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Alex Pettyferis “Breaking” Inby Lynn B
We got to have a Beverly Hills sitdown with the young actor recently and discovered that his blonde-tipped brown hair is shorter than in the film and he’s refreshingly honest. Alex is out of school now and focusing on his film career. Picture the young heartthrob in black tee and black pinstripe pants. He politely shakes hands when sitting down. We got the scoop on training for stunts, injuries, his favorite James Bond, working with Alicia Silverstone and the other actors and special laughs on set. AGW: : Did you know this character before you read the script? Alex: I did. I read the books two months prior to getting the script. I was nervous about reading the script about bringing a character out of a book onto the screen. Obviously, it’s a nerve-wracking thing to do, but I was excited but I only read “Storm Breaker” and “Point Blank”. AGW: What did you do physically to prepare for this role? Alex: Obviously, when I was going through the audition process I started going to the gym, because if I was lucky enough to get the part, Alex Rider is quite a muscular, bigger guy, and yes, I have lost it now, so no comments. I wanted to train up obviously and get prepared for the role. And also when I got the role I went into training for 3 weeks doing martial arts, kung fu, kick boxing, learning how to wheelie on a quad bike or whatever. So it was quite an experience. AGW: Any accidents doing that? Alex: No, but I did hurt my knee accidentally when I was doing the martial arts. I was training with a lovely woman called Eunice, who was Angelina Jolie’s stuntwoman and I thought she wasn’t as tough as she was and I went in for a move and she got me in the knee. Actually I figured out it was karma, or a good omen, because I went to my [physical therapist] who is an ex-SAS guy, and I created a bit of the character, I took a piece from him. Not an arm or a leg, [we laugh] just a piece of him towards Alex Rider. AGW: How many of your own stunts did you do? Alex: Donnie Yen was choreographing the martial arts sequences. I did all of them, but Donnie Yen brought his team on because they decided two days before to change the choreography to rope fighting. I thought Alex Rider isn’t an aggressive character. He’d rather run and should be a good example that instead of standing there and fighting and being the big guy there is always an easier way out. AGW: And the rope fighting was less “hands on”? Alex: Well, I thought instead of being physical and using his hands and legs as weapons he could be as far away as possible from the problem. So they were going to take over and do this stunt but I watched them one day and before the actual shoot I said, ‘Give me one day to train and I’ll do it. I don’t care even if I look like crap.’ Because he’s just picking up this thing from out of nowhere. And I did it in one day and I actually got quite good in it. I spent eight hours I think training that day doing the neck rope stuff and yeah, they allowed me to do it the next day. AGW: Cool. Were you a James Bond movie fan? Alex: Yeah, I’ve always been a big fan and I’m looking forward to the new one as well. AGW: Who is your favorite James Bond? Alex: Seeing as how Alex Rider is created on the basis of James Bond I would have to say Alex Rider, but my favorite is Pierce Brosnan, even though I’m obviously looking forward to Daniel Craig. AGW: Did you and Alicia Silverstone get along well since you both started as models and she has English parents? Alex: Yeah, I didn’t see her much except in the scene. She’s great. It was a really hot day on the set because we didn’t have any fans that day. It was boiling and she gave so much energy and you really come out in a scene with her great. She’s loved over here and she also is loved in England. They clap when her name comes on screen. It’s a privilege to have her on this film. AGW: : What did you read in the books that you wanted to bring out in this character? Alex: I say it all the time. A book’s like a door and you go into the imaginative world of a kid and I always see that kids see themselves as characters so I really wanted to portray him as a normal guy. He’s not a superhero. He’s not someone who can fly and who is out of reach that you could be. Children want come out of the cinema and want to be a character until they see the next film, but I want people to come out and actually believe they could be that someone. And that’s what I really took from the book, just being normal and people could relate to this guy. I did feel a bit of pressure, maybe on the looks side of things, but I knew that if I get the correct feeling for how he is inside, I think it would come out on the looks. So I think it was more the looks that I was worried about. AGW: How do you feel about being a heartthrob? We hear the premiere in London was pretty intense. Alex: I’d only done one TV drama and it’s only been shown once so I’ve only been on tele once for probably about an hour or two hours and I really didn’t expect anything. I got out of the car and obviously I had shaved my head just to change my image. My biggest fear was that there might be 5 or 6 kids there who just want an autograph and then I would walk in and do my press. I got out of the car and it was probably 3 seconds and like 3,000 girls were screaming for me ahhhhhhhh. It was quite a big shock, especially as I had never done any big feature films or anything big prior to “Stormbreaker”. AGW: What about acting with Mickey Rourke as the bad guy? He’s pretty wild, right? Alex: He’s fantastic. I always give everyone a clean slate before I meet them. First of all he’s a gentleman. He gave me 110% on camera and off. I really don’t have any more words than respect for that guy. He helped me on the set. I saw him, illegally, in 9 ½ Weeks then I did enjoy Sin City as well. It’s a rebirth of who he was. AGW: That scene riding a horse in London traffic was pretty scary-looking. Was it? Alex: I think I’ve had one horse riding lesson and fell off and said ‘I’m not getting on again’. But Alex Rider can’t horse ride. That’s the only thing he can’t do. No one is invincible so Anthony created that. We were very against the one horse riding scene because of that one thing, but it was fantastic to watch. We got the Queen’s Cavalry. We got Hyde Park free, through Leicester Square and all that kind of stuff, or wherever we were, Piccadilly Circus. I was really reluctant to go on that horse becoming the character, but I did it and I sat on him and I held on for my life, behind the stuntwoman. Sabina, or Sarah [Bolger] who was on it a couple of occasions. You get the same feeling and fear as your character, which is good, and I think might have come across on the screen. AGW: And, riding your bike through all that traffic. Some really close calls?
AGW: Did you ride a bike as a kid? Alex: Yeah, I couldn’t pop wheelies, but I learned how to do them when I was on there, and do stoppies and skid along. I was always eager to learn. Then you go on the set and I could never work again after this. This could all go ploop [indicates wiping out] just go wrong, so I wanted to learn everything I possibly could. AGW: How did your friends react to you getting the part? Alex: My friends act normal. I’m just Alex to them. Not Alex Rider, but just Alex. I’m just Alex Pettyfer to them so they don’t really care. I don’t even think they went to watch it. Well, one of them came to the premiere. AGW: What is your favorite scene and why? Alex: My favorite scene is with Mickey [having dinner]. We both make so much energy in that one scene and with so much charisma and life towards it, obviously because he helped me a great deal and he gave me so much energy towards it. So I really love that scene. AGW: Did you get to meet Ewan McGregor? Alex: Yeah, I did meet him. He was on set for two days. He’s a wonderful guy. I had lunch with him a couple of times. He’s very quiet in person, but he’s a fantastic actor. AGW: What kind of music do you listen to? Alex: Anyone, Rod Stewart to Tom Jones. I like Nelly Furtado. AGW: You speak a bit in Japanese in the film. Do you speak many languages? Alex: (speaks in Japanese), Parle vous Francais? Italian, or whatever, but I find it hard to speak Japanese because it’s a very flat language. There is no ups or downs like we have in English. Even though I only say one line I want to say it perfect. I had a Japanese teacher just come in and teach me the language per se, just to get me how to say the things, but I think it comes across with an English accent. It was good to learn. AGW: Is there any actor or star you’d love to work with? Alex: Robert Downey Jr. He’s a great actor. He is. I never know why people give a crap about his personal life. You should see him as an actor or a character and I think what happens behind people’s scenes make them better actors. So hopefully the more experiences you have the better you can become on screen. AGW: Good point. What was it like on set with Sarah? Alex: Sarah is great. She’s going to go so far. She’s a great actress. Her little sister is great as well. She came to the premiere party. Sarah is 14 and for such a young girl, she’s really got something there. AGW: What about Missy Pyle? She’s hilarious in the movie as the bad guy’s sidekick/girlfriend. She has a really funny walk. Alex: She actually walks the same on film as she does outside [in the real world]. I went to dinner with her and she’s walking along Isle of Man and she’s walking along like this [demonstrates]. I sat down to dinner and said, ‘Missy, are you still in character?’ And she said, ‘No, I just walk like this’. She’s such a lovely, great, energetic person and I was glad to work with her. AGW: Any moments shooting with her when you couldn’t stop laughing? Alex: You know when she first comes in and says, ‘Are you ready to see Stormbreaker?’ No one can see above her head, but two horns are above her head. And behind Bill Nighy, there is a statue that goes like that as well. You miss all the funny jokes that aren’t that visible, but if you are an actor and you’ve seen the set, they are hilarious. AGW: Bill Nighy is also hilarious and a great actor. Alex: He created this character. He had been in the trailer to do makeup and I didn’t know who he was and I didn’t want to say much so I just sat down and he put his glasses on and he said, ‘I look like my dad’. So it was quite funny to work with him as well. He’s a great character. AGW: Do you think you’ll ever move out here to L.A.? Alex: No. I’m a very English guy. I love my home and I miss that at the moment. I’m looking forward to going back. I’m just a tiny bit outside of London. I’m a country boy. I’m a quarter country boy, but I’m only 15 or 20 minutes outside of London.
pictures on this page courtesy of and copyright The Weinstein Company, 2006 |
 
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until his starring role in Alex Rider: Operation Stormbreaker,
16-year-old English treat Alex Pettyfer had only appeared in commercial
ads and a 2002 ITV production of “Tom Brown’s Schooldays”
but he’s got a huge U.K. fangirl following already. Cute Alex beat
out 500 other actors to win the role of the teen spy saving school kids
from a horrible computer-generated disaster in the film based upon the
popular series of Alex Rider novels by Anthony Horowitz. 
Alex:
A kid was asking me if I really did that or if it was blue screen. I said,
‘No, it was real but it’s like ballet. You need perfect timing’.
If I had accidentally gone astray I would have been run over. So it was
all choreographed down to the split second and they were really against
me doing it, along Chelsea Bridge, which also was another location we
got lucky enough to use, but I did do it and I enjoyed it very much.