To some, Kristen Stewart is simply “the ‘Twilight’ girl.” Her arresting turn as love-struck teen Bella Swan in the swoony series of vampire romance blockbusters put her on the map and earned her the mantle of “movie star.”[Source: BackStage.
And for many young actors, this would have represented the chance to cash in, to do a whole bunch of well-paying wannabe hits with various supernatural love interests. Stewart, on the other hand, prefers the more challenging route: offbeat indies, parts that speak to her in a genuine way, and the occasional portrayal of an icon (like, say, Joan Jett). She only hopes that those who want to see her as nothing more than Bella will give her a chance.
“There’s a road I’m going down now, and I’m aware that there’s not as much of an audience for strange movies—for different, eclectic movies—and I totally accept that,” she says. “But at the same time, if I do films like that, I want people to take it for what it is instead of going, ‘Oh, let’s see the ‘Twilight’ girl try to do this.’”
Stewart says she is deeply grateful for all the opportunities the runaway vampire franchise has sent her way, but she has made sure the personas she has taken on since have not been terribly Bella-like. Take her nuanced performance in the recent indie sensation “Welcome to the Rileys.” As foul-mouthed teen runaway/stripper Mallory, Stewart is raw and real, a believably bruised troublemaker, and she more than holds her own opposite co-stars James Gandolfini and Melissa Leo. “I’m really glad that it took the time that it did to get made, because I think by the time I was 18, I was ready and more confident and mature enough to play the part,” says the actor, now 20. “I had read the script when I was 16, and I was just too young. I would’ve shied away from stuff, I think.”
‘Road’ MapStewart was in Pittsburgh working on the indie film “Adventureland” when she first got wind of “Twilight.” At the time, she says, she didn’t really have “enough room in my head” to even consider a project of that magnitude. Still, she was up for the audition and recalls being thrilled when director Catherine Hardwicke and actor Jackson Rathbone flew to Pittsburgh to meet with her. “We worked together for four hours,” Stewart says. “And by the end of it, we didn’t want to stop talking about it, and Catherine was like, ‘Okay, well, I think you should do this. I’m gonna get on a plane now, but hopefully we can continue this discussion later.’ I was like, ‘Uh, does that mean…’ I couldn’t believe it.”
Like Scott, Hardwicke was charmed by Stewart’s brief “Into the Wild” performance. “I felt her vulnerability and yearning leap off the screen when she sat on that bed in the trailer, trying to seduce Emile [Hirsch],” Hardwicke recalls. “Kristen has to feel everything—to connect, to make it her own. She is intense and powerful and athletically gifted. Bella Swan is clumsy. Kristen had to be the most awkward volleyball player in ‘Twilight,’ but in reality she’s a superstar.”
Stewart wasn’t necessarily prepared for the “superstar” status “Twilight” would afford her, but she has tried to remain grounded and keep her decision-making process basically the same. “A lot changed, but at the same time the process of choosing stuff doesn’t change,” she says. “I guess I wouldn’t know the difference if I didn’t have ‘Twilight,’ because the things that have rolled in probably wouldn’t have rolled in. I’m aware and thankful for that. And when something like ‘Welcome to the Rileys’ speaks to you, you have to jump on it.”
That said, she’s still genuinely surprised when filmmakers want to cast her in certain things—like Walter Salles’ upcoming take on Jack Kerouac’s novel “On the Road.” “When it was sort of coming to be and I was the right age to play the part of Marylou, I didn’t even want to think about it a whole lot, because I was like, ‘They’re gonna hire Scarlett Johansson,’” Stewart says with a laugh. “Which would’ve been fantastic, but I just couldn’t imagine inserting myself into that equation.”
Now that she is part of the equation, she’s bringing her usual commitment to the role—and, refreshingly, with a sense of wonder not typically found in young stars who have been working as long as she has. “I worked with my friend Tom Sturridge, and he plays Carlo Marx, who’s Allen Ginsberg,” Stewart says, excitement creeping into her voice. “And I would look over at him, and he’s doing this f*cking full-on Allen Ginsberg crazy monologue in the corner of some thumping, raving party, and I’m dancing to bebop jazz, and I’d be like, ‘Tom, we’re doing “On the Road.” Just so you know “On the Road.”‘
Read the rest of the interview here!
Rumors are circulating and social media networks are buzzing as many Baton Rouge residents stalk “Twilight” movie stars who are in Baton Rouge filming “Breaking Dawn.”
Avid fans have spotted the cast at several hotspots including Tsunami, Perkins Rowe and Tigerland.
And they’ve been permeating the city at downtown bar Boudreaux and Thibodeaux’s, where 100 Monkeys — a band including “Breaking Dawn” cast member Jackson Rathbone — has been performing every Tuesday, said Eric LeBlanc, manager at Boudreaux and Thibodeaux’s.
“The crowds have been huge on Tuesdays,” LeBlanc said.
Rathbone and 100 Monkeys were at the Baton Rouge State Fair this past weekend to film a music video, according to J.H. Martin, the State Fair’s CEO and chairman.
“Because Jackson is in the movie, they have been hanging around Baton Rouge,” Martin said. “We did see an increase in people crowding around the stage when they started playing.”
Martin said the band was a pleasure to meet.[Source: LSUReveille]
“The ladies might think [Jackson's] the cutest because of his Southern charm,” Martin said. “They were super nice young men.”
While the production team for 100 Monkeys was filming the music video, some of the patrons started to notice, Martin said.
“We did a shot in the back by the bumper cars, and we had to get two security guards to make sure nothing got out of hand,” Martin said. “If somebody spots one, they tell the world about it on Twitter and Facebook.”
Kasey Emas, creative writing senior, said she has met several “Twilight” cast members. Emas said she met Kellan Lutz a couple times around Baton Rouge.
“He is really cool,” Emas said. “The first time I met him I was a stand-in for a movie he was working on with Samuel L. Jackson. I didn’t recognize him as a ‘Twilight’ actor until another stand-in told me after we talked for a good 30 minutes.”
Emas said Lutz and many of the producers were nice the last time she ran into them at The Office, a bar on Third Street.
“We were at The Office, and they were just drinking and having a good time,” Emas said. “When we were hanging around their table, [Lutz] was dancing with my friends and buying everyone shots.”
Emas said she has also met Robert Pattinson, who is less of an extrovert than Lutz.
“Both times I ran into Rob, he looked kind of messy and pretty pale,” Emas said. “The last time, he left The Office right as it was filling up. He just seems like a really quiet person who keeps to himself.”
Ashley Greene and Joe Jonas frequent Fred’s Bar in Tigerland and are usually accompanied by other “Twilight” cast members, Emas said.
“I feel bad because I know my friends pull out their iPhones and snap pictures of the actors when they are out,” Emas said.
Katie Harvey, project coordinator for the Baton Rouge Film Commission, believes filming will help raise Baton Rouge’s profile.
“All of the films that are in the area bring a great deal of direct [spending] into Baton Rouge and its businesses,” Harvey said in an e-mail. “[We] offer a discount to the films while they are shooting. It’s a wonderful gesture on behalf of the local businesses and a great grassroots way to display the hospitality of Baton Rouge to our guests.”
Since “Breaking Dawn” production began, Harvey said her office has been inundated with inquiries about extras casting, but BRFC doesn’t handle extras placement.
“We get calls and e-mails daily from Baton Rouge to even as far away as Brazil,” Harvey said.
ROBERT PATTINSON, 24Below is a video of Sexy Men In 1 Minute and amongst the lot is Taylor Lautner and Kellan Lutz, but they saved the best for last Robert! The winner will be released on November 17th!
The question is: What’s not sexy about the Twilight star? Case in point: Pattinson, with his signature messy hair and intense stare, ignites mass hysteria wherever he goes. “I don’t know how the Beatles felt, but very few human beings could ever get this feeling,” he told PEOPLE. “You can’t prepare for this.”
You’ve got another film coming out next year, ‘Abduction’ with John Singleton. What was it like working on that movie?
DW: ‘Abduction’ was crazy. It was a wild ride. It was fun. It’s unbelievable seeing the amount of hysteria that can go down surrounding Taylor Lautner and his fans in that town or in any town. Literally, they come out in hoards with posters and signs and support, always trying to find out what the next location is. It was like a wild goose chase trying to get the film down because we always had fans interrupting the shots. Other than that I had a wild time. It was great working with John. We had some high action scenes. A lot of material that he gave me and cast members, a lot of room to play around and just really express ourselves on film, not only as characters but as actors. I enjoyed that a lot.
What’s your role in that movie?
DW: I play Taylor Lautner’s best friend, pretty much the go to guy. Pretty much, his character ends up on a wild, wild chase to figure out who his parents are and he’s also running from immediate danger. So with that being said he needs all the information that he can get and I’m his go to guy in the film, whether it’s fake ID’s or just figuring out the best route to get out of the city or just helping him along the way in trying to trace down his parents. He comes to me and confides in me because I’ve been his best friend for so long and I also have access to all this technology.
What’s it like working with someone who has that kind of fan base where, like, on ‘My Soul To Keep’ there’s not quite the same fan base there for the actors?[Source: Blackfilm via taytay_Daily & TaylorLautnerUpdate.
DW: Right. I mean, other than it literally being an interruption on set maybe here or there, the security levels having to be heightened I don’t find it any different. As a person Taylor was no different than me working with Max or me working with a newcomer because he was just genuine, which is interesting to find. He was a very genuine person. He was very charismatic. It’s like fame hadn’t really affected him as the person I had know and so he treated me and every other actor the same way that he’s been treating us throughout the whole year. So it was never something uncomfortable or a situation that was anything different or out of the ordinary. It was just like working with a fellow co-worker.
I met my friend Rob, he was a musician too. He was hanging out with a few of his other friends who are musicians as well. I became friends with them and for the first time I felt like I’d made friends similar to myself.[Source: ROBsessed via YouTube]
Rob ended up being an actor and stuff, we co-wrote this song and he took the song to the producers, and I thought “oh cool” and didn’t really think about it. It went in and it was far bigger than I thought it was. The film was Twilight…
It was kind of ridiculous, and I was suddenly getting like, two thousand plays on myspace. I was getting from twenty a day to two thousand a day and it was all kind of kicking off as a musician. I was unsigned and in London and I still can’t put my finger on it, I don’t know why I got so exposed at that time. Suddenly I got “Do you want to go to America, please come to Kentucky, please come to Canada, please come to Hawaii.” I think it was just their own want to know everything about this film and I was tied into that, it escalated when I went over and played so much.
Fans of Eclipse gum and the Twilightmovies can now enter for a chance to spend an evening with Kellan Lutz, star of The Twilight Saga: Eclipse. The contest, which celebrates the movie’s upcoming DVD release, asks fans to submit a moment when they needed breath-freshening Eclipse gum at EclipseSecrets.com. A winner from all entries will be chosen to attend a private DVD viewing of The Twilight Saga: Eclipse with the film’s star.Fans 18 years and over can enter now through November 9th to win a one night stay in Baton Rouge and a screening with Kellan. The winner will be announced November 19th. There are of course other ongoing contests on Eclipsesecrets.com. Go there to find out more about free ‘Eclipse’ givaways.
Posts
All Comments
