Peter Facinelli On Whatever With Alexis & Jennifer

Peter Facinelli (aka Dr. Carlisle Cullen) appeared on Whatever with Alexis & Jennifer Friday, September 17th. Peter chatted about Twilight and his Showtime drama Nurse Jackie.






ON HOW PETER GOT THE ROLE OF DR. CULLEN IN TWILIGHT:

P: I got a phone call from my agency and they said “Do you want to be in a vampire movie?” and I said “No.” I was thinking like bats and caves and some kind of like B-horror, slasher movie. They said “No. It’s based on this book, Twilight. It’s got an underground following. You should read it, and Catherine Harwicke is directing it.” So I said “OK. I’ll give it a read. I love Catherine Hardwicke.” And then I read it and I just fell in love with it. It was kind of a throw back for me to the vampire tales- to the origins of the vampire. It reminded me of this black and white, film noir, beautiful love story with this vampire backdrop and I liked that so I said I would be a part of it.

A: And they told you who you were going to play when they gave you the script?

P: Yeah, they said… the dad and my first thought was I’m too young to have an eighteen year old kid and they said “No. He is twenty-three and he is three hundred and fifty years old at the same time and I said “OK. I can do that maybe. I can play three hundred and fifty.”


ON PETER PLAYING A MATURE 350 YEAR OLD VAMPIRE:

A: You look very, when I say old that’s not what I mean, you look…

J: Alexis!

A: Not now! In the movie.

J: Well in the movie he is old. He just told you he is three hundred and fifty years old, but he never ages. He is very pale because he is a vampire, but if he is caught in the sunlight, he twinkles.

P: It’s hard to look good dead.

A: No, I don’t mean that. I mean that you look very mature like you look like the father like its very apparent.

P: Well, I also played him very mature which is kind of one hundred and eighty degrees from the character I play on Nurse Jackie which is very immature. So I brought, hopefully, a lot of maturity to the character which is what you’re seeing and not seeing me as an old vampire geezer guy.

ON WHAT PETER’S CHILDREN THINK ABOUT HIS ROLE IN TWILIGHT:

P: My children love the movies. I have three little girls- thirteen, seven and three. The three year old doesn’t quite get it yet- she thinks I’m on Skype so she is always trying to talk to the TV. My thirteen year old loves the books and my seven year old hasn’t read them yet but loves the movies. The thirteen year old kind of rolls her eyes that I’m Carlisle because anything a dad does is embarrassing at thirteen so..

ON WHETHER PETER IS TEAM EDWARD OR TEAM JACOB:

J: Here’s what people really want to know. Are you Team Edward or Team Jacob?

P: I like Team Edward I guess because that’s my family.

ON WIFE JENNIE GARTH AND LIVING IN A HOUSE FULL OF GIRLS:

J: For people who don’t know, your wife is Jennie Garth who was so great on 90210.

A: So you’re in a house full of girls?