“Rob was so into it, he fell off the bed.”
In the latest episode of The Big Hit Show podcast, Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke revealed all the intimate details of auditioning Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart for the roles of Edward Cullen and Bella Swan. Namely their passionate first kiss, which was rehearsed in Catherine’s home.
“Rob and Kristen auditioned on my bed — the kissing scene — Rob was so into it, he fell off the bed,” she recalled. “I’m like, ‘Dude, calm down.’”
Catherine was initially wary of hiring Rob — “he was a bit out of shape, his shirt was just all messy” when he first walked in — but after his kiss with Kristen, she knew he was meant to be Edward. Although, the director is still worried about the actors’ four-year age difference, being that Kristen was underage at the time.
“I could tell they had a lot of chemistry, and I’m like ‘Oh my God,’” she said. “I thought, Kristen was 17. I don’t want to get in some illegal thing. So I remember I told Rob, ‘By the way, Kristen is 17. In our country, it’s illegal to, you know, have a sexual… And he’s like ‘Oh, ok. Whatever.’”
Eventually, Kristen and Robert dated from 2009 to 2012.
Catherine later expressed that she asked Rob to adopt some new grooming techniques, in order to accurately portray the beautiful vampire.
“I said, ‘We’re going to work a little bit on the eyebrows, work a little bit on the teeth. We’re gonna do a different thing with your hair. You’re gonna start working out, you can’t just be drinking beer all day and have a little beer belly, no,’” she shared.
In an interview with The New Yorker last November, Kristen herself recalled the moment she met Rob. “It was so clear who worked. I was literally just, like…” Kristen said while pretending to swoon, the outlet reported.
She continued in saying Robert had an “intellectual approach that was combined with ‘I don’t give a f**k about this, but I’m going to make this sing.’ And I was, like, ‘Ugh, same.’ … And, whatever, we were young and stupid and, not to say that we made it so much better, but that’s what it needed, and that’s what anybody playing those parts needed to feel.”
