Saoirse Ronan Says It Was Considerate Of Robert Pattinson Not To Steal The Spotlight At The Lovely Bones Premiere

When reading a novel, most of us develop our own images of its characters based upon our interpretation the text. It must have been a bit surreal for you, having already played Susie, to picture yourself within the context of the book.

SR: Yeah, it’s weird. I really sympathize with the likes of Kristen Stewart, who’s playing Bella in Twilight. I think teenagers can make their points more well known than adults, and they feel quite strongly about things — [especially] with a book like Twilight, which I read and loved and that everyone just was sort of obsessed with. And if anyone has their own image of what Bella should be like and then they see Kristen, everything is blamed on her, you know? Luckily, that hasn’t happened for me, but because I’ve done about four movies now that have been based on books, I can see how people would be like that — and even how I would be like that. But I wouldn’t blame the actor or anything. I felt a little bit of pressure, not only because [The Lovely Bones] was a book but because the whole movie was, in a way, on my shoulders. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.

When I interviewed Kristen for New Moon, I was struck by how protective she was about her character.

SR: Yeah, it doesn’t seem to her like she’s making a movie that has about three sequels and is based on a book and all the teenagers are going to see it. It seems to her that this is a very serious role that’s important to her, and I respect her for that. I felt the same way when I did Atonement and people would come up to me and say, “God, that was an awful child that you played. She was such a bitch.”

People really said that to you?!?

SR: Yeah! People said that to me ... so I can see why Kristen would feel defensive about her character.

Speaking of Twilight, I heard that Robert Pattinson snuck into the Lovely Bones premiere.

SR: Yeah, I heard that when I was at the after-party. I didn’t see him, though.

You figure he’d at least have the courtesy to say hello.

SR: [Laughs] Actually, someone said that to me: “God, you think he’d come up and tell you how awesome you were.” And I was like, eh, it doesn’t make a difference. It’s okay. I can see why he would just want to sneak in. I mean obviously, if he snuck in and didn’t do the whole red carpet, then he just wanted to see the movie, which is great. He didn’t want to do the whole, “Oh look, Robert Pattinson’s here!” He seems like a really nice guy, though.

I guess it was considerate of him to not want to steal the spotlight.

SR: Exactly, yeah. Because he would have. [Laughs]

To read the rest of the interview head over to the Source Hollywood.com