Crave Online: Is it fun playing a vampire?
Rhona Mitra: Probably the most fun role I've had to date. Well, my character in nip/tuck actually, but I think absolutely. It's a world that kind of allows you to do and be all the things that you want to be, well that I'd like to be anyway. I get to swordfight, ride horses, make whoopee with a werewolf which wasn't on my list of things to do but I highly recommend it.
Crave Online: Except for the werewolf, why don't you do those things in real life, like sword fighting and horseback riding?
Rhona Mitra: Oh, I do but at the same time? No, I do those things. That's it, just to be able to culminate it with an amazing outfit and fangs and eyes and Bill Nighy and Michael Sheen and all the other wonderful strange creatures and world that is the Underworld. No, it's not just about those elements being isolated. It's about it all culminating and being part of the whole picture.
Crave Online: Do you feel reminiscent of a Hammer film?
Rhona Mitra: Not really. I do understand there's vampires involved but I just think that the Underworld and the way that it has been set up involves so many other facets to it. It seems to be its own creature. Maybe I have a very different idea of what you're talking about.
Crave Online: What's your coolest scene in Underworld?
Rhona Mitra: Well, I have a favorite action scene which is with myself and Bill Nighy where we have a standoff. It's a swordfight and it's in the rain. It's incredibly powerful because it's really sad and it's about what he feels is my treason and treachery, and therefore his broken heart and my feeling of how I've upset my father. There's this incredibly powerful relationship between us but it gets played out in this wonderful swordfight in the rain. I'm really looking forward to seeing it actually because it was incredibly brutal to shoot and involved a lot on his part and my part.
Crave Online: You've played lots of kickass characters before. Did you have to learn any new skills for this?
Rhona Mitra: Only with the hindrance of the costume and the eyes and the fangs. I had to sort of re-teach myself, or I was re-taught a lot of the ways of moving, and also being on horseback while doing a lot of these things, with this armor. There's heavy armor and corsets and chainmail and stuff like that, so it was really more about reworking it with all of those hindrances I suppose.
Crave Online: How does Sonja meet Lucien?
Rhona Mitra: When they were children. When they were little kids.
Crave Online: They were still human?
Rhona Mitra: No, he was a lycan. He was a half-breed and I'm obviously the daughter of Viktor. It struck up when I think they were probably about eight years old, something like that. And it continued on for some time and they had to really play out the love story behind closed doors and in secrecy for obvious reasons. It sort of comes to head in this movie really, where it's sort of make or break.
Crave Online: Were they married?
Rhona Mitra: No. Lucien and Sonja married? No. The relationship's a secret.
Crave Online: Will you be wearing the necklace?
Rhona Mitra: Yeah, yes.
Crave Online: How was your experience with the screaming fans at Comic Con?
Rhona Mitra: Oh, it was really lovely actually. They're really sweet. Everyone seems just very welcoming. You can't really see past the first few feet. Then you look further and you're like, "Oh my God, there's like 5000 people here." It felt quite warm, cuddly.
Crave Online: What did they tell you about Sonja when they cast you?
Rhona Mitra: Well, what they explained to me about her was that she was, I suppose, the son that Viktor never had. So although she was this incredibly powerful warrior who had this very heartfelt love story, she has this incredibly loyalty to her father and so has to play out the sort of son, proving to him and being a death dealer that she's worthy of being a daughter to him. But at the same time, I think the truth in really following through with her heart in who she loves, which I think is really unusual for a vampire. You don't really see vampires with that much compassion and that much heart and that much love with it really kind of winning through in such an intense way. We had a very thorough discussion because when I first became involved in it, when they first asked me I wasn't interested because I thought they were asking me to take on Kate Beckinsdale's role which obviously is suicide. When they explained to me exactly the depth of the character and what it would entail and the relationship with Bill Nighy and the relationship with Michael Sheen, which they thoroughly explained as being a Romeo and Juliet love story. It's like Spartacus being the rise of the slaves against the Roman empire if you like. Then a level of treason and treachery which is between me and my father which was an enticement to me because I think that's incredibly cathartic because of my own relationship with my father. So I did know all the elements that were in play. I just think that it's an interesting thing to realize how human really the vampires, if you like, for want of a better word, really are human. She particularly is and what a different creature I think Bill Nighy's vampire is. I think there's a reason why she fell in love with Lucien. It's because she had more of a human quality I suppose.
Crave Online: They survived on animal blood in Underworld. Will they be eating humans in the prequel?
Rhona Mitra: It's not actually brought up. You don't see any of the feeding. You just see us drinking it from a glass. So there's not actually any feeding. There's the dream fasting. You know, when Viktor can bite into a neck and then the person's story gets played out. Dream fasting, I don't know whether or not that's a word I've made up for it or whether that really exists.
Crave Online: How hard are the fangs to get used to?
Rhona Mitra: Not at all. I felt like I'd always had them, and I wear them still. I absolutely love my fangs and they make them for you so they fit so snugly. There are battle fangs and then there are the fangs you wear every day so I wear my battle fangs when I get very angry or very horny. The other ones you just wear all the time and they're very easy to wear.
Crave Online: How long are they?
Rhona Mitra: Probably about four millimeters.
Crave Online: How long does it take to make them?
Rhona Mitra: Oh, they take a mold and that's it. My nephew thinks I'm brilliant and he absolutely fully believes that I'm a vampire and I go out and I kill werewolves. He says to me, over breakfast, over some Cheerios the other morning, he's like, "So, killed anybody this week, Auntie Rhona?"
Crave Online: Would they work if you tried to bite someone or just snap off?
Rhona Mitra: No, they work.
Crave Online: And the contacts?
Rhona Mitra: The contacts come out. In most of my scenes when I'm with Lucien, because I like to show the more human side, they're my eyes. Then in times of passion or fury, the blue ones come out.
Crave Online: One obsessive nip/tuck question: We found out you were the Carver's sister later, but when you had Christian in jail, why'd she let the Carver give him an alibi? They could have framed him for the whole thing.
Rhona Mitra: I can't even remember. We're talking two years ago. Wait a minute. I was interrogating him, that's right. I don't think we were trying to frame him. I don't think that was our M.O. if I remember correctly. It wasn't about setting him up. I think it was just about putting him through hell because our M.O. was actually just to torture people who were inflicting this thing called beauty upon the world, right? Just put them through torture by giving them the Chelsea smile and raping them, correct? So I think it was just another form of torture.
