Jack Lowden, Callum Turner, and Josh O’Connor are in final auditions for the next James Bond, and progressive entertainment writers are already restless that the shortlist does not advance their identity checklist.
Deadline reported the three men are among the actors still in the mix, and that they are currently doing final auditions for the role long tied to Amazon MGM Studios’ stewardship of the franchise.
A DiscussingFilm post on October 22, 2026, relayed the same shortlist and the final-audition stage, citing Deadline as the source. Kotaku covered the report the same day and turned it into a staff reaction piece more interested in who was missing than in who might actually play 007.
That is the core news. Three working British-screen actors have reached the last round. The surrounding commentary is where the politics show up.
Jack Lowden is a Scottish actor known for a recurring role in Apple TV’s Slow Horses and is married to Saoirse Ronan, per the same write-up. Callum Turner is a British leading man recently tied to One Night Only. Josh O’Connor has appeared in The Crown and played Father Jud Duplenticy in Wake Up Dead Man.
None of that is exotic casting. It is conventional leading-man material for a character created as a British secret agent. Earlier coverage already put Lowden and Turner in London screen tests as the search narrowed, so the Deadline shortlist fits a process that has been tightening for months rather than a sudden culture-war stunt.
Amazon MGM Studios sits over the decision. No studio spokesperson quote, no named executive, no casting memo, and no decision date appear in the available report. The public record, for now, is the shortlist claim and the audition stage.
"Jack Lowden, Callum Turner and Josh O’Connor are among the actors in the mix to be the next James Bond. They are currently doing final auditions. (Source: Deadline)"
DiscussingFilm posted that summary on X on October 22, 2026. That is the cleanest factual spine in the package.
Inside the Kotaku piece, enthusiasm was thin. Colleague Ethan Gach was blunt.
"I like Jack Lowden but am not enthused about any of them,"
Author Ash Parrish preferred O’Connor most among the three and immediately undercut even that faint praise. Lewis Parker also leaned O’Connor. Zack Zweizen argued Amazon MGM Studios had “fumbled hard” by passing over what he called “a perfect Bond option,” without the report establishing that the studio had closed the door on anyone in particular.
Separate speculation has already treated Turner as a real frontrunner, including attention around Turner’s One Night Only run while franchise auditions loomed. Lowden’s name has stayed loud as well, including when Gary Oldman backed Lowden in earlier casting chatter. The new shortlist does not invent those names. It concentrates them.
Parrish did not stop at taste. The column framed the moment as a “post-woke” backlash and claimed the industry is “currently legally barred from casting someone who’s not a white dude,” then said it would have been “really nice to get a brown guy in there.”
"I know we’re in a “post-woke” reactionary backlash situation, so I understand the entertainment industry is currently legally barred from casting someone who’s not a white dude, but it would have been really nice to get a brown guy in there. Like, aren’t you tired of seeing the same s***?"
There is no statute in the report. There is no court order. There is no studio rule reproduced. It is a writer’s political complaint dressed up as industry law. John Walker offered a concrete alternate pick in the same discussion.
"Here’s my pick for Bond," said John Walker. "Rahul Kohli."
Kohli is not described as auditioning in the Deadline-sourced shortlist. He appears as a preference, not as a finalist. That distinction matters. Fans can want anyone. Studios cast from the people actually in the room.
James Bond is intellectual property with a long audience contract: British, lethal, polished, and specific. Audiences have watched that brief survive multiple actors without needing a lecture about their fatigue with “the same” face. When entertainment press treats three plausible British leads as a civil-rights setback, it reveals the priority order, representation theory first, character continuity second.
Former 007 Daniel Craig remains part of the wider Bond news cycle in other coverage, including lighter items such as his stake in a historic London pub, while family voices from the Roger Moore era still argue about what Hollywood keeps recycling. The casting fight, though, is not about pubs or nostalgia essays. It is about whether the next Bond is chosen as Bond.
Open questions remain obvious. The piece does not say where the final auditions are being held, who inside Amazon MGM Studios signs off, whether the shortlist stops at these three, or when a name will be announced. It also does not reproduce Deadline’s full original text beyond the social summary.
So the verified story is narrow and still solid: Lowden, Turner, and O’Connor are in the final audition tier for James Bond, the trade press circulated that fact on October 22, 2026, and a slice of entertainment media answered with a shrug for the actors and a sermon about race.
If Bond still means a standard, the studio should cast the best man for the brief, not the best remedy for a columnist’s politics.
