night, that’s for sure. I do enjoy playing nasty people!” she said (via Radio Times). The producers, for their part, certainly sound pleased with how the casting has played in the studio. Robert Valentine said:
“Casting Miriam Margolyes as the monstrous henchperson Cleek MacSawney was Barnaby’s masterstroke. She’s a phenomenal actor, and absolutely relishes in making MacSawney a vile, revolting, pig-killing ogress. It was a delight watching her work from the back of the studio!”
Fellow producer Lizzie Worsdell added, “I was thrilled when I heard that Barnaby and Rob had cast Miriam. What an icon. She brings exactly the right amount of evil and sinisterness that the role needed. There was never a dull moment when she was around, but as soon as she was in the studio, you were reminded very quickly why she’s such an extraordinary talent. It was a privilege to watch” (via Big Finish Productions). Margolyes has one of the most distinctive voices in British acting, so the casting logic is fairly easy to see.
Two more names were confirmed alongside her. Harry Marcus of Poldark voices Red Kelly, the streetwise friend who joins Bond’s investigation, while Christopher Nathan of The Walking Dead: World Beyond plays George Hellebore, the lord’s son and bully who becomes Bond’s first real enemy at Eton. They join Rouse, Higson, and Charlotte McBurney, the BAFTA-nominated voice of the A Plague Tale games, as horse rider Wilder Lawless. Young Bond: SilverFin arrives on Oct. 29, 2026, and while an audio drama was never going to settle the larger question of Bond‘s screen future, it does stand out as one part of the franchise that is simply getting on with things.
