Being the wife of 'Underworld: Evolution' director Len Wiseman holds its advantages and disadvantages for film star Kate Beckinsale. Reprising her role as vampire warrior Selene, she was spared a horrible death - by jumping off a cliff - as it was unbearable for Wiseman to kill off his wife. However, she wasn't completely secured from injury on the set. When she threw her first punch at a stuntman, she was almost knocked out by a camera.
Here Beckinsale discusses her awkward sex scenes with pal Scott Speedman, the weirdness of inhabiting a world of vampires and werewolves and the hysterical little girl who couldn't stop crying while declaring her love for the Underworld star at a recent convention.
In this film we meet Selene as a young girl. Is it surprising to you that your character was that innocent in her youth?
That's actually my little girl playing me as a child (laughs). She'll be seven at the end of this month. That's an interesting thing because I don't think anyone's born tough. I think you learn tough, for whatever horrible reason. So for me yes, that's always sort of in the back of my mind, but it's nice to have the chance to show the character's innocence.
Was your daughter a natural on set? She had to take direction from her stepdad.
We were quite worried because, obviously, I didn't think she would take either of us that seriously on the set, and we both envisioned it as a situation where it'd be almost like trying to get her into a snowsuit, which is `No, I won't, I won't.' But she suddenly became highly professional to the point where I think Len called her over and said, `Lily, just in this one, can you just look over your shoulder?' And she said, `Uh, could you call me Selene?' It was really cute. But I certainly didn't insist on being called Selene, so she didn't get that from me!
Does she want to be an actress?
Actually the plan worked quite well. I think the lure of the donuts, in the beginning, on the craft service table was quite heavy and still is. But then just experiencing the sheer boredom of having to do the scene over and over again has changed her mind, so now she wants to be a writer.
Will she get to see the movie?
Oh no. I've not done one movie that she's remotely interested in. I need to play a talking fish (from 'Finding Nemo'). We show her her bits (from the film) and frankly they're the only bits she's interested in. Honestly, she has no interest if there's not a talking bear. If Gwen Stefani's not on the soundtrack and Anne Hathaway's not in it, she's not interested.
How difficult is it to drop your work when you go home, especially when you're married to the director?
I'm banned from my local Sav-on (grocery store) for elbowing people in the throats constantly (laughs). No, it's actually not too bad; this is a character that I'm quite familiar with and I think actors always like to think they don't bring the character home. Then their family all laughs and tell you otherwise, but I don't feel too much like that. I don't sit there biting people or anything (staying in character as a vampire). It can be quite an organic process, filmmaking, where you need to kind of tweak things as you go along. It was quite tiring because I did find I had more involvement in scenes that I wasn't in.
Can you describe what it felt like to wear the skintight latex jump suit?
Did I wear it at home? No, not often (laughs). It's actually an extremely comfortable costume, surprisingly enough. You do panic a bit when you've got Latex (to wear) for several months ahead of you, and there's not a scene where she gets into sweats or anything. So it gives you a little gasp, but actually it tends to sort of hold everything together and stop it from moving.
How tricky is it to do a love scene with your co-star Scott Speedman in front of your husband?
Well, it wasn't too bad. We were able to sort of block out the moves together, because actually he was allowed to touch me at home (laughs). We sort of put it off a bit because Scott (Speedman) has become quite a family friend. I think it's sort of easier to do something like that with somebody you haven't had Fourth of July barbecues with and things like that. So we kept finding we were postponing it to the following week. Actually, when we came down to do it, Len and I were all right and Scott was just tortured. I think it was worse, much worse for him. He's the one who has a moveable part!
Did you have to do a lot of stunt work yourself, and which was the toughest scene to shoot?
Yeah, I did. There was one scene where, originally, Len wanted me to jump off a cliff, and then, with just the sheer panic of killing his wife, he called that one off. Len really likes us to do as much as we can because it's more interesting for the audience to see us risking life and limb. We had this brilliant stunt team so it didn't feel unsafe. What will happen is everyone gets very geared up for when you have to do a big jump or a big wire stunt or something, and the times when you hurt yourself is when you're just turning a corner in a corridor. The first punch I threw, I hit the side of the camera and it really hurt. But it's always the least interesting thing that hurts you the most. Whenever I'm jumping off 50 feet, it always goes better for me (laughs).
