By Ben Travis | Posted 23 Dec 2019

The best Bond movies give you a stellar villain – a truly nasty adversary for 007 to face. For upcoming James Bond movie No Time To Die, Daniel Craig’s returning agent will be going up against Safin – played by none other than Rami Malek, who went on to Oscar glory for his role playing Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody. While the Queen frontman might not sound like the usual Bond baddie, Malek revealed that he took some of Mercury’s ethos when fleshing out Safin.

Speaking to Empire in the upcoming world exclusive No Time To Die issue, on sale from Friday 27 December, Malek revealed the lesson he took from Freddie Mercury for the role. “If I went in there and tried to make a carbon copy of someone, what joy or fun would that be for anybody? I guess that may be a lesson I learned from Mr. Mercury. If it’s not original, then why bother?” he explains. “I’ve pocketed some things from some of my favourites. But I tried to every day imbue this character with something I thought made sense for the character, but might also at the same time be shocking and unnerving.”

The role saw Malek once again team up with his Bohemian Rhapsody dialogue coach William Conacher to figure out the right villainous voice. “I wanted to create something that we couldn’t quite peg from any particular part of the world,” he teases.

Read more about No Time To Die in Empire’s world exclusive new issue – including new interviews with Daniel Craig, director Cary Joji Fukunaga, Bond boss Barbara Broccoli, and series newcomers Lashana Lynch and Rami Malek. Plus we have exclusive images, and on-set access to Bond’s long-awaited comeback. Pick up a copy on newsstands from Friday 27 December.