Sheen, Fanning, Bright, and Campbell Bower teamed up to talk about playing these fearsome vampires at a press conference in LA in support of New Moon.
Michael Sheen, Jamie Campbell Bower, Dakota Fanning, and Cameron Bright Interview
Dakota, as such a fan of the series, you’ve said in many interviews before that you were really excited about this. What were the highlights of playing Jane and do you get to do more in the next movie?Dakota Fanning: "I think the highlight of playing Jane was getting to wear that costume and to have the red contact lenses. I was really excited about that, and getting to play an evil character. The next movie I already finished doing, Eclipse, and it’s about the same. It’s still not very much in the movie."
What did you think when you saw yourself for the first time with the red lenses in?
Dakota Fanning: "I know. It’s really scary. I think it makes anyone look automatically evil. But yeah, it was really fun. You get used to them after a while. You can see pretty good, but it’s still kind of weird."
Michael, now that you get to play a vampire rather than a werewolf, was it more satisfying?
Michael Sheen: "[...]The tailoring is so much better as a vampire. I’ve been observing vampires for some time now and I finally got to give my own fang, although we don’t have fangs, do we? But no, it was great to be on the other side for a bit."
Jamie, can you describe what the Volturi are?
Jamie Campbell Bower: "We are basically the vampire government, I guess. We’re there to sort of keep all the vampires in check. People keep describing us as evil. I wouldn’t say we’re evil necessarily. We’re the government and not everybody likes the government, which is fine. So, we’re there to keep everybody in check. Without us, like you were saying earlier, it would turn into complete anarchy. It would be vampire anarchy. So we’re there to keep the Cullens in check in particular. There’s me and Michael and Chris Heyerdahl who plays Marcus, Aro and Caius respectively, and we sit on these big thrones and then there’s you (Dakota) and Charlie (Bewley) and Dan (Cudmore). They’re our runners effectively."
Michael Sheen: "It’s quite thrilling to have Dakota Fanning calling you 'master'."
Cameron, can you talk about your character and your relationship to Dakota and what kind of powers you have and what your character has to do?
Cameron Bright: "Me and Dakota, we’re the henchmen but it’s kind of funny because Dakota is the most feared out of all the Volturi. She’s the one with the worst power and everything. We’re the henchmen. We kind of do what they say. For me, as Alec, I’m the only one that isn’t quite afraid of her, but I still am. Like I’m not afraid to say what I want, where everybody else is always kind of watching their words, as far the henchmen go. Felix and Demetri, they’re always – as soon as they say one thing bad, she just looks at them and they just shut up and don’t say anything. We’re brother and sister. That’s basically about it. That spells it out for you. Luckily, we don’t fight at all or else I’d be in trouble."
Can each of you talk about your character’s special power and if you had a special power in real life, what would you like it to be? Also, Cameron and Dakota, your characters are brother and sister. Which one is older?
Cameron Bright: "I think we’re twins. [To Dakota] Aren’t we?"
Dakota Fanning: "We’re like thousands of years old, I guess, so it doesn’t really matter anymore, I suppose."
Cameron Bright: "Special power – I cut off people’s senses. And the special power I’d want in the real world would be to have any special power I wanted. My special power would be to have every special power in the world. That’s something, really. I don’t know. I can’t talk."
Dakota Fanning: "For me, my special power is that I can just look at someone and cause them pain. And, if I could have any power, it would be to read people’s thoughts."
Jamie Campbell Bower: "I don’t have a power. Take from that what you will. And if I had a power in real life, probably something like the power of flight would be kind of cool – just to get from A to B much quicker rather than walking everywhere. It’s much faster."
Michael Sheen: "My power is to be able to read people’s thoughts by touching them, and in real life, I would like to have the power to always look like I’m 3 centimeters to the right of where I actually am. [Laughter] Mock!"
That was very specific and unusual.
Michael Sheen: "I’m doing it now. I actually do have that power. More fool you!"
Is it challenging to play characters that are duplicitous because that’s kind of what you get into whenever it comes to the Cullens? And is it fun to play characters that are so intimidating?
Dakota Fanning: "Yes. [Laughs] Yes, it is fun."
Michael Sheen: "We had to tone Dakota down. She was too evil. Her natural personality is too evil and we had to tone the volume down on the evil."
Dakota Fanning: [Laughs] "Yeah. It was fun to get to play a feared character, you know, something different than what I’ve done before. And also, she uses her power not for good, which was another thing that was kind of interesting to me."
