Rob's Interview with Paris Match - France

PM: In Paris, last Novem­ber you were really scared by the crazi­ness. How do you feel today Robert Pattinson?
Rob: I feel bet­ter. I’m start­ing to get used to Hol­ly­wood. It all seems just as crazy to me, but I have more con­trol over myself. I know I have to watch what I’m going to tell you for exam­ple… And I’ll never get used to peo­ple who spend their lives fol­low­ing me around or to the peo­ple who use my name to make money. But I’ve learned to speak about the movie, my char­ac­ter and my career.

PM: In this third install­ment your char­ac­ter refuses to sleep with Bella and only thinks about one thing: get­ting mar­ried. It’s an ancient cou­ple con­cept don’t you think?

Rob: This vision is a bit archaic but I assume it. The way I see it, Edward is obsessed that he isn’t human. He would like to not be a vam­pire. There­fore he takes advan­tage of every lit­tle detail that can bring him closer to “nor­mal­ity”. What’s bet­ter than a mar­riage to feel like every­one else? In all clas­sic vam­pire sto­ries, they think of sleep­ing with their prey and are ready to kill for blood. Edward, is search­ing for sim­ple love, to not be dif­fer­ent any­more. But he knows that’s impos­si­ble, that he’s damned to eter­nal life. This is what also causes this pro­found sad­ness in him.

PM: Does Edward represent purity?
Rob: He’s as pure as pos­si­ble! But a vam­pire lives by its instinct, which pushed him each day to find blood to feed and that’s not the purest act in the word. Edward is on a spir­i­tual quest. Love seems to be his reli­gion even though he know he’ll never go to heaven.


PM: Did you speak about your char­ac­ter with Stephe­nie Meyer, the author of the saga?
Rob: Some­times. She was present on the set of the third install­ment with­out being too involved. As long as we haven’t started shoot­ing a scene, I lis­ten to every­thing peo­ple say on my char­ac­ter. Once the cam­era starts rolling how­ever, only the Direc­tor speaks to me. I don’t need to have var­i­ous opin­ion all the time, or to hear comments.

PM: Are you impa­tient to be done with Twilight?
Rob: Not really. A saga such as this one allows me to be on screen often with­out bor­ing peo­ple. If I did one movie after the other I think peo­ple would turn away from me. As Twi­light has become an impor­tant finan­cial asset, pre­pro­duc­tion is quite fast. It allows me to do other projects between shoot­ing 2 movies. Then, the wait is incred­i­ble, fans are impa­tient to see the next “Twi­light” They really don’t care about the “new Robert Pattinson”!

PM: Is Edward more pop­u­lar than Robert?
Rob: You just have to look at the amount of peo­ple who went to see Twi­light and the amount of peo­ple who went to see Remem­ber Me (a film in which he played that came out in April)! It made 70 Mil­lion at the box office whereas Twi­light made 1 bil­lion! But for Remem­ber Me it’s really good.

PM: Why did you want to become an actor?
Rob: I enrolled in the­ater because my dad pushed me too. He thought it would help me over­come my shy­ness. But it’s mostly when I real­ized that all these pretty girls went to these course that I became more atten­tive. Before that I hated theatre.

PM: Were you more inter­ested by cinema?
Rob: I never dreamed of being an actor. It was a chain effect. But I always loved movies. This may seem arro­gant but I think I have good taste in terms of Direc­tors and movies in general.

PM: What kind of movies did you love?
Rob: Amer­i­can movies from the end of the 60s and the begin­ning of the 70s and French movies from “La Nou­velle Vague”. For a long time I was obsessed with Godard’s movies. I would dream of learn­ing French to be able to film with him. “Prénom Car­men” is by far the most beau­ti­ful love story I’ve seen in movies. When I filmed the first Twi­light I had that movie in my head constantly.


PM: How to you imag­ine the rest of your career.
Rob: I’m reached a high level of fame at an incred­i­ble speed. All the movies by authors, the inde­pen­dent movies that I dream to make will surely suf­fer from it. But it could also help them. I don’t know yet. If Godard hired a French teen idol to be the star of his movie wouldn’t it turn out to be noth­ing much? I feel like I have the future in front of me but I also know that I have to make the proper deci­sion to get what I want.

PM: Do you dis­cuss your future with Tay­lor Laut­ner and Kris­ten Stewart?
Rob: We have dif­fer­ent ideas on the way we want our careers to evolve. It’s very bizarre. Tay­lor dreams of doing big block­busters, in action movies. Kris­ten dreams of doing small inde­pen­dent movies that have trou­ble get­ting released as for myself I’m a mix of both.


PM: Your sis­ter is in music. Is she jeal­ous of your success?
Rob: No, she’s been writ­ing songs for years, it’s dif­fer­ent. My fam­ily, my loved ones still live in the UK. They only see from afar this gen­eral crazi­ness, they read it in the press. I don’t think I’ve changed because of the suc­cess. My par­ents came to LA for the first time a few weeks ago. We were con­stantly fol­lowed by paparazzi. They were a bit over­come by every­thing. But the fact that I’m British helps to not sink into the Hol­ly­wood tur­moil. Even though you’ll read a lot of things about me I’m actu­ally quite nor­mal. And to be hon­est I’m seri­ously think­ing of doing music with my sis­ter. It’s a project that should be done before the end of the year.

PM: Did you fol­low the elec­tion in the UK?
Rob: Absolutely! I voted and I think that this coali­tion can be a plus for this coun­try. Nick Clegg and David Cameron look sin­cere and hon­est, full of hope. This duo has to work as well together as Kris­ten and I do.

Scans/Translation