14 DAY TRIAL // Jamie Dornan has been promoting “Fifty Shades of Grey” for a few weeks now and his latest interview with Variety makes it sound as if he’s already growing weary of it. He’d like us all to stop comparing it to “The Twilight Saga,” even if only in terms of what this franchise will do for his career and how it will turn him into an international star.
“Fifty Shades” and “Twilight” have a lot of things in common: they’re both love stories of the star-crossed kind, they star a leading British actor (Dornan and Robert Pattinson are actually friends, by the way), they appeal to the female demographic, they’re based on best-selling novels, they have a huge fanbase to start with.
No grounds for comparison
However, comparing these two goes beyond comparing “The Hunger Games” to “Divergent” because, unlike these two novels that have nothing in common except the fact that they feature strong female characters and are set in a dystopian future, “Fifty Shades” started as “Twilight” fanfiction.
Whether Dornan likes it or not, comparisons between the two aren’t just “handy,” they also make perfect sense. They are justified. If you read the “Fifty Shades” books, you know this for a fact.
“By the way, it’s not the same thing,” he tells Variety. “We’re not the Twilight franchise. We’re a different thing. Whatever my situation is, it’s going to be different from Rob’s. They are incomparable. I’ve been around Rob long enough to see what it’s been like for him. I don’t know if it’s been a benefit to witness that. Whatever that is.”
It sounds like Dornan is very eager to distance himself and “Fifty Shades” from whatever preconceived notion we have of it ahead of the release, even though he doesn’t quite seem to know what that might be.
He should just let the movie speak for itself because, this way, by getting so defensive about it weeks in advance, he comes across as if he’s preparing himself for failure. Critics and regular moviegoers are already convinced it will be a disaster, no sense in giving them even more ammo. You know what Shakespeare said, thou doth protest too much.
“Fifty Shades of Grey” also stars Dakota Johnson, and will open wide in theaters on Valentine’s Day.
