Taylor Lautner Nearly Lost His Role in the ‘Twilight’ Movies For the Weirdest Reason
It’s always been something of an urban legend, but Taylor Lautner has now confirmed that he was told by the production staff on the Twilight franchise that they would not be casting him in any further films, beginning with New Moon. Lautner’s character, Jacob Black, undergoes a startling physical transformation in the books as he “comes of age” as a werewolf, and becomes a peak athlete of a man. Speaking with the Call Her Daddy podcast, Lautner revealed that he received a call telling him his services were no longer required in the film series, which also starred Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson. “Yeah, they called me and said ‘Thank you for your participation, but we are recasting you for the rest of the franchise’.”
When prompted as to whether or not it was down to his performance as Jacob, Lautner explained that, as depicted in Twilight, his character was meant to be a scrawny 16-year-old teenage boy, but that by the middle of New Moon, he is a much bigger and mature looking physical specimen. Actor Michael Copon made a very public play to take the gig from Lautner at the time, after director Chris Weitz sought a new performer.
Their plan was to just cast a regular 16-year-old, which I was at the time, and then they were going to cast someone in their mid-twenties to be Jacob for the rest of the franchise. I had to fight for my role in the franchise and, thankfully, I had already hit the gym the second we finished filming the first movie. I knew if I was going to continue playing him, I’d need to. When my team got the call they said ‘Have you seen him recently?’ and they said ‘No, why?’ and my team said ‘You might want to take a meeting with him or something’.”
How Did Taylor Lautner Keep His Role in ‘The Twilight Saga’?As the actor revealed, he’d already begun working out as soon as Twilight was done filming. He also explained that he had to re-audition for the role as well, stating:
“I’d been, like, hardcore working out for about 9 months and had added 20-25 pounds of muscle by that point and, well, they were surprised, but they didn’t make it easy, I still had to re-audition but thankfully Kristen said ‘You’re not reading with any casting director, you’re reading with me’, which was very sweet of her, and it all worked out.”Lautner went on to reprise the role of Jacob in all four of the sequels to Twilight, with the movie franchise going on to gross a staggering $3.346 billion at the worldwide box office. The Twilight Saga can be watched via STARZ on Hulu and Prime Video. Stay tuned to Collider for updates.
