Beyond Bond Famke Janssen Hopes ‘Goldeneye’ Role Won’t Limit Her Career Options

Former model Famke Janssen had her doubts when she was offered the chance to play “Bond girl” Xenia Onatopp in “Goldeneye,” the 17th installment of MGM’s never-say-never-again James Bond action-adventure franchise.

The film opens Friday.

“It was a very scary decision to make,” recalls the 30-year-old Dutch native. “If I’m going to do this, people are going to pigeonhole me for a very long time.”

Indeed, with few exceptions, Bond girls have failed to go on to particularly illustrious careers. Among the more successful were Ursula Andress of 1962’s “Dr. No”; Diana Rigg of 1969’s “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”; Jane Seymour, who appeared in 1973’s “Live and Let Die”; and Barbara Bach, who lit up 1977’s “The Spy Who Loved Me.”

Among the less successful, Scandinavian Britt Ekland did little of note following 1974’s “The Man With the Golden Gun.” Tanya Roberts, co-star of 1985’s “A View to a Kill,” went on to a career as a B-movie scream queen, appearing in, among others “The Yum Yum Girls” and “Inner Sanctum.” More recently Maryam D’Abo (“The Living Daylights”) and Carey Lowell (“Licence to Kill”) also became mired in B-moviedom. Many of the other Bond girls over the years have drifted quietly into obscurity. Has anyone seen Akiko Wakabayashi (“You Only Live Twice”) or Lois Chiles (“Moonraker”) recently?

Janssen, and fellow “Goldeneye” newcomer Izabella Scorupco, hope they’ll fare at least as well as their male counterparts. The careers of Sean Connery, Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton all survived even the lowest fluctuations in the Bond franchise, as have many Bond villains, including Donald Pleasence and Herve Villechaize. Surely the newest James Bond, Pierce Brosnan’s career won’t be harmed by the exposure.

“I decided it does help to get your name out there,” says Janssen. “I’m very serious about what I’m doing and will fight (stereotypying).”

Janssen says she also felt that having a second movie come out earlier this year, Clive Barker’s horror film “Lord of Illusions,” would also help combat any pigeonholing. “The characters are really opposite,” she says. “The woman I play in ‘Lord of Illusions’ is sort of a classic femme fatale, while Xenia is more like a killer whale trapped in a human body.”

In choosing Janssen for her role in “Lord of Illusions” producer Joanne Sellar says she had the right combination of “toughness and an extreme amount of vulnerability” to beat out roughly 40 other women considered for the part. “We were looking for an unknown because of budget limitations,” she says. “Her face sort of haunted us.”

Taking advantage of her impressive cheekbones and lanky body, Janssen dropped out of college in Holland after a year to embark on a modeling career. “I always knew it was going to be temporary,” she says. “It’s not art. You wear clothes and people photograph you.”

Janssen, who had landed small roles on “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and “Melrose Place,” had just begun work on “Lord of Illusions,” her first starring film role, when she was asked to fly to London for a screen test with Brosnan. Executives at MGM-UA, which produced both movies, apparently had liked what they saw during dailies. She was offered the part almost immediately.

Even more important than impressing studio heads, however, was the chance finally to earn some respect from the folks back home.

“My family is very proud and happy,” she says. “Where I grew up, modeling isn’t a very big deal. But James Bond is such a big thing in Holland.”

Though it was already written into the script that her Bond girl knew her way around the weapons closet, Janssen says she battled to bring her stogie-puffing character into the ‘90s by giving her a more active role in several scenes where she had formerly been a passive bystander.

“This is a James Bond movie; there’s no realism involved,” she explains. “Still I fought very hard to get my way in scenes where they went back to 1965 - you know, where all the women were planted against the wall and the men are doing all the talking.”