Lashana Lynch says her wig scene in No Time to Die was ‘a real conversation’

The first black female 007 said the scene ‘worked out really, really well’

Lashana Lynch wearing Vivienne Westwood at the world premiere of No Time to Die in September 2021 (Getty Images for EON Productions)

Lashana Lynch has opened up about the deliberations that occurred behind the scenes during a key moment in the new James Bond film No Time to Die.

Lynch, who stars as the first black female 007 agent, Nomi, has spoken about removing her wig to reveal her natural hair in a scene that she says required “workshopping”.

The moment occurs after Nomi drives Daniel Craig’s Bond back to his place in Jamaica, ahead of what viewers anticipate as a romance scene.

As she removes her wig, Bond quips: “Well, that’s not the first thing I thought you’d take off.”

Lynch described the thinking behind the scene as “a real conversation”.

In an interview with Bustle, she said: “We had to workshop that moment, actually, on how we were going to reveal her because she’s undercover.

“How do we take the wig off? How are we going to do the hair underneath the wig? Do we have to stop and reshoot? Fix the hair? She leaves the wig? Does she take the wig? Is the wig going to be commented on? The whole wig thing was a real conversation.”

She adds: “And that worked out really, really well. Thank God. We changed it a couple times, and now it’s resulted in being something that you think is going to be [one thing], and then it turns into something else very quickly. Which, I think, is really, really clever for the franchise but also nice for me to play as an actor.”

And it’s not the only scene in which expectations are subverted. In an interview with The Independent, the 33-year-old actor revealed that there was talk of a tampon appearing in the hit film franchise.

While the menstrual product sadly failed to make the final cut, Lynch said: “I didn’t want to pass a moment where we could really push the needle forward in a long-running franchise.”

The London-born actor wore a canary-yellow Vivienne Westwood dress for the film’s premiere last month with a doctor bird - the national bird of Jamaica - embroidered on the back.

“It’s everything that I am,” she said of her Jamaican heritage.

“It’s not so much a question about staying connected to my Jamaican culture.

“It’s more about teaching people that my culture is what comes first. I guess I have to remind myself that the world doesn’t necessarily know [where I’m from],” she added.