Twilight Stars Talk about New Moon

Photo courtesy of Summit Entertainment.

Hollywood writer Earl Dittman interviews the three young New Moon stars, Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and Taylor Lautner. New Moon opens across Canada today.

While New Moon is packed with incredibly thrilling and intense sequences and scenes, the most important and pivotal part of the film is the “break-up” portion, where Edward decides to leave Bella in order to keep her safe. During a recent Los Angeles press outing, I sat down with Kristen, Robert, and Taylor to discuss the scene that has been leaving Twilight aficionados sobbing.

After Robert’s brother, Jasper, nearly plants his fangs in Bella’s neck (after failing to control his yearning for blood when she sustains a tiny cut) Edward fears that his presence is putting his beloved in mortal danger from Victoria and Laurant, his bloodsucking, revenge-seeking, arch enemies. He decides to leave Bella behind in the tiny town of Forks, Washington, for her own safety, all the while professing his true love for her and explaining his reasons for leaving. It’s easily the most emotionally heart-wrenching scene in New Moon, a sequence that prompted dozens of young females at a preview screening of the film to shed quite a few tears.

Earl Dittman: The break-up scene with Edward is causing quite a few female fans to cry, some quite audibly. Was it emotional for you to do, Kristen?

Kristen Stewart: That was the scariest scene for me to do. I was almost as worried about messing it up as I was about what I actually should have been thinking about, which was the issues that Bella is dealing with. Reading it, it’s so iconic. There’s nothing like that moment in reality even. It’s not even like a normal break-up scene.

Photo courtesy of Summit Entertainment.

ED: On a personal level, can you relate to what it feels to be dumped in a relationship?

KS: I know what’s it like to get broken-up with, but I don’t know what it’s like to get broken up with by a vampire, who I’ve now been physically and chemically altered by. Suddenly, you’re an addict, you take whatever they’re addicted to away from them and there’s withdrawal. So that was the most intimidating scene in the entire movie. I don’t know how to explain how I did it.

ED: Ultimately, how did you make it work, because you give a really great performance.

KS:Thanks. [Director] Chris [Weitz] really helped me out. It was just about talking. I don’t know. It was just about talking to him and reading the book and I had no other actors to play off. I mean, the break-up scene that I did with Rob, that’s not where it happens yet. That’s not where I was intimidated. That was still, like, she doesn’t even believe it yet.

ED: When did it sink in?

KS: It’s when he goes, the absence of him that I was scared of. I was like, "How am I going to be by myself in the woods with a hundred guys standing around me, filming me, die?" Basically, literally, having the equivalent of like a death scene but stay alive and get up and keep walking. It was hard. It was really intimidating. I still don’t know. I’ve seen the movie. I really like the movie but I don’t know if anyone ever really would’ve been able to bring that to life the way that [author] Stephenie [Meyer] writes it.

Photo courtesy of Summit Entertainment. 

ED: And, for you Rob, what was the break-up scene like with Bella? Was it tough or easy?

Robert Pattinson: There was something weird about it. One of the main things I felt doing that and what really helped was people’s anticipation of the movie, and the fans of the series’ idea about what Bella and Edward’s relationship is and what it represents to them. It’s some kind of ideal for a relationship. And, so, just playing a scene where you’re breaking up the ideal relationship, I felt a lot of the weight behind that. Also, it took away a fear of melodrama. It felt seismic, even when we were doing it. It was very much like the stepping out into the sunlight scene, at the end. You could really feel the audience watching, as you’re doing it. It was a strange one to do.

ED: In your own life, have you ever had your heart broken like Edward does when he leaves Bella?

RP: No, I don’t think so.

Photo courtesy of Summit Entertainment. 

ED: Rob, after you leave Bella, Edward appears as only a series of visions to Bella, until the last act of the film. Did you wish you were in more scenes in New Moon? Did you feel disjointed from your castmates at all?

RP: Believe it or not, those vision scenes were the hardest scenes to do. They weren’t really, at the time, but after I saw the first cut of the movie, they changed them quite a bit in the edit and ADR [dubbing]. As for being alone, I’ve always felt a little bit aloof as the character, throughout the whole series. I think that’s how he is, so I didn’t feel any different.

ED: Can you clear it up for fans, who see and hear Edward warn Bella to be careful about the things she does while he’s away, if he is mentally contacting her or what?

RP: It’s not Edward. It’s a manifestation of Bella’s loneliness and desperation. It was always very difficult. I’d asked Kristen, "How would you play it?" It’s her opinion, so that was hard.

Photo courtesy of Summit Entertainment.

ED: Okay, Taylor, since Edward has broken up the relationship and is gone and Bella is growing closer to the new buff, beefed-up Jacob, I think a lot of female fans will wonder why Bella doesn’t fall head over heels for Jacob. I mean, the only drawback to going out with Jacob would be werewolf hairballs, because emotionally and physically, you're very winning.

Taylor Lautner: Thank you very much. [laughs] I think it depends on what kind of girl you are, what kind of guy you like. Edward and Jacob are complete opposite guys. They’re hot and cold. Literally. So, yeah, I mean it’s just I personally love Bella and Jacob’s relationship, how they begin with best friends and it starts to grow into something more and more. Both guys are in love with Bella. Both guys are always going to be there for Bella, and they’re protective. I just think it’s what kind of guy you like.

ED:What was it like playing Bella, who is torn between two supernatural hunks?

KS: For me, it was the most difficult. Bella is so sure all the time and this is the one movie where she’s actually baffled and totally like, "I don’t know!" It’s weird to play Bella like that, because she’s so not like that. That was difficult. It was really hard to go back and forth because you don’t shoot a movie in sequence, obviously. I had to do stuff with Jacob where I was alive and happy and out of this depression thing and then after lunch go back and scream in my bed for six hours for Edward. So that was difficult.

New Moon opens across Canada today. Will you go see it? 

Read our review of New Moon here.