Actor Peter Facinelli Talks Twilight

I got a free ticket to see Twilight. Not that I wouldn’t have gone anyway – I love vampires and movies aimed at teenagers – I just wouldn’t have gone so soon.

It turns out, two weeks after its November 21 release, I was late to the party.

In the row ahead of me, a group of high school students was settling into their seats.

“How many times have you seen it?” one asked.

“It’s my third,” admitted another.

“Second.”

“First.”

“First?” they squealed. “It’s your first time? You’re a Twilight virgin! Virgin! EEEEEEE!”

And so it began.

They had much in common with the young protagonists, Isabella Swan (known as Bella and played by Kristen Stewart) and Edward Cullen (known as ohmigodIamgoingtomarryhimohmigod and played by Robert Pattinson), for whom sex is literally deadly.

But it’s the patriarch of the Cullen clan I’m interested in, Dr. Carlisle Cullen. Played by Peter Facinelli, he’s a former vampire hunter whose 16th century mission to rid the world of the scourge went terribly awry when he was turned into one himself.

Now living among the humans in Forks, Washington, he makes his family of six lead a “vegetarian” lifestyle. That is, they only feed on animals. And he himself only turns people into vampires when they would have died of natural causes. Edward, for example, would have tragically perished of Spanish influenza had Dr. Cullen not intervened.

“He’s kind of started a new way of life for vampires because most vampires, they live off humans,” explains Facinelli in a telephone call.

“He’s the doctor in this small town, living a secret life.”

And though his character is frozen in time at the age of 23, he’s playing the dad. When I tell him it’s a far cry from his role in Can’t Hardly Wait, the last teen epic he starred in, he laughs.

“You mean I’m not the hunky male lead?” he jokes.

“It was a little funny being the old guy, because I’m not that old,” the 35-year-old admits.

“But I was definitely older than all the kids…it was interesting for me because usually there’s always someone old in the cast and I was like the old guy.”

“Me and Billy Burke [Charlie Swan, Bella’s dad] were the oldest in the cast, so it was interesting to say the least.

“But it was fun. I mean, for me, because I’m only a decade older and because I don’t biologically look like Edward Cullen’s dad, my job was to make him be the patriarch of the family, to make sure there was a difference between the parents and the kids.”

The costumes and makeup helped.

“He’s definitely dressed a lot more proper than the kids, the way I wore my hair was very proper…we’d get [to the makeup room] and they’d spray you down. It took about 45 minutes to an hour to get all done up…they had us all with the golden contact lenses.”

Millions of the books’ fans had already cast the movie in their imaginations. And while Facinelli “kinda knew there was a big responsibility,” he only cared about the opinion of one critic.

“I have three daughters, 11, 5 and 2 [with wife Jennie Garth]. The oldest [Luca Bella] has read the book…she was my biggest litmus test. When the movie was done and I took her to an early screening, she watched it and she loved it. I knew then people would be happy, because she doesn’t hold back.”

Though he’s careful not to mention their names, Facinelli is eager to talk about his children, including a visit to a set that made quite an impression. Facinelli played Erik Weihenmayer, the first blind person to climb Mount Everest, in Touch The Top Of The World.

“My five-year-old [Lola Ray], came to the set and she went home and told all of her friends that I was a mountain climber!”

At least she didn’t see Twilight.

Facinelli at the premier of ‘Twilight at The Mann Village and Bruin Theatres on November 17, 2008 in Westwood, California. Photo by Vince Bucci/Getty Images.