Interview with Constantine actor, Rachel Weisz

Q:  Was there any talk of the irony that Constantine went from a British setting to America? And that you are British playing American? Was there any discussion of using your normal voice?

RW:  Of me, personally? No. I’m an LAPD homicide detective. It would be really odd if I spoke in [British] English. No, there was no talk of that.

Q:  How much did you have to work on the accent?

RW:  I’ve done it a bunch of times, so it’s not a big deal now.

Q:  You’ve made a name for yourself in the Mummy films. Is that why you to do another action blockbuster?

RW:  I was actually looking for a comedy. I was reading romantic comedies and there just wasn’t one that really worked, and then suddenly I read this script. I’d never read the comic book. I’d never heard of the comic book. I just couldn’t get it out of my head. Something about the world that it painted and the complexity of this woman within it. I thought it was such an interesting role for a woman. And then I met [Director] Francis [Lawrence] and I was really impressed with him. I saw his music videos, which I’d seen before and hadn’t realized they were him, and I just thought he’s such a great visual stylist. He’s so intelligent and he really was interested in working with actors. It was real left of field for me, but obviously I must be interested in supernatural. The Mummy totally is more for kids. It’s more like Saturday morning TV B-movie tone. [Constantine] is much more grown-up…I was looking for a comedy, so it really wasn’t part of the plan. It wasn’t like I wanted to do a big Hollywood special effects movie. It literally came out of nowhere and I couldn’t get it out of my mind. I couldn’t bear to let anybody else play her.

Q:  Constantine has a definite dark side. Do you go for the dark, brooding type?

RW:  When I was younger, definitely. The bad boys, brooding types. Now I’m much more interested in geeks. Nice, kind, geeks. I think what’s meant to be cool, like bad boys, is just…I find it very uncool. I’m into geek culture. I think that’s where the coolness is.

Q:  Is there a middle ground, like a brooding geek?

RW:  Geeks are too cool to brood. Brooding’s kind of pretentious I think.

Q:  Is doing a comic book movie a good way to reach out to geeks?

RW: That is genius. Yeah, I never thought of that but probably. Yeah, maybe I’ll get me some geek fans.

Q:  You consulted with a psychic while you researched this role. Do you believe in psychics?

RW:  I actually met her through somebody I know here in LA who’s quite deep into that culture. I believe that she believes that she’s psychic, this woman that I met. I don’t know, though. I can’t prove it.

Q:  How did meeting her affect your performance?

RW:  In doing research, if you meet someone who really is who you’re pretending to be…I steal. I just steal from them so I ask them questions about their childhood and about what it feels like to have a vision, what it feels like to have sight and how it’s a burden, how it’s a blessing and what it’s like to have a boyfriend and you can read their mind. I just ask them all the questions. And so then I just…steal from them, so when I’m playing the character, I’ve just gotten stolen goods from somebody else. It’s research. Like detective work. So did I believe? I believed that that was her reality. A ghost has never revealed itself to me. I’m pretty in tune with people. I can normally get a sense of what the vibes are in a room, but I can’t read somebody’s mind. It would be fun. It would be fun for about a month.

Q:  How much of this can you personally accept? Do you believe in possession?

RW:  You know, it’s never happened to me or to anybody I know, but I’m not ruling it out. Weird stuff goes on in the world. I have a friend who used to live in South Africa and he used to tell me stories, like voodoo stories. I don’t know. I would never be so arrogant as to say it’s not true, because how do I know? Just because I haven’t seen it doesn’t mean it’s not happening. So I’m going to look into it now. I’m very curious, like TV shows about psychics and stuff. It’s fascinating.

Q:  Did the film convince you one way or another?

RW:  No. A ghost has to come, something has to happen to me in reality. Film is make-believe.

Q:  You’ve worked with Keanu Reeves before. How has your relationship with him evolved?

RW:  We’re just like old pals, really. We didn’t have to go through the getting to know each other phase. We just were like old pals getting together. It made things really comfortable and easy.

Q:  Did you research the police aspect of this role?

RW:  I trained with this ex-Navy Seal. In England we call it SAS. It’s like the highest trained possible kind of [military]. Amongst the LAPD he was a hero. I mean, we’d walk into police stations and the whole room would just stand up and applaud him. He was the man. He’s now training people in movies and doing personal security for really big Hollywood stars, but he gave me kind of a crash course in being a cop and introduced me to a lot of female officers. I met a few days with a female homicide detective. He took me to the LA County Morgue. I spent an evening there which was very intense and a very new experience. I’d never seen dead bodies before and I saw hundreds that night. And he took me on drive-alongs in police cars at night and taught me to fire a gun at the firing range. I love to do all that stuff. I got to do cops and psychics in this. It was a complete research fest.

Q:  Did you do any of your own stunt work for this film?

RW:  There was the scene where I get dragged through the building. They rigged a special machine. It was a chair on a kind of track that was about four times as long as this room. And they pulled the lever on the chair and I was seat belted in but [whoosh] I was whipped back incredibly fast and your body jerked back. And that was pretty terrifying. And then they painted in the office blocks afterwards.

Q:  There’s a scene in Constantine where Keanu Reeves holds your character underwater…

RW:  That was quite scary. That wasn’t CGI. That was me under the bath and the water being held down. The director wanted it to look as real as possible so he told Keanu, in front of me, “Don’t go easy on her.” So it was scary. I mean, I had a signal which I think was tap him on the arm, but it was very hard for him to tell because I was thrashing about so much what was tapping and what was thrashing. I think he just knew when it was enough and I had to come out. After a minute and a half, no one’s doing too well without breathing.

Q:  You’re currently working on a project with Darren Aronofsky called The Fountain. Does it have a lot of special effects?

RW:  It does have in one section. It has a kind of science fiction element to it so there is. We haven’t done it, but a little bit of the film is green screen.

Q:  How is that project going?

RW:  It’s phenomenal. The most original, incredible screenplay. It’s an original story and he’s directing it and Hugh Jackman plays my husband. It’s a love story, a great, big gianormous love story.

Q:  How has the struggle to get the movie made affected Darren?

RW:  He’s like the happiest guy in the world. He spent six years trying to get something made. It’s his dream. It’s his dream come true, so he’s as happy as anyone can be.

Q:  You’ve said you might like to return to theater. Is that true?

RW:  I’m looking for the right play. I was maybe going to do another Neil Labute play but it’s in London and I don’t want to go to London right now, so I’m looking for a play in New York.

[end]

by Staci Layne Wilson