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Here are two new interviews with Dev in which he discusses his role in The Last Airbender.
From Backstage.com:
Eye of the Storm
For Dev Patel, [the surreal moment when he realized he had “made it” was] when he was introduced to Steven Spielberg at an Oscars party—and the director praised his work. Even today, more than a year later, Patel seems stunned by the memory. “I didn’t know what to say,” he admits. “I didn’t know whether to call him Steven or Mr. Spielberg or just sir.”
‘Slumdog’ to Prince
Few actors have enjoyed as meteoric a rise as Patel, the British-born Indian actor who played Jamal, the young man hoping to connect with a lost love in “Slumdog Millionaire.” In 2006, Patel’s mother took him to an audition for the BBC program “Skins,” which she had read about in the newspaper. Though he had no professional acting experience, the then-16-year-old Patel landed the role of Anwar Kharral, a British Pakistani Muslim teenager, after two auditions. When director Danny Boyle was looking to cast “Slumdog Millionaire,” Boyle’s teenage daughter pointed him toward “Skins,” which landed Patel an audition for the film. Upon the film’s release, a whirlwind followed: The world fell in love with the movie, Patel and his cast won SAG Awards in the ensemble category, and the film won the Academy Award for best picture.
Patel repeatedly uses the word “surreal” to describe the experience. “But when you’re in the eye of the storm, you’re just riding the wave,” he says. “It’s only looking back on it now that I’m in awe.” Though he was still only a teenager at the time, he seemed to keep a cool head and enjoy the ride. Asked if he handled it well, he says, “Yes and no. And I realize now that the question isn’t so much if I ‘handled’ it, but did I enjoy it? Fuck yes. I really did.” He points to the Academy Awards ceremony, where the cast and crew of the film were seated together. “You watch the Oscars, and there’s all these actors who look so poised,” he says. “Then you cut to the ‘Slumdog’ crew, and we’re all bouncing off our seats like we’re at a football game.”
Patel adds that he was fortunate to be surrounded by people who were looking out for him. While filming “Slumdog,” he had yet to land an agent, so several people, including Boyle, urged him to start looking. Patel went to the casting directors of “Slumdog” and “Skins” and asked for recommendations; both provided him with a list. “Whoever was on both the lists, I went to see,” Patel says. “And the ball got rolling from there.” Patel eventually signed with Curtis Brown Group in England and recently with Theresa Peters at UTA in America.
Patel says that from the beginning, he sat down with his representation and explained what types of roles he was after. “I want to break the mold,” he says. “The way I see it, I’ve been given an amazing opportunity; I want to stretch and do things that interest me.” After the success of “Slumdog,” he was in demand. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t get any offers, but there was nothing that would have elevated me,” he says. “It doesn’t need to be another lead role, just something that will either challenge me or help me improve. And what I was getting was very stereotypical, easy roles. With the way I look, it would be easy to fall into that trap, so I had to choose wisely.”
This week, Patel returns to the big screen in his first film since “Slumdog”: M. Night Shyamalan’s “The Last Airbender,” an effects-heavy spectacle based on the cartoon “Avatar: The Last Airbender.” While it may seem like Hollywood came calling thanks to the success of his first film, the truth is that Patel had auditioned for “Airbender” before the release of “Slumdog.” Reveals the actor, “There was sort of a lull where I finished ‘Slumdog’ and came back to London and was still a nobody. I put myself on tape for ‘Airbender’ after hearing about the casting call. Midway through doing press for ‘Slumdog,’ I got a call from M. Night Shyamalan.” Shyamalan had seen “Slumdog” and was set on the actor to play the villainous Prince Zuko in his film. “He said he saw me on tape and I really popped out from the crowd,” Patel recalls. “But ‘Slumdog’ cemented me in his mind.”
One factor in playing Zuko that particularly pleased Patel is that the casting was colorblind; he didn’t have to be of any particular ethnicity. As a result, when Patel was cast, the roles of Zuko’s relatives and members of his nation were cast with Middle Eastern and Asian actors. “I feel the industry is slowly moving towards becoming more colorblind,” Patel says. “And with ‘Airbender,’ I struck gold in that department.”
Coming to Terms
Of course, there can be a down side to sudden fame and attention. Patel admits he went through a period of time where he would get “very angry” when his privacy was invaded. “The only hard part of any of this was being thrown into this whole paparazzi stuff and having people asking about my private life,” he reveals. “People were turning up on my doorstep and taking pictures of me wherever I went. It frustrates you; it can spoil your mood.” Patel says he has come to terms with it, and now has more sympathy for the celebrities he used to read about in gossip magazines. “There are some stories I’ve just had to laugh at,” he says. “There was one about me planning my wedding and having cakes flown in from other countries. I just have to shake my head and laugh.”
From USA Today:
Dev Patel is finally in his element for ‘Last Airbender’
Dev Patel is going from affable to evil.
The 20-year-old British actor became famous in 2008 for playing Jamal, a heroic street-kid game-show contestant in 2008’s Slumdog Millionaire, winner of eight Academy Awards, including best picture.
Just as his character in the film captured the imagination of the TV-watching populace in India, the actor found that movie fans were also inspired. “Lots of people have come up to me and said, ‘I believed in you.’ I felt like every man,” he says.
With his next film, M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender, which opens Thursday, Patel gets to show his sinister side in this live-action version of the Nickelodeon cartoon. It’s set in a mythical realm in which people are divided into four tribes: Air, Water, Fire and Earth.
Patel plays the villain Zuko, a disgraced prince sent on a mission to hunt the last human who can harness all four elements as a weapon.
For this role and others to come, Patel says he has drawn strength from the Oscar-winning journey of Slumdog. Before then, his first role was a supporting part in the British TV teen drama Skins, playing a hyperactive, not-terribly-devout Muslim kid. The show has a devoted following, even many fans in the USA.
“But they probably don’t like me in that,” Patel says with a laugh. “And you know what, I’ll shake their hand! Because I agree with them. That was me fresh off an open audition, off the street. You could tell, ‘This guy has no experience and is just goofing around on set.’ And that’s what it was for me. It was an experience of having fun in front of cameras with other kids my age.
“Now I’m like, ‘Damn, it’s about concentrating on character, and now I know how blessed I am to be in this position.’ I want to make the most of it. Whereas then, I didn’t really know. I was just overwhelmed by everything. If that makes sense.”
Even now, he says, “in all honesty, I’m no Daniel Day-Lewis— I’m a million years away from that.”
That humility is omnipresent, and whatever comes next, he’s not worried about getting a big head. “Not really, no,” he says, laughing. “I live at home (in London) with my parents, so it’s not going to happen.”
He has an older sister, who recently graduated from college with a passion for fashion. His father is an accountant (”Very quiet, brooding. If he tells you a joke, you’re going to have to be in it for a good 40 minutes to get to the punch line.”), while his mother, who cares for the elderly, is where he gets his gregarious side.
“My mum’s like the ultimate best-ever dinner party host,” he says. “Everyone knows her. She has 50 million friends down our road. Whatever shop I go into, I have to talk about my mum for ages. She’s quite a character and has a really big sense of humor.”
The next step in his evolution: getting a driver’s license, which he never did since Slumdog came right around the age he would have started. “I’m a late bloomer, so I’m trying to learn now. Trying to be more self-sufficient and independent — but not with my dad. Oh, now, that’d be horrendous. He’s got short patience.”
One thing he’s quiet about is his romantic relationship with Freida Pinto, his Slumdog co-star. “We’re good. We don’t normally talk about it,” he says.
Patel says the best advice he has gotten came from Slumdog director Danny Boyle is: “Be still.” The actor feels that even in regular life, his animated nature gets in the way of the kind of man he wants to be.
It worked, at least in the movie.
He says he’s still trying in regular life.
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