Judi Dench (Francois Duhamel/Sony)

In the new James Bond film, Skyfall, new characters spend much time deliberating the future of M, the head of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service. Well, time to add something to the “con” list: suburban traffic.

Drivers along River Road in Potomac, Md. today experienced quite the onerous traffic jam due to the filming of an upcoming BBC film, Philomena, that stars Judi Dench, who has played M in the James Bond series since 1995. About 40 vehicles related to the production were parked on the side of the road near Saints Peter and Paul Antiochian Orthodox Christian Church, Patch reports.

The hubbub caused drivers to slow down and rubberneck, creating a snaking traffic jam that at one point reached the neighboring village of Travilah.

Patch reports:

According to county spokeswoman Lucille Baur, police did not block off the road, but drivers, seeing that crews were filming at a private residence near Saints Peter and Paul Antiochian Orthodox Christian Church, slowed down to watch.

“Police did not close the roadway,” Baur said. “There is filming going on and drivers on the roadway did slow down because they could see there are lots of movie trucks. A couple of times traffic was stopped because a piece of equipment needed to cross the road.”

Maybe those Maryland drivers will take heed tomorrow; Philomena, in which Dench plays a woman looking for her long-lost adult son, is filming again from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday in the same location.