David Beckham Sets the Record Straight on Playing James Bond and Acting Career

— -- Fans have taken to social media to try to cast soccer superstar David Beckham as the next James Bond, but the 40-year-old says he is “definitely” not planning to take over the franchise.

“I saw that the other day and I laughed many times about it,” Beckham told ABC News' Juju Chang Thursday, referring to the social media efforts. “Definitely won’t be in the next James Bond.”

The father-of-four and husband of Victoria Beckham says that acting is not yet a “career” for him, but something he is “stepping into.”

“I’ve never, ever thought about going into any kind of acting,” Beckham said. “People have actually started talking about me and my new career of acting, which it’s not my new career of acting, it’s just something that I’m kind of stepping into and enjoying myself with.”

One role Beckham did not have to flex his acting muscles for is his new collaboration with fashion brand Belstaff. The former Los Angeles Galaxy star appears as a leather-clad, mysterious stranger in the brand’s new short film, “Outlaws."

“I ride bikes, I wear these kind of clothes,” said Beckham, who has previously created two capsule collections for Belstaff. “It’s not a false thing. It’s not something where I’m like, ‘Oh, I’ve got to do a campaign. I have to wear these clothes. I don’t like them.”

“These are clothes that I’ve kind of had some kind of involvement with, you know, creating,” he said of his wardrobe in "Outlaws," which will be released Monday and then available online. “What we created, I love.”

It was for a different fashion line, that of his wife, Victoria Beckham, that Beckham made a splash this week when he sat front row at the line’s New York Fashion Week show.

Beckham runs the line with his wife, a husband and wife business partnership that he calls “pretty easy.”

“We’ve been together for 18 years, we’ve been married for 16 years so you trust each other’s judgment,” Beckham said. “I think that has worked for us.”

“My wife, you know, she’s a hard worker,” he said, describing his wife’s dedication to her career as “incredible.”

The Beckhams are parents to three sons -- Brooklyn, 16, Romeo, 12, and Cruz, 10 -- and a daughter, 4-year-old Harper.

Beckham says he and Victoria work hard to protect their kids from the scrutiny of fame, even with their growing social media presence.

“It’s hard because our 16-year-old son, Brooklyn, he’s got like 4 million Instagram followers,” Beckham said. “We control everything that he posts, everything that he does, and it’s the same with our other kids.”

One realm of parenting Beckham, who calls Victoria the “strict one in the house," may not be able to control is whether his children pursue his passion, soccer.

“I'd love them to play soccer, but I want them to be happy doing it, you know,” Beckham said. “There was one thing that one of my boys turned around to me the other day, he said, ‘Daddy, you know, I'm not sure I want to play football all the time.”

“It broke my heart a little bit," Beckham recalled. "He said, ‘Every time that I step onto the field, I know people are saying, you know, ‘This is David Beckham's son,’ and if I'm not as good as you, then it's not good enough.'"

“I said, ‘Okay, stop right there…You play because you want to play. You play because it makes you happy.’”

After his wife and children, Beckham calls UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund, the thing closest to his heart. Beckham has been a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador for the past 10 years and will speak at the United Nations in New York next week, urging world leaders to act to protect children from abuse and violence.