Street Style

From banking to Bond in just four years, Simon Kassianides is one of the new bad boys on the 007 block. You’d do well to keep him in your sights…. 

Yusef, as described by his off-screen alter ego, Simon Kassianides, is “an agent for Quantum, the organisation that Bond learns more about in this film. His job is to make women of influence who have highly classified information about their governments fall in love with him. The moment they are in love he is ‘kidnapped’ and held to ransom in exchange for the secrets they are privy to.”

And who is man behind the character blamed for unravelling James Bond’s heart and setting him on this vengeful rampage? While you may not have heard of his name (yet), he counts Woody Harrelson as a friend, says Daniel Craig has the bluest eyes he has ever seen and fell madly in love with Eva Green in just one day. Oh, and he took his mum as his date to the royal premiere of Quantum of Solace at Leicester Square in London.

Kassianides is a charming ball of energy you can’t help but instantly like. Somewhat surprisingly, acting wasn’t even on this handsome South Londoner’s radar until about four years ago. Rather, he completed a business degree with his sights set on working in a bank. Realising he didn’t want to be “a cog in the machinations of globalization”, he floated around in a few odd jobs before deciding to see what the world of ‘showbiz’ was all about.

He landed a job as a runner at a production company and, after a year of perfecting the art of tea and coffee making, was asked to jump in front of the camera as an extra – allegedly due to his smouldering Mediterranean good looks. Feeling something click, Simon enrolled in a course at London’s Central School of Speech and Drama and within two weeks was cast in a lead role for a pilot TV series where an agent saw him and signed him on the spot.

A steady flow of television and stage roles followed including a play with Woody Harrelson. Four years later, as he was about to switch off his mobile phone to board a flight to Barcelona, his agent called. The producers of Bond wanted to see him for a role - be there in 90 minutes.

Winning a role in one of the most successful film franchises in the world is a dream come true for Kassianides. He threw his whole being into shaping his character. Playing a dodgy looking ethnic created its own challenges – who wouldn’t want to have the mantle of mugging and glaring and snarling at Bond? According to Simon, Daniel Craig is “devastatingly humble and gracious” although he refused to wrestle with Kassianides in his tight blue swim shorts, no matter how much Simon begged.

Filming his scenes at both Pinewood and Aldershot studios in Buckinghamshire in England, the character description changed dramatically from the day Kassianide’s signed up to the first day of filming. “What I prepared myself for one day I’d have to forget the next so I tried my best to relax and expect nothing and everything! We went for something psychological in the end and I think/hope we’ve achieved that. I’m proud of it.”

On October 20 2008, the film was ready for worldwide domination. “It was a dream night for me. I took my mum as she and I had a difficult time together during my teens making ends meet, so I knew what it meant to her to be there watching me speaking to the press. I enjoyed every minute of it.”

So what is next on the agenda for the bad boy of Bond? Kassianides will soon start filming for his first lead role in a movie called Between Two Fires by, Agnieska Lukasiak,(an Algerian film maker). The storyline involves an Algerian musician and a Polish woman from the Ukraine both on the run from their home countries that meet in an immigration camp in Sweden. They start an impossible romance that gives hope and fear to them both in an extremely hostile environment.

Perhaps if he has a break in his filming commitments, Kassianides can once again visit Sydney and see more of Australia. Here for two weeks in 2005, Simon absolutely loved it. “I met the friendliest girls, ate the best sushi and went to the best zoo I’ve ever been to. The architecture was great too - how different suburbs have their own very distinctive personalities. Plus I have some amazing friends there who I loved seeing in their hometown. I can’t wait to go back.”

With the juggernaught that is James Bond in Australian cinemas, keep an ear out for the ring of Simon Kassianides’s footsteps as he enters the hallowed halls of the Bond.