Paul Bettany may play a villian (Dryden Vos) in Solo: A Star Wars Story but I assure you that he isn’t one in real life. I say that because he took the time to make sure I was OK (after seeing me walk with crutches) and then offered me his chair for our group picture. He also insisted I sit down on the chair with him (after I told him I was fine to stand) because he would feel bad to have me stand. Not only that, he then helped me to the chair…Paul Bettany is quite the gentleman.
For someone that is in 2 major franchise films, Avengers and Solo: A Star Wars Story, none of the success has gone to his head. In fact, it has made him appreciate just how fortunate they are. I was already a fan but after the interview we had and what he did for me, I am now his number one fan.
Here are some fun facts from our interview…
The screen saver on his phone was a picture of his wife, Jennifer Connelly, as a 4 year old.
“I have a picture of my wife when she was four on my phone so that when she’s really annoying I look at it go, whoo.”
Star Wars changed his life as a child so he was pretty much geeking out while filming Solo: A Star Wars Story.
“there were many moments where I went, oh, my gosh, I’m in a Star Wars movie…I kept elbowing him (Ron Howard) and saying, were making a Star Wars movie…”
Paul got the role of Dryden Vos by texting Ron Howard and hinting at wanting a role in the film. 2 weeks later he was filming.
“I’m in the Avengers so I think there’s no way I’m ever going to be asked to be in Star Wars. Unless, Ron Howard becomes the director. And that happened. And so, I texted him and I literally texted him this, I said, ‘hey, Ron, have you ever spent long winter evenings, like I have wondering why you’re not in the Star Wars franchise?’ And he said, ‘LOL, give me a moment’ and two weeks later I was flying to London to shoot it.”
Kathy Kennedy and Paul Feige made it possible for him to be able to play both roles. Actually, Kevin is a big fan of Star Wars.
“…Kevin Feige, who is a huge fan, who I have been emailing with recently, talking about the massive success of the film (Avengers: Infinity War). And he’s like, forget about that, what about your new trailer, it’s amazing. He’s such a huge Star Wars fan…”
He considers Ron Howard a very close friend.
“Ron is as close to family as you get in this business. He’s put his hand out and helped me out so many times I can’t tell you…”
He wanted to have fun with his character.
“I really wanted to sort of be quite loose with it. He is an entrepreneur, you know what I mean. He knows who he is and is super happy about it…no problems with being bad. He’s really, really gifted at hurting people. Some people are gifted at playing the piano or whatever and he’s really gifted at torture and murder and he’s like, really okay with it. And that’s really fun to play because you’re just able to sort of close down all the conscious stuff and just be great at torture and murder.”
Paul didn’t need any make up application for this character, it was all done with CG.
Want to know more about Solo: A Star Wars Story? Check out my post on the Solo: A Star Wars Story world premiere, my movie review and be sure to check back for my interviews with Alden Ehrenreich (“Han Solo”), Emilia Clarke (“Qi’ra”), Director Ron Howard, Joonas Suotamo (“Chewbacca”), Phoebe Waller-Bridge (“L3-37”) and Woody Harrelson (“Tobias Beckett”).
Solo: A Star Wars Story hits theaters on May 25th!
Board the Millennium Falcon and journey to a galaxy far, far away in SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY, an all-new adventure with the most beloved scoundrel in the galaxy. Through a series of daring escapades deep within a dark and dangerous criminal underworld, Han Solo befriends his mighty future copilot Chewbacca and meets the notorious gambler Lando Calrissian, in a journey that will set the course of one of the Star Wars saga’s most unlikely heroes
