Arterton won her first professional role in Stephen Poliakoff's Capturing Mary, while she was still at drama school. Similarly, she made her stage debut as Rosaline in Shakespeare'sLove's Labour's Lost at the Globe Theatre, London in July 2007 before graduating later that year. She made her film debut in St Trinian's (2007) as Head Girl Kelly.
In 2008, she appeared in the James Bond film, Quantum of Solace. Chosen from around 1,500 candidates, Arterton plays Bond Girl Strawberry Fields, in what is described as a "nice-sized role". On her character, Arterton describes Strawberry Fields as "the thinking man's crumpet". In the same year, she played the eponymous protagonist in the BBC adaptation ofThomas Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Also in 2008, she played the role of Elizabeth Bennet in the ITV serial, Lost in Austen. Her most controversial role to date was in the 2009 filmThe Disappearance of Alice Creed, in which her character is kidnapped and abused in several graphic nude scenes.