Dior Promo: Interviste carta stampata Spagnola

Glamour Spain:

THE MAGNETIC SEX APPEAL OF ROBERT PATTINSON

He has one of the most magnetic looks of current cinema. Free from his vampiric past, the actor writes the first chapters of his new life, next to Dior Homme, turning into an icon of freedom.

Robert Pattinson says he's not the perfect man, but he's very close. His millions of fans believe so, and after seeing him in the new Dior Homme ad, so do we. Discreet and misterious, Pattinson (London, 1986) is still the same he's always been in spite of the fame he got with The Twilight Saga. Since then, his CV grows in an unstoppable way with titles like Water for Elephants, Bel Ami and David Cronenberg's Cosmopolis. We'll soon see him in The Rover, and he starts filming: Maps to the Stars, again with Cronenberg and Hold on to Me, with actress Carey Mulligan. Used to living with the rumors of his break up with Kristen Stewart, he feels grown up for the first time. In Los Angeles and in a Glamour Exclusive, he confesses that he's a one-woman man. As said before: almost perfect. 

What made you accept to being the new face of the Maison Dior?

It was a combination of circumstances. When it was proposed to me, I was filming very small movies and I thought representing a brand like Dior would allow me to get to the public more. It's good to have a big company as an ally. Being the face of a brand is something I've doubted a lot. I've turned down offers in the past, but when the french campaign proposed it to me, the decision was easy. I like what the brand represents. I like it because it's inaccessible and I relate to its philosophy. 

Do you miss the media attention the Twilight Saga caused?

No, although I do have new found feelings. On one side, the popularity made me face the pressure of the media, but on the other side, I felt safe being part of a saga so profitable.

Do you mean Twilight gave you economical support that now allows you to freely choose low budget cinematic projects?

Yeah, that's what I mean. Twilight has given value to my image all over the world. Before I star in a romantic comedy, I'd rather turn into the face of a strong firm. It's something that in reality, I could've done earlier, but I've waited because I wanted to team with a good brand. Two years ago, when I began considering the idea of being the face of a perfume, nobody was doing it. Now all actors do it, from Brad Pitt to Matthew McConaughey. It's fun that we're all doing it now.

Originally, the story of the advert (directed by Romain Gavras) was going to be of two men and one woman, but you decided to change the script...

A lot of people thought we were going to have an orgy. Certain images were cut because there was nakedness and we don't want to give the wrong ideas.

But if you start allowing yourself to be seen surrounded by models, a lot of people will expect you to do exactly what's expected of the sexy actor of the moment...

There's a very precise line that marks reality and fiction. If people aren't capable of distinguishing it, there's nothing I can do to explain it to them. 

You said becoming the face of Dior makes you feel adult. Do you feel that at 27, you've lost your innocence? 

I don't know. I feel less self-conscious now. Up until now I saw myself as a teenager, and for a few months now I haven't felt so immature.

Has letting go of Twilight and everything that surrounds it contributed to your maturity?

I don't know, with Twilight I turned into a public persona and my ego had to face a lot of things. I don't like calling attention, or that people hug me and take pictures of me. Twilight made me change. However, for the last eight or nine months, I feel a lot more comfortable under my skin.

The new promotional images of the ad come with James Dean quotes. They sound very good, but they become exahusting, "Live every day as if it were your last", for example-

That's how I live. If I had to die tomorrow, I'd feel content with what I've achieved. I'm not a very ambitious person.

Another James Dean jewel is "Forgive quickly", is it easy for you to forgive?

*Sighs* I'm good at forgiving myself.

Do you have to forget to forgive or are you capable of forgiving generously?

I think I'm capable of forgiving without further ado. But at the moment, I don't feel the need to forgive anyone. There's nothing that really bothers me.

The Dior ad speaks of independence and the sex appeal of a one-woman man, is that how you see yourself?

I don't know how I see myself, that perception changes every day. The ad represents a couple that lives their relationship with such intensity that in the end, they're incapable to keep it. But it's not real...

Have you ever snuck into a party?

Into many, continuously. I never get invited to parties, I always have to sneak in *laughs*.

How do you fight boredom?

For a long time I've been so afraid to show up in public that I stayed at home doing nothing. It came to a point where I couldn't hide anymore, so I decided to change. I've never minded, because I like spending time alone, but I have more confidence in my self.

Do you still write and compose?

Yeah, I've been composing lately. Trying to develop the scripts of two movies and writing. One of the films I'll be in, I can't say much about the other one. It's funny, I like to write the characters as if it was a woman and then playing them. 

Why do you think that happens?

I suppose it's because female emotions are a bit more complex than male ones. 

Do you think you're the perfect man?

*Laughs* Not at all. I'm very, very far from being that. 

Do you worry about dressing well? Is clothing important to you when you define your image?

Of course. I think shoes are very important, because even if they're nice, if I don't feel comfortable wearing them, it ruins the whole ensemble. In the perfume ad, I'm wearing my own clothes. 

Really? We thought it was Dior.

All the tshirts in the ad are mine. It always happens, I always end up wearing something of mine.

Your image projects a lot of elegance, something like the British charm, how do you manage that?

I'm very squared and a little maniac. I find it very difficult to find clothes that captivate me. I don't want to pretend to be someone I'm not and getting it wrong; the wrong suit, shoes or shirt can ruin everything. I like dressing elegant but always comfortable. 

Is there any fragrance or smell that helps awaken your emotional memories?

Yeah. The smell of breakfast. Bacon, coffee, toast... it remids me of family sundays at home. Bacon and marmite. 

Would you like to shoot a superhero film?

I don't know, I have no abs... I'm missing the six pack! I don't think I'd dare to sign a contract in that kind of proejct, which usually includes various films. I'm still learning what I want to achieve in my career as an actor. 

Back to your abs, you're not one of the guys that sells himself without a shirt. Gym must not be your thing, you haven't even been caught at the beach...

I hate going to the gym. Now that I'm getting older who knows, I might sign up, but I know I'd only last two weeks. About the beach, to be honest I don't really like taking my shirt off, I'd rather get drunk *laughs*.

Since we interviewed you for Harry Potter, you keep the same humbleness. Haven't you changed during these years?

I'm still a very shy and tremendously insecure guy. In reality, I've never been interested in following the path of egomaniacs. 

El Paìs:

"My favorite stories are the dark ones, where there's no hope"

He's given a turn in his life. He's broken up with Kristen Stewart and focused on his career. Now he only does auteur films. The actor and new face of Dior talks to S Moda exclusively.

He didn’t put the audience in his pocket. Neither did he understand it. But he did wake up a very feminine instinct: the maternal one. That was not Robert Pattinson’s night. The british 27 year old, got up on the stage of the Soho House, a private Los Angeles club, to talk about his first luxury firm: Dior. Around 30 international media, including this magazine, had attended the premiere of 1000 Lives, the commercial for Dior Homme that Pattinson stars in (online at dior.com on September 1). “I am incapable of seeing an audience as such. In my eyes they’re all individuals and in my head I try to have a conversation with each of them. That’s impossible.” He apologizes the next day sitting on a couch in the Beverly Hills Hotel.

The actor recovers his confidence. Goodbye to shyness. And out of place laughter. During face to face, Pattinson –with beard, a hat, jeans and tshirt – measures time and words. And he inspires instinct very different to the maternal ones.

He doesn’t like to talk about his private life, or his earlier years as a model. His purpose: to build a solid career, leaving behind the labels of it boy and mass phenomenon, “If I could go to Cannes every year, I’d be fine with lower income. I’d like all of my movies to go through that festival.” He assures us. And he’s serious. His first attempts after the Twilight Saga were: Water for Elephants (2011) and Bel Ami (2012), they didn’t rescue him from the mainstream circuit. However, Cosmopolis (2012), David Cronenberg’s film, did. “It was nothing like anything I’d done before, and I loved that.” He admits. What’s coming is even better. Mission: Blacklist (Jasper Granslandt), The Rover (David Michod), Queen of the Desert (W. Herzog) and Maps to the Stars, Cronenberg’s upcoming film. “It’s more accessible than Cosmopolis, although not as much as A History of Violence. The script is dark. I find it funny, but you have to have a very unique sense of humor to see it that way: it’s not a comedy.”

His ability to capture irony is probably, in part, because of his English roots. Pattinson grew up in Barnes, southwest of London. When he was a kid, his sisters dressed him up as a girl. His appearance – a bit feminine, then- didin’t distune. Little of that is left – blue eyes, framed by never-ending lashes and certain delicacy. But a lot of his modeling past. His mother, model agent, introduced him to it and Robert posed until he was 16 years old. Then he got a worm for acting and since his role in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005), he hasn’t stopped. Critics agree, he’s not just a pretty face. 

One of your upcoming projects is ‘Queen of the Dessert’ by Werner Herzog. Are you only interested in auteur filmmaking? (Note: there is no proper translation for this question, by auteur filmmaking, it refers to films where the director plays a huge part in the writing process, normally his own scripts)

I want to work with geniuses. I’m trying to recreate my favorite film list from when I was seventeen. I met Werner, we talked, and two weeks later he offered me the role of Lawrence of Arabia. We start shooting at the end of this year.

You didn’t have many releases in 2013. But its raining roles for you. For The Rover, a modern western, you spent two months in an Australian town covered in dust, sweating and surrounded by flies. It’s not a very encouraging setting.

We shot in the dessert. My character breaks his teeth, bleeds, gets spread with mud. On set, nobody made an effort to look hot, just the opposite from Twilight. I’d never been in a film without my shirt on because I’m embarrassed, but in this one, I barely ever have it on.

That’s a step... 

Yeah! From now on, I’m never wearing one!

Fans must be sad now that you cut your hair. 

It was a distinctive symbol. But it was because of laziness. I didn’t go to the barber’s because I didn’t want to pay for a haircut. I just fixed it when I had to do a movie.

So, you don't take care of himself?

I need to do it more. Just yesterday I was thinking of wrinkles and grey hairs. 

He doesn’t hide them, Pattinson makes an effort to look less handsome. He’s like Brad Pitt in that aspect. And for Nan Goldin, the photographer of the Dior Homme campaign, it’s perfect. The artist, famous for photographing the dark sides of life, stresses his asymmetrical features and makes him look older.

Yesterday, at the press conference, you admitted to feeling adult. In what way?

It’s a feeling that started eight months ago, when I turned 27. I’ve been taking adult decisions for years now. I would ask my parents for advice but they didn’t know what to tell me. Fortunately, I’m more comfortable now.

You played Edward Cullen in five films, enough to feel affection. Was it hard saying goodbye to the vampire and the saga’s stability?

I couldn’t have filmed another one. It got harder each time and I felt like I was repeating myself.

How do you deal with prejudice? Making films for teenagers gets you typecast, they think you’re less smart.

Actors that build a career after a franchise are usually smart. A project like Twilight indicates: it’s not only about keeping up work, it’s about not losing your head. Edward was young, he went to High School. People thought I was, too, but really I was 21.

You don’t like talking about your private life. But you’re a teen phenomenon, you represent a global brand. How do you deal with stardom?

Life is decisions. I chose this job, and at the same time, I set out not to mix personal and professional. That has allowed me not to obsess: I don’t pretend for media and the public to really know me. If I did, I’d go crazy.

You don’t use lotions. But you like to shop and create styles, you created Edward's in Twilight.

Filming was in Canada, and it was set behind two weeks, I had nothing to do so I went shopping. But I had no money. I sent pictures with the clothes that I wanted with texts like “I think Edward should wear these jeans”. Many made it and the studio bought my clothes! 

In the Dior ad, your style reminds to those of Jean-Paul Belmondo’s and Steve McQueen’s. Do you like its aesthetics?

I’m very practical; I go for basic clothing, what you can wear for a straight week. Fragrance adverts tend to be perfect and we were looking for tough aesthetics. For the shooting, we had many options, but I was bent on wearing the same thing all the time. I ended up ruining a jacket. And I skipped codes: I was wearing a t-shirt beneath a shirt. I saw it as very 50’s, very masculine. Yet, in France that’s unsightly, the opposite of chic.

Surly it’ll become a trend. Are those your favorite decades, the 50’s and 60’s?

Yeah. I really like their practical spirit. A lot of suits looked like uniforms. I’m not an advocate of triviality.

Once you said you’d rather spend 10 years with a girl rather than 10 minutes.

I still think the same, but it depends on the person.

You’ve been very involved in the Dior ad. If you directed or produced a film, what genre would it be?

My perspective as a director is very different: I dream of shooting a big budget film. A science fiction one.

Your favorite movie of this kind?

Blade Runner and Star Wars. I love science fiction, I love how it creates universes. When you’re a kid and you watch The Empire Strikes Back, you identify with the characters, you believe you are one of them even when the movie is finished. It’s fascinating. I, for example, still want Star Wars toys. If somebody gave me a laser sword for my birthday, I’d flip.

Now that I see you in a hat. I think you had a rap group at school.

[Laughs] Yes. I went to private school and my friends and I played every day. I was obsessed; I wrote rap songs in class. From fifteen to seventeen, I took it very seriously. I still like it, I’d like to record an album.

A lot of your films are based on books, do you like literature?

I used to read a lot. But my focus has gotten worse. My favorites are Russian authors and dark stories where there’s no hope.

So, are you nostalgic or pessimistic?

No. I don’t know why I like those types of stories. But I do. I re-read Dublineses by James Joyce the other day. I gave A Painful Case, my favorite story, to a friend. He said it was the most depressing thing he’d read in his life. I love it. There’s something in those stories that allows me to connect with myself and that makes me happy.

tradotto da @oldmoriiarty

GQ Spain (tradotto by letmesign)

The Beverly Hills hotel is one of the most historic establishments in Hollywood, one of those places in which if you try, you can feel the ambiance and glamour of the golden age of American cinema. Amongst it’s pale pink columns – which have given it the name The Pink Palace – have eaten, slept and drank stars of the stature of Marylyn Monroe, Carey Grant, Grace Kelley, Lucille Ball or Elizabeth Taylor, to name a few. Even today, The Beverly Hills continues to me a main stop for the industry’s royalty and, since the best place to hide a tree is a forest, it is the best establishment to interview the paparazzi’s favorite prey of all of Los Angeles, Robert Pattinson. Dressed in jeans, sweater and a backwards baseball cap, he waits for us in a suite. Donning a scruffy beard he does not sparkle when the California sun illuminates his blue eyes. In fact, Robert looks less and less like a vampire abandoning high school and more like a mature actor seeking out roles with meaning. If you review his recent filmography, you’ll find smaller films – David Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis – than blockbusters. His collaboration with Dior directed by Romain Garvais, represents one more step on his journey to adulthood. Ironically, the man whom the pressed dubbed the next Jude Law after his role in Harry Potter is substituting him as the face of Dior Homme fragrance. “Everyone is the new someone,” jokes Pattinson. "There are probably about three new me…” He laughs.

In the campaigns films you have some racy scenes with model Camille Rowe. Did she feel intimidated about being in bed with Robert Pattinson?

No, I don’t think so. She was so… No, I don’t think so (laughs). And if she was, of course she didn’t show it (laughs).

And this doesn’t feel a bit disappointing?

No, not at all. If you have to kiss someone you don’t know and that person keeps their distance or pulls away it’s horrible, it’s very cutting.

In Twilight you needed 4 films to have sex and in this one you have 30 seconds…It’s a fast forward

Yes, that it is (laughs).

I suppose that’s what not being a teenager is about. You’ve said you’re beginning to feel like an adult. Why now, at 27 years?

I don’t know, I think it’s the age. It’s strange, you start to change, childhood ends and suddenly you feel that your physical appearance is different, you feel heavier. When I see the photos from the campaign or my last film I feel with a very different look than what I’ve had in other things I’ve done, I look older, like an adult, as if before I was.. “oh lord! You’re like a kid faking it..” Yes, I think it’s the age.

It’s clear Twilight has changed your life. Did you ever think it would be so big?

No, not at all, I lived in a tiny apartment when the premiere came and I didn’t know if we were going to do the sequels. Then the opening weekend came and it was like: “Oops, now we’re going to have to do the sequels.”

Did you dream with being a big star?

No, not at all, I didn’t even think about being an actor.

What price have you had to pay for success?

It’s strange, you can’t have a normal life. You spend a lot of time trying to fight it, but at the end you end up finding a new way to live. People don’t notice how lonely you are. In any case, I feel fortunate because I didn’t achieve success too young and I was at least able to have a life before.

While you filmed Little Ashes in Barcelona, I understand you invited a stalker to dinner…

Yes, it’s true. It wasn’t that big a deal, it was strange, a bit boring.

You didn’t think she could be a psychopath?

I can be a little psychopathic too (laughs). She’s the one that should have been scared of me (laughs).

Let me tell you that you portray yourself badly…

Yes, I’m trying to fix that. Before I didn’t like appearing like I had a big ego, now I do. Now I have a big ego (laughs). I will never again pretend to be humble (uses evil voice).

Do you ever feel like you have to apologize for your success?

When you become famous, it’s so easy for people to hate you just because you are famous. …So you try to beat yourself up so others can’t.