Christian Bale talks Batkid, Ben Affleck playing Batman, and origins of his Batman voice

At this point we’ve all heard about one of the most heart-warming stories of the year when the Make-A-Wish Foundation transformed San Francisco into Gotham City for five-year-old Miles Scott.His wish was to be Batman. He become affectionately known as Batkid.

In an interview with Access Hollywood, former Batman Christian Bale had high praise for Batkid and the entire event:

“I just think it’s great. It’s a great day for the little guy. I just think Make-A-Wish and San Francisco did such an amazing thing to organize that. You just think of the delight in that little fella’s heart, running around doing that. Then also as someone who has played Batman, it’s great to see that the symbol of Batman is so much bigger than any one person, than any film, than any comic book, any TV series, that’s really what it’s all about. It’s irrelevant which actor is playing it, we’re irrelevant in that sense. But for little Miles to have such a great day is just delightful.”

Bale was also asked in his interview what he thinks of Ben Affleck taking on the iconic role:

“I wish him all the best. He’s a very experienced actor and filmmaker and he’ll make it his own. Our thing’s finished, we’ve always declared it was finished and it should be passed on to another actor and it will be again after him.”

Some advice for the new Batman:

“The only thing I said to him is just make sure he can take a piss without anyone having to help him. Because it’s a little bit humiliating, at least what I went through, when you have to have someone help you out of the costume. That was my main piece of advice for him.”

In a separate interview with MTV, Bale opened up about his “Batman voice” from Nolan’s The Dark Knight trilogy that has been often criticized and parodied:

“I got there. They put me in Val Kilmer’s suit. It didn’t even fit properly, and I stood in it and I went ‘I feel like an idiot.’ What kind of guy walks around, dressed like a bat? And is then going to go ‘Hello, how are you? Just ignore that I’m dressed as a bat.’ Of course, he’s meant to be doing this,” Bale said. “If you look at the history of the guy and the pain that he went through. I went ‘I can’t do this in a normal voice. I have to become a beast in order to sell this to myself. I went home that evening, and my wife said, ‘How’d it go?’ I went, ‘I kind of did this.’ And I showed her, and she went, ‘Oh, you f—ed that one up, didn’t you?’ Thank God they went for it.”

 Another piece of advice for Ben Affleck:

 “[The voice] ain’t for everybody. Ben’s obviously going to have to do his own thing, but it was the only way that I could find how to get into that and to justify wearing the fricking Batsuit. Otherwise, he’s just loopy beyond belief. He’s loopy, but he’s loopy with a method to his madness.” 

You can watch both interviews below.

Access Hollywood

MTV