Short new Rob interview with French newspaper”Liberation”. He talks about his career path, actors who have influenced him, and directors with whom he would like to work with.
Google Translation | Via @tnyfrontrow
During the Deauville festival to present “Good Time”, the Englishman tells how the act of shooting with the Safdie brothers made his game ripen.
At the age of only 31, British actor Robert Pattinson stands out as a fearless superstar and cinephile. Ex-vampire sparkling Twilight, he builds an already admirable course of bold collaborations and interpretations of the more and more singular material. His curiosity when he was met by an express promo passage in Deauville, he noted under our feverish advice that indeed he should watch season 3 of Twin Peaks (even if he is already “frustrated” having never been called to audition for this inordinate casting ” ), and notes on his laptop the title of the film of Steve De Jarnatt Miracle Mile(1989) as soon as it takes us to cause apocalypse. Coming to France, between two days of German filming with Claire Denis, to boast of his collaboration with the Safdie brothers, he still lands in a blond square with roots at sight, the vestige of Connie’s Good Time.
The universe of Good Time transpires the influence of a past Hollywood golden age. Have you been inspired by actors of the past?
Despite the nostalgic part, this project really seemed unprecedented. Certain aspects of course make mention of classics like Dustin Hoffman’s Recidivist [and Ulu Grosbard, released in 1978, ed.]. It shows a scene of robbery where the burglar [interpreted by Hoffman] Max Dembo hesitates for a few seconds. Like Connie, he could turn back and everything would be different. He is his own worst enemy. I spent a lot of time feeding on the streets, talking to people who had been in jail, others in conditional, others living on the street. When you ask someone his story for the sake of a movie, he remains very open and you learn incredible things. It is difficult to ask without the pretext of cinema. Say: “What are your secrets? It’s for a movie “, it works (laughs) !
One can also think of a Sidney Lumet dog afternoon …
I’ve seen this movie so many times. It’s anchored in me, in the background. The performances of Al Pacino are the first to have marked me. When you start in cinema and you’re English, everyone expects you to just play a kind of prince. I wanted to play a fucking Pacino (laughs).
At the time of the New Hollywood, these actors-stars turned with the greatest American filmmakers of the moment from the first films of the latter. The big names today are coming less from the beaten track, with rare exceptions …
I think that there is a great responsibility of the players to have to take on new challenges today. It is up to us to ensure that new alchemies are made, with gifted filmmakers and less expected. As soon as you have a little influence as an actor, you have to use it for new challenges rather than track down big commercial projects, try to refer a different, more popular audience to authors which count. On reflection, I do not think that the actors or actresses particularly seek to hunt new singular projects, most of them do not care, they just want to work …
Starified in the Twilight saga , you said to yourself, at that moment, “I will be able to aim for more risky or surprising projects”?
Everything has changed from Twilight, indeed. But with each new project, I acquired new skills, new nuances, with James Gray, the Safdie, now Claire Denis [in High Life, currently shooting]. As time went on, my tastes changed. There was a big turning point with Cosmopolis [by David Cronenberg in 2012]. This filmmaker is one of my heroes. So it was crucial, I gained new confidence in it, and I started to see myself a little differently.
Did you have the idea to build a composite and sharp filmography from the start?
I have targets, yes. But all this takes infinite time. With James [Gray] for example, I was supposed to play in other movies. But that was what … seven or eight years ago. Lost City of Z took five years to unfold. With Claire, it took us five years too. If I like a project, I persevere, until it takes shape. On the other hand, I do not have a short-term strategy, I do not say “Hmmm, here, Claire Denis” (laughs) . But I ripened within me a wide range of desires.
You think of someone here, in particular?
I really want to make a film with the Colombian director Ciro Guerra, and it will happen next year if everything goes well. And I would love to work with Maïwenn. I was really impressed by his latest film, My King [in 2015].
You present yourself as a rather “traditional” actor, who works on his text. In a recent interview, you mentioned the part of improvisation in Safdie and their actors. Was the confrontation difficult?
Yes, but I got out grown. Few actors on the film really read the script. Sometimes, in a scene, I found myself facing someone who suddenly improvised, and it seemed very hard to make the scene in the intended direction. I found it really stressful. And it’s palpable in the film. So much the better. The more the pressure rises, the more it takes away a good part of self-awareness. It is a real relief. You act so fast that you have no time to contemplate you.
You adopt various states in the film, like a metamorph. Pigmented faces, dyed hair, changes in clothes. How have you experienced this action of constantly moulting?
Beginning to behave slightly differently and to change some appearance, suddenly we find ourselves received in a fundamentally different way. I had time to experiment all this, two months in New York where I tried various costumes and accents. I talked to people on the street to see if they recognized me. Sometimes we feel too aware of what we are. One may want a time to get rid of this judgment that one has of ourselves. Playing the shapeshifter allows that, we are mistaken ourselves and we find a way to deceive people is quite addictive. But I do not know how healthy it is (laughs) …
How is filming with Claire Denis, in studio in Cologne?
It’s really incredible to work with her. Claire Denis has a world of her own, very intimate. In addition, it has something quite similar (laughs) … as a creative chaos. I’ve never had to trust someone so much. But at the end of the day, it was in a film by Claire Denis that I dreamed of being, not in my own.