Not holding back! Robert Pattinson has thrown some major shade at his role in the Twilight movies over the years. Some of his quotes have made fans question whether he disliked his role in the franchise, which was based off a series of books by Stephanie Meyer.
The actor first starred as the sparkly Edward Cullen when the first movie premiered in 2008. At the time, he revealed during an interview with E! News that he didn’t understand why people liked the books.
“It was like it was a book that wasn’t supposed to be published,” the British star candidly revealed. “I was just convinced, like, ‘This woman is mad. She’s completely mad and she’s in love with her own fictional creation.’ And sometimes you would feel uncomfortable reading this thing.”
Throughout the four books and five movies, Robert’s character Edward falls in love with a human girl named Bella Swan, famously played by Kristen Stewart. In the end, they get married, have a baby and, oh yeah, she also gets turned into a vampire. Not to mention, her best friend, Jacob Black (a werewolf played by Taylor Lautner) “imprints” on Edward and Bella’s child, Renesmee.
Once the final film — The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 — hit theaters in 2012, the floodgates opened further and the Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire alum’s thoughts about the movie really started to come out. While appearing on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon at the time, Robert was asked if the movies coming to an end were “bittersweet” for him. He replied, “for them,” referring to the fans.
Not all of his comments have been negative over the years. During an interview with W Magazine from 2017, Robert did note that it was a “fun” and “wild experience” to play a vampire.
“What a strange way to spend my early twenties. I never really quite knew how to play a vampire though,” he added. “I mean, if it hadn’t been so successful, I think people would have thought it was really weird. It’s a really weird story. But I think once it becomes mainstream, it’s difficult for people to see how strange the story is.”
When looking back at the film’s auction, the Batman actor admitted he was actually in L.A. for a different role.
“I mean, the audition was fun. I flew out to L.A. to actually audition for something else. Which I was told it was mine to take, just on a plate,” he told W. “And I went in and completely ruined the audition. And then the next day it was the Twilight audition. And I think I was at such a kind of nothing-to-lose state, it was quite easy for me to do. But the audition was really fun.”
Scroll through our gallery to read more of Robert’s quotes about the Twilight franchise over the years.
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Reflecting on the Story
“I mean it’s a weird story, Twilight,” he said during a November 2019 interview with Variety. “It’s strange how people responded. I guess the books, they are very romantic, but at the same time, it’s not like The Notebook romantic. Twilight is about this guy who finds the one girl he wants to be with and also wants to eat her. Well, not eat — drink her blood or whatever. I thought it was a strange story. Even the way I promoted it, I was very open about how strange I thought it was when I was doing it.”
Learning to Like It
“It’s lovely now that the mania is not so intense,” Robert told USA Today in April 2019. “People come up (to me) and just have very fond memories of it. It’s a really sweet thing. I think the only scary part was right in the thick of it all, when it was very, very intense. Now the intensity has died down and it’s just very warm memories.”
A New Fanbase
“It seems like with younger people in their late teens, early 20s, it’s sort of become quite a hip thing to like,” he shared in the same USA Today interview. “It’s a fascinating second wave of people appreciating it, which is kind of cool. I think when anything becomes a massive phenomenon, there’s always people who get annoyed because it’s just everywhere. But now it seems like a retro thing: the soundtrack, the fashion. It’s like, ‘Oh, that’s so late 2000s.’”
Jokes About His Age
When asked about the possibility of a Twilight reunion during a September 2018 interview with Variety, Robert joked: “The amount of time I’ve spent moisturizing, I am ready to play 17 at a moment’s notice. Ready!”
The Intense Fandom
“I can’t really understand it even now,” he told Vanity Fair in 2011. “It does have an angle which is attached to something quite primal in girls. I guess people want it to define them, like ‘I’m a Twilight fan.’ That’s crazy to me. I think people really just like being part of a crowd. There’s something just tremendously exciting about hyping yourself up to that level.”
Discussing the Franchise
“With Twilight, you’ve got to please the franchise,” he said in the same Vanity Fair interview. “There’s nothing you can do about it. That’s the way it is. But it is weird being part of that, kind of representing something you don’t particularly like.”
