James McAvoy had to tackle 24 different personalities when playing Kevin Wendell Crumb in Split and now Glass, but he opened up about which of his character's personalities has a bit of a "kinky" side.
McAvoy's Kevin was first introduced in Split in 2016. However, director M. Night Shyamalan brought the character back once more for Glass. Glass, which is the third installment in the Unbreakable film series, follows Kevin and Unbreakable's David Dunn/The Overseer (Bruce Willis) as they're placed into a mental institution alongside Elijah Knight/Mr.Glass. The group believes they possess superpowers, but Dr. Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson) aims to break them from their delusion.
Since McAvoy has gotten to explore Kevin—who has dissociative identity disorder (DID)—in both Split and Glass, he's become quite acquainted with the character. Therefore, he has room to say one of Kevin's multiple personalities is "kinky."
In an interview with People, McAvoy explained why he enjoys playing Miss Patricia—the matriarch that controls the Horde. "She's real kinky, and devout, and pious, but kind of longing to be touched at the same time. Which is sort of achingly sad and dead fun to play," McAvoy, 39, said.
McAvoy also said he enjoyed tapping into Hedwig, who is one of Kevin's other primary personalities. This one, in fact, identifies as a 9-year-old boy. "He just doesn't really recognize barriers or boundaries, and it allows him to be pretty inappropriate with anybody and everybody," he added.
Unlike Split, Glass hasn't been received well by critics. The psychological thriller holds a 35 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes and a 42 percent grade on Metacritic. RogerEbert.com noted how the film is "the kind of depressing misfire that hurts even more given what it could have been." Rolling Stone additionally noted how it's "merely a Glass that's half empty, half full (of itself)." Toronto Star, for its part, suggested Shyamalan was "so intent on not making a conventional superhero movie, he ends up not making much of a movie at all."
Despite poor reviews, what can't be mistaken is McAvoy's efforts in nailing 24 different personalities. Paulson, in fact, explained to Newsweek how "amazing" it was to watch McAvoy perform seamlessly between his character's various identities.
"Those are not all different takes Night's putting together. Those are just things that are happening in the scene," Paulson, 44, told Newsweek. "He just jumps from one thing to the next. It's really something to see. It was like having a front row seat for a real master class in acting. It's one thing to sit in the audience and watch it. It's another thing to be in the room in the where it happens, to quote Hamilton."
Glass is in theaters Friday.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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Dory Jackson is a New York-based entertainment journalist from Maryland. She graduated from Randolph-Macon College—in May 2016—with a focus in Communication ... Read more
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