With The Batman about to be released Robert Pattinson has started doing interviews and most recently whilst on Jimmy Kimmel Live! he spoke about his Batman voice. Pattinson told host Kimmel that he initially wanted go with a “radically different” voice from the low, raspy ones that previous Batman actors have used to portray the Caped Crusader. He was soon put right about that.
“Everyone does this kind of gruff, gravelly thing, and I’m like, ‘I’m going to do the opposite — I’m gonna go really whispery,’” Pattinson recalled. “And I tried to do it for the first two weeks, and it just looked absolutely atrocious, and they told me to stop doing it.”
Ultimately he went for a deeper, traditional voice, and found that hew was not the first to go for an alternate voice. “I found out from Nick, who was putting me in the suit every day, that’s what Christian Bale did on Batman Begins as well,” Pattinson said. “And if you listen to the first Batman Begins teaser trailer, you can hear the original voice. I only found this out a couple of weeks ago.” Pattinson realized that he was wise to keep working on the voice: “You can feel when it feels right. You put the suit on, and you have to speak in a certain way.”
He then went on to recall an early conversation with director Matt Reeves about the character. “One of the first things that Matt said to me — he’s like, ‘He’s sort of inspired by Kurt Cobain,’” the actor said. “I’m like, ‘Really? That’s kind of the opposite of what I imagined Bruce Wayne to be.’” The actor said he then pitched Reeves on having his version of Wayne dress in the late Nirvana frontman’s signature grunge style, but the director didn’t go for it. Kimmel replied, “So you had a lot of bad ideas to start with.”
Pattinson replied with a laugh, “Tons.”
