Backed by the Pentagon: MI6 initially moved to block the filming of a scene around their headquarters, citing security concerns, but were overruled by Foreign Secretary Robin Cook, saying "After all Bond has done for Britain, it was the least we could do for Bond." In the end, when the film was screened for the office staff, they cheered during the bombing scene.
California Doubling: Sir Robert King's funeral is supposed to be in Scotland, but due to Judi Dench appearing in a play in London's West End, it was filmed outside of London.
Cast the Runner-Up: Maria Grazia Cucinotta was considered for the role of Elektra, but this was nixed when it was discovered her English wasn't up to par. This did however, parlay into her brief but memorable role as the Cigar Girl Assassin.
Creator Backlash: Denise Richards stated in her autobiography The Real Girl Next Door that she did not have a happy experience on the film. She claimed that Michael Apted made no effort to build any comradery on set or give her much direction. She felt very lonely and unwanted (as her casting was Executive Meddling from MGM) and depressed at the negative reviews she received.
Cut Song: The soundtrack album of this film includes a song titled "Only Myself to Blame", sung by Scott Walker. Originally, David Arnold intended to use this song during the end credits, but it was considered too glum to go out on, so a techno remix of the James Bond theme was used instead.
The Cigar Girl meets Renard in the opening after Bond's escape from the banker's office.
Bond's pursuit of King through the Vauxhall Cross building takes much longer as originally filmed. The reason for this cut was because of the decision to move the title credits sequence to after the Thames chase, instead of after the Bilbao fight.
So does his seduction of Dr. Warmflash. Including a funny moment where he tosses his sling onto a suit of armor.
The Q scene was longer.
The sequence of Bond and Elektra's meeting in Azerbaijan takes much longer also, which also added more information on Elektra's backstory.
Bond and Elektra returning to her home from the casino and sharing a kiss on the staircase before heading to her bedroom.
M's arrival in Azerbaijan and greeting Bond was also longer and included Bond introducing M to Dr. Jones.
Bond drives his Aston Martin DB5 to Sir Robert King's funeral.
Fake Mixed Race: Elektra King, being half-British and half-Azeri, and implied to have been raised in the Soviet Union (it's said that her family had fled the Soviet Union many years earlier), manages to fit both Fake Brit, Fake Russian, and fake Middle-Eastern at the same time, since she's played by Frenchwoman Sophie Marceau.
Fake Nationality: Renard, a Bosnian who worked for the KGB and then became a terrorist, is played by the Scottish Robert Carlyle.
In the opening, Bond visits a Swiss banker and is offered a Cuban cigar. These are holdovers from previous drafts where the pre-credits sequence took place in Havana, then Switzerland.
In the extended opening, M says that the classified report is a study by the Russians on Y2K impacting their computer systems. This would have tied in with R's line at the end of the film.
Renard's final spoken line to Elektra is "Au revoir", a holdover from an early draft when he was French, not to mention the fact that Renard is French for fox. Plus, Jean Reno was supposed to play him.
As soon as I knew we were doing it, I ran out and bought a compilation album and listened to a few of the classics, but I got so spooked I had to stop. But then I remembered - and realised I was covered. At least, I wouldn't go down in history as the worst Bond theme.
The helicopters with sawblades originally appeared in an early draft of Goldeneye.
Zuchovsky's return and Q's retirement appeared in early drafts of Tomorrow Never Dies.
Role Reprise: For the video game, even though most of the characters are voiced by professional voice actors as opposed to the actual actors from the film the game is based on, John Cleese actually reprises his role as R from the movie. Although footage of him in the film only appears in the extended 007 difficulty ending in the PlayStation version.
There was reportedly a plan for Elektra King to survive and for Bond to visit her in the hospital where she was being treated for Stockholm Syndrome, but this was considered too downbeat.
There was a deleted scene where Bond later checks Valentin's pulse. There would later be a scene where Dr. Warmflash takes Valentin in and finds out he was shot in the ribs and she eventually gets the bullet out.
Pierce Brosnan ad-libbed the part where he adjusts his tie while underwater during the boat chase.
The stunt of grabbing the cables on the Millennium Dome took several tries to get right. Apted put in one of the shots of the stuntman missing the cables to give a better sense of how hard it was.
Uncredited Role: Michael Apted's then-wife Dana Stephens did an uncredited rewrite of the script, largely fleshing out the female characters at the request of Barbara Broccoli.
Underage Casting: The movie was much mocked for having its main Bond Girl, Christmas Jones, played by the twenty-nine-year-old Denise Richards, be supposedly a world-renowned nuclear physicist. What makes it stand out even more is that Dr. Arkov was clearly in his fifties.
Word of God: In the DVD Commentary, Michael Apted implies that Zukovsky might not have actually died, though any potential further plans for him were scrapped with the franchise's reboot after the next film.
Working Title: Initially, this was due for release in 2000, with rumored titles including Elektra, A Whisper of Love, A Whisper of Hate, Death Waits for No Man, Fire and Ice, Pressure Point, and Dangerously Yours.
Shadow Ops: Red Mercury has a Kazakhstan level which is transplanted almost wholesale from the Kazakhstan level in this one. Besides the locations, the player is introduced to the protagonist's (James Bond / Frank Hayden) on-off lover, Galena / Christmas in an identical first meeting. Both games also contains a shootout against mooks in a circular room with enemies swarming left and right, the Love Interest character running between control panels where the hero needs to provide cover for, an escape attempt down a shaft, and an Outrun the Fireball cutscene followed by the hero (Bond or Frank) being chewed over his recklessness in the prior mission. Not to mention both games having a Hidden Villain, Kate Daniels and Electra King.
Troubled Production: According to interviews, this hit the planned PlayStation 2 version. The team behind the game started development on PC but some executive meddling from EA resulted in its development getting halted so that it could get ported to the PS2. However id Tech 3 was primarily designed for the PC so, alongside having to update it for the PC version, it needed to be ported to PS2 which the porting team encountered issues with memory and rendering which took so long for the team to resolve that the game needed a delay (from MGM) and eventually got cancelled (by EA) in favor of putting out something polished in the next year which came to be Agent Under Fire.
What Could Have Been: After the cancellation of the PC/PS2 game, EA planned to have the N64 game ported over to PS2. This didn't go anywhere however as Eurocom declined to do it in the two months they were given. The only remnant of this was a tech demo created by one of the Night Fire developers.
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