By Rebecca Pauley

 

It was said to be one of the hottest days of summer so far, but the Piazza at  Schmidt’s, located in Philadelphia, was still exploding with excitement. The third sequel of the Twilight Saga was soon opening in theaters and fans were buzzing.

Girls painted their faces white, with red face paint looking like blood dripping down their chin. Others had arguments about who was the best character. Some answered questions about “Twilight” so they could win cool prizes. “Twilight” T-shirts and posters and even cookies that sparkled were sold. Fans of all ages were screaming and cheering for hours on end.

Meanwhile, a second Blockbuster movie, “The Last Airbender,” was poised for its debut the same week. This movie was directed by one of Hollywood’s best storytellers, M. Night Shyamalan, and brought a well-loved television show, “Avatar”, to the big screen. “The Last Airbender”, akin to “Eclipse”, brought thousands of fans, adults and children alike, to theaters all around the country.

Both international phenomenons have the well-known actor, Jackson Rathbone, portraying a lead character in it. In “Eclipse”, we see Jackson as the dark, mysterious Jasper Hale. In “The Last Airbender” we meet Sokka, a sensitive young man who protects his sister.

I got the chance to sit down and talk with Jackson Rathbone, along with the fun-loving Bronson Pelletier, who portrays Jared, a member of the Twilight Saga wolf pack.

“He moved like a lightning strike – power and speed and death rolled into one.” ?Jacob Black on Jasper Hale’s fighting ability.

Just to get you in the vampire/werewolf frame of mind, here is a peak into the world of our characters, Jasper and Jared:

—  They are coming – a clan of newborn vampires. They are stronger and faster than the Cullens. They are ruthless; human blood drips from their mouths, and their eyes are crimson red. They are controlled by the merciless Victoria. The Cullens must destroy them. Jasper Hale must teach them how to fight, and Jared, the werewolf, must use his speed, agility, and strength to help. —

While interviewing the two characters, I was interested to know why fans of the Twilight Saga, especially teenagers, have yet to lose interest in this vampire craze. The line of teenagers wrapped around the movie theater for the midnight show; and, fans even brought chairs and food so they could tailgate outside. The rush of excitement was practically rocketing through the building. I wondered why the fascination has kept its momentum for the past few years.

Bronson revealed that, “The story gets a little more in depth to begin with and a lot more characters get introduced and, you know, the love triangle gets a little more uh what would be the word…

Jackson helped finish that sentence, “STEAMY”

Jackson further shared his thoughts regarding the vampire mania.

“I think it’s cool because, as Bronson was saying, the stories progress with the course of the films. With “Twilight” you introduce a vampire world; with “New Moon” you introduce the werewolf world and then here in “Eclipse” you see the two worlds come together, combine and they have to get along and fight together for the common good. And the stories keep going keep, getting more interesting… Life only gets more interesting.”

Transforming yourself to look the part and get into character was not an easy job, even though Bronson claims he barely has a costume.

Bronson described the experience, “…when I just get into the shorts and they bronze our whole bodies and the whole nine…it takes about an hour and a half with the tattoos on. Right when you get into our wardrobe, which is pretty much nothing, you really feel in the character, though.

And of course all of us on set are doing push ups and what-not right before we are filming… We pretty much have a lot of fun on set. The  Director of Photography… calls us ‘the crazy monkeys’ because we are pretty wild on set.”

Jackson, on the other hand, had to have a lot more done to him in order to fit the part.

He related, “Well, for me I have to go through about an hour and a half to two hours of make up in the morning to get all pale-like. I wear a wig in “New Moon” and “Eclipse” so it’s not my hair. ”

I was then inquisitive about their characters, and how they are similar and different to their actual personalities. I got very interesting answers from both of them.

Jackson revealed, “I’m from the south. All of my family is from Louisiana. A lot of my family lives in Texas now. I was raised to be a southern gentleman as much as possible and if I don’t act so I feel like my grandparents will descend from heaven and slap me. So I try to uphold that as much as possible. That’s pretty much it, though. Jasper is very different then me.

One of the things I like about being an actor is playing characters that are far more extreme and have extreme sides of their personality that I would not necessarily go to in my daily life like attacking a girl because she got a paper cut. I am not really that blood thirsty.”

As for Bronson, “I just love getting on set and getting the script and dissecting it and making it mine. I do bring a little of myself to that character. This time I chose to bring a little jokester side, a little lighter side to my character. But as the books go on my character turns a little darker, though, so we’ll see what happens with that. It will be interesting to do.”

I could not even imagine the amount of training they had to do for this movie, for when I saw the movie I nearly cringed looking at the intense fight scenes. But it was even more training than I thought.

Jackson explained, “We did a lot of vampire fight choreography which is fight choreography with the idea that they are going to ramp it up, speed it up. We are going to be a lot quicker, a lot faster.

There are going to be certain character attributes that we each have in the vampire world in terms of the fighting for “Eclipse.” It was fun because I do a couple of scenes where I was taking on seven opponents at once. I was going through seven different stunt people. There is very, very long, elaborate fight choreography for that.”

Bronson further explained, “For us, honestly, we did a lot of physical training in the sense of we did some Brazilian jujitsu and Muay Thai for “Eclipse.” In the original one we trained with …one of the trainers from 300, and he had us do circuit training, strength training, conditioning. It was pretty intense. In that sense it was a lot of blood, sweat and tears. I mean, after a workout I would sometimes almost get sick. We trained so hard. It was pretty cool.”

I was still curious about what goes on behind the scenes so I asked the actors if anything funny, crazy, or wild happen on set while not filming?

Jackson quipped, “I think every day was strange.”

Bronson laughed and gave us an example: “Actually, we were all playing football, me, Taylor and some of the wolves. We were … just throwing around the football, and it was a little bit muddy out. And, I don’t know, for some bright reason I decided to kick the ball. And when I kicked it, the ball came on flying and hit transport. The transport was swerving because I smacked it right in front of the windshield…

Next thing you know, like where did my shoe go?  Everyone’s looking for my shoe. All of a sudden, boom, it comes flying down and hits one of the other characters right in the head, right after he got his make-up done, of course.  Mud is all over his face. I just grabbed my shoe and ran back to my trailer. I was like, ‘I’m out of here!’”

After our interview, we all joined the festivities at the Piazza at Schmidts and Jackson and Bronson thrilled the crowd by answering questions from the fans and signing autographs.

I enjoyed my time with Bronson and Jackson. They were amiable and funny and enjoyed a lot of laughs together during the interview.

I left the “Eclipse” party at the Piazza and joined the crowds at my local movie theater for the midnight showing of the movie. As I soaked in the excitement going on during the midnight showing, I imagined the amount of work put into this truly spectacular saga.

These two young men have put their heart and soul into their acting careers and this movie. The usher took my ticket, and I walked into the theatre. I sat down in my seat, and I watched, with great joy, the magical movie, “Eclipse.”