Lea Seydoux is returning for the next James Bond adventure, with filming beginning in the spring

For your eyes only . . . Lea Seydoux is back in the next James Bond adventure.

The 33-year-old Parisian, who played psychiatrist Dr Madeleine Swann in Spectre three years ago, will feature in Bond 25, which begins filming in the spring.

Bond star Daniel Craig wanted her back — and so did film-maker Cary Joji Fukunaga, who will be directing his first Bond picture.

Fukunaga told me exclusively that 'Lea will be returning'; as will regulars Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw and Naomie Harris.

The director praised the Bond Brit pack — and British thespians in general — noting that he has worked with many on past projects, including Beasts Of No Nation and Jane Eyre.

'You have some of the best actors in the world here,' he said. 'Why wouldn't I have the best coming back?!'

In Spectre, Ms Seydoux was to be found working at a private clinic nestled in the Austrian Alps. She and James Bond bonded between the sheets, and at various other exotic locations.

Hard core Bond fans will know that Maud Adams also returned to make further Bond pictures.

But unlike Seydoux, she played different characters. She was Andrea Anders in The Man With The Golden Gun in 1974; the eponymous Octopussy in 1983; and two years later had an uncredited cameo in A View To A Kill.

The 24th official Bond film, based on Ian Fleming's character, was released two years before the #MeToo campaign hit Hollywood.

So I'll be fascinated to see what tone the new screenplay by Neal Purvis and Robert Wade (with major input from Fukunaga) sets, in terms of how women are treated on screen.

The Parisian actress is set to return after Bond star Daniel Craig and film-maker Cary Joji Fukunaga asked her to

I mean, is one even allowed to refer to the actresses who appear in the 007 pictures as 'Bond Girls' any more?

I discussed the topic with Rosamund Pike, who was in Die Another Day (and was nominated for a Golden Globe yesterday for her portrait of war correspondent Marie Colvin in A Private War).

And she told me that she quite liked being referred to as a 'Bond Girl'.

But it will be more about how Craig's Bond, whom Fleming described as a 'blunt instrument wielded by a government department', treats the women in the picture, whether it's Ms Seydoux (who was also in Blue Is The Warmest Colour) or any of the other actresses to be cast in the as yet untitled picture.

Whatever producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson decide to call the movie, Bond 25 is due to hit cinemas on February 14, 2020.

Why Ken loved his ding-dongs with Dame Judi

Kenneth Branagh said the secret of Judi Dench's success is that 'with her, every morning is Christmas morning'.

Branagh, who has worked with the thespian dame 11 times on stage and screen, talked to me following an awards season screening of their latest collaboration All Is True, about William Shakespeare's return to Stratford — and his wife and two daughters — after a long absence in London, producing plays.

The two old friends portray the playwright and his wife, Anne Hathaway, in the film. Ian McKellen also features as the Earl of Southampton, one of Shakespeare's supporters.

Branagh, who directed the film, said Dench had signed on without reading the script or knowing what the story was about.

He added that the mere mention of Dench's name 'produces an audible 'Aah!' She has that quality of delight'.

Sir Kenneth Branagh, Dame Judi Dench and Sir Ian McKellen attend a BAFTA screening of ALL IS TRUE at Picturehouse Central on December 4, 2018 in London

He recalled a comment Michael Williams, Dench's late husband, made about his wife. 'He said to me once: 'With her, every morning is Christmas morning.'

Branagh noted that 'Judi leans into life and is genuinely interested in people, and that comes across in her performances; she's right there, listening'.

'She's a lover of life, even though she's had all the knocks, like everybody else.'

He added that working with her and McKellen on All Is True was like working with 'two national treasures'.

In the movie, Shakespeare and his family are at crisis point as secrets are revealed. The powerful acting — and Ben Elton's screenplay — gives the audience a ringside seat.

'I wanted you to feel as though you're at somebody else's domestic,' Branagh said.

'Where you go: 'Oh my Christ, it's kicking off!' It's that stuff you recognise, because it happens in families.'

The film is being released by Sony in the U.S. on December 21; and here in the UK on February 8. Dench and McKellen have another joint project on the go: the Working Title production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical stage show Cats.

McKellen told me that they're rehearsing 'at Cat School, writhing all over the floor'. (Sadly, he admitted later that he was only joking.)

I asked Dench what goes on in this 'Cat School', and she replied: 'You might well ask. We're seeing a lot of the dancers, and they're extraordinarily good.'

WATCH OUT FOR...

Tracie Bennett, who will star in a new production of the rarely produced Jerry Herman musical Mame, running at the Hope Mill Theatre in Manchester from September 27, 2019. The show's being put together by Joseph Houston, William Whelton and Katy Lipson.

Olivier award-winning Ms Bennett told me the idea of doing 'a stripped-back show in an intimate space' appealed to her.

She said it's a charming piece about a rather eccentric woman 'who lives her life to the full — and everyone loves her'.

Bennett, who returns to the National Theatre to play Carlotta Campion in Follies from February 12, described Mame as one of the most 'dynamic, loveable heroines of the stage'.