Taylor Lautner said his perspective on the Twilight franchise and the fame he received from the films has changed over time.
During a recent interview on The Happy Hour on Today Show Radio, the actor said that while now he only has “fond memories” of his experiences while filming the movies, he also thinks that he “needed the space.”
Lautner was a teenager when the first film debuted in 2008. The franchise, based on Stephenie Meyer’s best-selling novels, went on to spawn a total of five films, with the last one, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2, premiering in 2012. Lautner starred as Jacob Black, a werewolf competing with vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) for Bella Swan’s (Kristen Stewart) heart.
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The Twilight Saga, which quickly became a worldwide phenomenon and grossed more than $3 billion at the box office, launched the films’ leads into stardom, something that Lautner said took time to process.
“I was always incredibly thankful, and feel super blessed for what it brought me, but maybe there was a little bit of, like, resentment deep in there going like, ‘I wish I could have just experienced this part of normalcy,'” Lautner explained. “Now, I wouldn’t change it. But I think it needed the growth to get to that place.”
Earlier this year, the Abduction actor opened up about the impact the rivalry that fans caused between his character and Pattinson’s had on him. “It was a little bizarre, the like, competitiveness,” he said at the time. “And there wasn’t a competitiveness between me and Rob but having that constant reminder, it definitely…had an impact.”
