Before Robert Pattinson earned global recognition playing Twilight’s vampire Edward Cullen, his first big role came via another fantasy franchise for young adults: Harry Potter.
In the fourth Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Pattinson portrayed the role of Cedric Diggory, another contender in the competition that Harry finds himself placed in at Hogwarts.
Pattinson has since criticized Twilight, making it known that the franchise isn’t his favorite. Still, he was happy to stick to his contract.
Speaking later about his experience as Cedric Diggory, Pattinson admitted that he wouldn’t have wanted to stay in the Harry Potter franchise for longer than one movie, the way he did with Harry Potter.
While he definitely had obstacles to overcome on the Twilight set too, including being intimidated by Kristen Stewart, overall he found the Twilight movies easier to film.
Did Robert Pattinson Find Playing Cedric Diggory “Terrifying”?
Speaking about his experience filming in the movie later, Robert Pattinson admitted that he found it “terrifying” to portray Cedric Diggory at first because he had never been part of a project on such a massive scale before.
“I’d sort of fallen into it,” Pattinson told GQ (via Cheat Sheet), speaking of how he came to join the famous cast. “I mean, it was so terrifying. I remember the first scene I ever shot was in the magical maze at the end, and I’d never done anything with special effects and stunts. And it was a big deal at the time. It felt very, very, intimidating.”
Of course, Pattinson would go on to film the entire Twilight franchise with the use of stunts and special effects. But at the time, the experience was new to him, so he read books on method acting to help him prepare for the role.
“The only thing I really got out of that was just beating yourself up before every single scene,” he said of what he learned in the book. “That was basically my only concept of how to prepare for a scene. I was psyching myself up as if I was getting into a fight or something before these scenes, and just screaming into a pillow and fighting, punching myself, and kind of ripping my clothing and stuff.”
He went on, “But I had all these prosthetic wounds on, and all of the prosthetics would melt off my face, and I’d have to have all of my makeup done again. But I had no concept of how to kind of get into a psyched-up physical state.”
How Much Money Did Robert Pattinson Make From Harry Potter?
Even though Harry Potter proved to be a challenge for Pattinson, it seems as if the experience literally paid off.
“I spent a lot of time living off the Harry Potter money,” he told GQ. “I moved to an apartment in Soho in London.”
Pattinson explained that after Harry Potter, he turned his attention to music and focused on doing open mic nights and gigs around London. Eventually, though, he ran out of money. “I was definitely going in the wrong direction in terms of a career, up until Twilight.”
Of course, Pattinson reportedly didn’t seriously increase his net worth until Twilight, which was a game-changer.
Why Robert Pattinson Didn’t Want To Say In The Harry Potter Franchise
In an interview with Games Radar, Robert Pattinson admitted that he didn’t want to stay in the Harry Potter franchise from the long-term, but not for reasons that fans may think.
He revealed in the interview, which was given while Pattinson was still in the midst of working on the Twilight franchise, that he believed it would be easier to complete all the Twilight films than it would be to complete all the Harry Potter films.
"The Harry Potter I worked on was an 11 month shoot. I couldn’t be doing that [for the long term]. I don’t know how those guys stayed sane—they’ve been doing it for 10 years. I would go completely crazy"
Interestingly, while Harry Potter may have been tougher to film, Daniel Radcliffe revealed that Robert Pattinson’s position as Edward Cullen may have been harder to deal with in terms of having his life consumed by fame.
“I think he’s had to do with kind of a lot more,” Radcliffe said (via Cheat Sheet). “I had a very gradual easing in to the idea of fame, because I was doing the first two films back to back almost.
"So, while the whole Potter film franchise was exploding, I was in studios filming and kind of unaware that this thing was going massive outside. Whereas Rob was suddenly the most famous guy in the world. I think that’s a lot harder to deal with.”
Even though Pattinson couldn’t have imagined himself staying in the Harry Potter franchise for more than one movie, he did enjoy his time making The Goblet of Fire: “It was a really nice environment on Harry Potter. Even compared to movies I’ve done since, it was very protected, the way the kids were treated.”
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