
Danny Boyle London Red Carpet – P 2012
Ian Gavan/Getty ImagesHaving already tossed her from an airplane, Danny Boyle has no need for the Queen of England’s highest honor.
According to reports, the Oscar-winning filmmaker was nominated for a knighthood by the U.K.’s arts and media honors committee for his direction of the massive, very British opening ceremony for the London Summer Olympics; when the committee approached him to see if he’d accept the honor, however, he declined.
PHOTOS: Inside the Olympics Opening Ceremonies
As Boyle told Mark Lawson in an interview on BBC radio earlier in December, he considers himself a populist, and the ceremony he created — which included tributes to the National Health Service and a pre-recorded scene between James Bond and Queen Elizabeth — was a celebration of all of Britannia.
“I’m very proud to be an equal citizen and I think that’s what the Opening Ceremony was actually about,” he said.
THR‘s critic David Rooney agreed, writing of the ceremony, “Boyle’s epic opera of social and cultural history was a vibrant work of unfettered imagination that celebrated a nation, but even more so, its people.”