Hugh Grant calls his ‘Notting Hill’ character ‘despicable’

Hugh Grant has some harsh words for his character in Notting Hill.

The actor, 64, took a trip down memory lane along Vanity Fair in a video interview, published on November 14, in which he watched scenes from previous films. While doing so, he looked back on his role in the 1999 romantic comedy and said his character William “Will” Thacker was “despicable”.

“When I’m flipping through the channels at home after a few drinks and this comes on, I’m just like, ‘Why does my character have no balls?’ ” Grant said in the interview before taking issue with a particular scene involving Will and his love interest, Julia Roberts’ character Anna Scott, a movie star.

“There’s a scene in this movie where she’s in my house and paps comes to the front door and rings the bell and I think I just let her walk past me and open the door and it’s horrible,” he continued he.

“I’ve never had a girlfriend, or actually now a wife, who hasn’t said, ‘Why the hell didn’t you stop her? What’s wrong with you?’

He added of his character: “And I don’t really have an answer for that. That’s how it was written, and I really think he’s despicable.”

PEOPLE Puzzler crossword is here! How fast can you solve it? Play now!

In the interview, Grant also praised his co-star Roberts’ acting skills.

“Probably all the time with Julia, as with any brilliant actress, you just think, ‘Oh, God, they’re really good. I’m not going to be as good as her,'” he said.

“And she’s great at emoting, and she has that kind of quality where it looks like her skin is fluid. You can kind of see her soul,” he added.

Written by Richard Curtis – who later reunited with Grant in the 2001s Bridget Jones’s Diary and the 2003s Love actually – and directed by the late Roger Michell, the film follows the romance between a London bookseller and a famous American actress, played by Grant and Roberts respectively.

The film was nominated for three awards at the 2000 Golden Globes, including individual nods for the two leads.

Never miss a story – sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

Grant opened up to PEOPLE in an exclusive interview in October ahead of the release of his A24 horror film Hereticalwhere he plays a reclusive Englishman who threatens the lives of two missionaries when they visit his home.

“Good guys are hard,” the actor told PEOPLE at the film’s AFI Fest premiere presented by Canva on Oct. 24. “They’re hard to avoid being boring… I think almost every actor prefers to be the damaged, bad guy. It’s much more interesting.”