Pierce Brosnan Receives Maverick Award At Maui Film Festival

Former 007 star Pierce Brosnan was at the Maui Film Festival this past Thursday to accept the Maverick Award–reports the Maui News.

Brosnan received the award ‘in honor of his commitment to make movies that matter as well as his long-standing efforts to work for environmental justice and the triumph of the spirit of all life on earth.’

‘I’m deeply proud to be here,’ started Brosnan, just as the rain began to downpour at the Wailea Beach Marriott Resort & Spa festival. Not one to miss a beat, he quickly added: ‘We’re having a little blessing.’

Following up tributes for actors Virginia Madsen and Dennis Quaid, Brosnan described his own acting career as a ‘work in progress.’

‘Someone like Mr. Dennis Quaid and myself are people in our 50s. You have a career, you’ve built up a reputation, you want to stay at the table as long as you can and you want to be able to grow,’ he said.

‘You want to be able to create interesting roles. That comes about by being courageous and adventuresome and leaping off into the wild blue yonder and trying to do something different.’

‘I’ve made a very good career on the back of Remington Steele and James Bond. I suppose that’s what I’ll be known for. But now, what else? What else do you have up your sleeve.’

Speaking about his role in the 2005 dark comedy The Matador (which earned him a Golden Globe nomination), Brosnan said the film wasn’t so much a commentary on the smoothness of James Bond, ‘but just a bloody great script and a subversive piece of material that found me at the right time, on the cusp of change.’

‘My work in the theater before I came to America was very diverse, be it that I was very young, at age 22, 23, 24, 25. I worked with really amazing people, Franco Zeffirelli, Tennessee Williams, and some people you would never know of. I came to America and found my niche being dashing and suave, and I ran like hell with it. So I could be commercial, so I could make money, so I could have a great life and hopefully within it, do things that were rough and edgy.’

Brosnan’s next film, Mamma Mia! hits theatres next month and finds him acting alongside Meryl Streep. ‘You see all these faces float before you,’ he said, referring to her numerous unforgettable roles in the past. ‘And she’s a team player,’ he added, referring to the musical and dance challenges this film adaptation brought on.

Mamma Mia! opens on 2 July in the UK and on the 18th in the US.

Summing things up, Brosnan said: ‘It’s all a responsibility to the writer, to how good the material is,’ he said. ‘You always have a responsibility to the writer, first and foremost. If you get caught up in the rest of it, you’ll fall apart.’

For his part, he concluded, ‘I’m having the time of my life. It’s kind of beginning all over again.’

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