Eva Green To Be 'Royale' Bond Girl

The new James Bond now has a new Bond Girl.

She's French actress Eva Green, and she'll star in the new "Casino Royale" as the character Vesper Lynd.

Green's film debut was a couple of years ago in the ultra-steamy movie "The Dreamers." The director of that NC-17 film had once said Eva Green is "so beautiful it's indecent."

Now, Green will use that beauty opposite the new James Bond, Daniel Craig.

Her other films were last year's "Kingdom of Heaven" with Orlando Bloom and "Arsène Lupin." She is presently working on the European film "Zhivaya Riba."

In other casting news, Jeffrey Wright, who's currently in "Syriana," will play a character named Felix Leiter in the new Bond film.

It was already announced that Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen will be the villain in "Casino Royale," which is expected in theaters on Nov. 17.

"We are thrilled that Eva and Mads have joined the cast of 'Casino Royale' completing a first rate international cast," said producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli on the film's official Web site. "They bring exceptional talent to the characters Ian Fleming described so vividly in his first James Bond novel."

According to the New York Post, the final decision for the Vesper role came down to either Green or Olivia Wilde of television's "The OC."

Green is "one of France's most accomplished young actresses," the statement said. "She brings to the complex role of Vesper an exciting combination of enigmatic and seductive beauty."

Craig was named the new 007 last October after an 18-month search for a replacement for departing Bond star Pierce Brosnan. The 37-year-old Craig is the first blond actor and only the second Englishman to star as Agent 007 in the movie series. (Roger Moore played Bond in seven films from 1973-85.)

Fleming's first Bond novel, originally published in 1953, "Casino Royale" is one of the few Bond adventures not to feature the MI6 gadget-maker Q. It was previously filmed as a 1967 spoof starring Peter Sellers, David Niven, and Woody Allen — all as James Bond.

Fleming sold the rights to "Casino Royale" for an American television production before hooking up with the original producers of the James Bond series, so the book was not included in that package. Unable to use Sean Connery or any of the other actors from the hit movie series and certain moviegoers wouldn't accept substitutes, the producers of the 1967 "Casino Royale" instead made it a broad comedy. Vesper Lind was played in that film by Ursula Andress, the first "Bond girl" in "Dr. No."

Others in the 1967 production included Orson Welles, William Holden, John Huston, his daughter Anjelica Huston, Peter O'Toole, Deborah Kerr, Charles Boyer, and Jacqueline Bissett.