Robert Pattinson believes artistes resort to method acting only when they are not playing “lovely” characters on-screen.
Pattinson, who went the method way to pull off his character in Robert Eggers’ “The Lighthouse”, said the role pushed him to the edge. “It was a kind of no limit part, which I always really like.
We’d do these completely wild scenes, and then literally after a take you’d be exhausted. It’s kind of cathartic. I don’t know how you’d be able to bring the part home.
It would be impossible,’ the actor told Jennifer Lopez during Variety’s Actor on Actor. Lopez agreed with Pattinson and said there have been times when she just couldn’t wait to shrug off the characters when she is done playing it.
‘I feel like some younger actors feel like they need to stay in it all the time, and as I’ve done movies for many years now, I can’t wait for the end of the day to kind of let it go and go home and get in the shower and literally wash it all off,” she said. To this, Pattinson remarked,
‘I always say, you only ever see people doing method (acting) when they’re playing an a**hole. You never see someone just being lovely to everyone going, ‘I’m really deep in character.’
He said it is important for actors to know when to get into the character and when to leave it. “I need to know when you’re on stage and when you’re off stage. I need to know that between action and cut, that’s the thing. That’s the safe space. I need to know it ends. I need to know there’s a cut coming, and then I’ll feel safe. If it just feels like you can’t get out, that’s when you go crazy,’ he added.
The Lighthouse, which also featured Willem Dafoe, released in the US in October. (PTI)
