Daisy May Cooper has shut down rumours that she is set to star as M in the next James Bond film.

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Last week, a report in The Sun said that Cooper was in line for the role of M as part of a "sweeping overhaul" of the franchise, with her role said to have been linked to friend Phoebe Waller-Bridge's involvement as a script consultant on No Time to Die.

However, Cooper has now seemingly put these rumours to rest, after she won the Comedy Performance (Female) prize at last night's (Tuesday 28th March) Royal Television Society Awards for her role in BBC comedy-drama Am I Being Unreasonable?.

While she didn't attend the awards in person, her winner's speech was read out in her absence, in which she said: "I can't be there because I'm filming Bond... jokes, the only M I'll ever be is Mental."

Ralph Fiennes as M in Spectre
Ralph Fiennes as M in Spectre. Francois Duhamel/Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc./Danjaq, LLC/Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.

Cooper's series Am I Being Unreasonable? won in three categories at the RTS Awards, taking home the Breakthrough Award Prize for Lenny Rush and the Comedy Performance (Male) award, also for Rush, alongside Cooper's win.

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M has previously been played in the Bond film franchise by Bernard Lee, Robert Brown, Dame Judi Dench and, most recently, Ralph Fiennes, whose character Gareth Mallory took on the codename after Dench's M died in Skyfall.

Ever since Daniel Craig announced his decision to depart the role after No Time to Die – and in fact before then – Bond fans have been speculating fervently as to who could be next in line to play the iconic spy.

One star whose name has been repeatedly mentioned is Jamie Dornan, although he said of those rumours: "Of course it's nice to be in those conversations. If you're an actor of a certain age who's had a good year, there's an inevitability about [being mentioned].

"But they'll probably replace Daniel Craig with somebody who's never been on one of those lists."

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