CHICAGO — Dashingly disheveled Robert Pattinson has an infectious, high-pitched laugh that would never do for his seductive vampire lover-boy, Edward Cullen.
Buff-and-polished Taylor Lautner is pocket-size compared with the looming stature of his werewolf counterpart, Jacob Black.
Casual yet cool Kristen Stewart can be a real chatterbox, unlike her moody Bella Swan, the high schooler in a romantic tug of war between these two supernatural objects of teen desire.
Lucky girl, right? “Yeah, but that’s in the movies,” Stewart says about bringing to life the modern-day Gothic heroine from the insanely popular Twilight book series (85 million copies sold so far). “I’m just the ultimate fan. If you read a story and you like it andconnect to it, it probably means you’ve inserted yourself in the story, and I get to do that on the most glorified level possible.”
Hollywood fantasy regularly blends with everyday reality for these three blazing-hot rising stars. It has taken a while for a cultural navigator like Oprah Winfrey to zero in on the heat behind the literary-spawned phenom. But on this early May morning, Twilight fever is raging at Harpo Studios as the actors file into the backstage area after taping a show that aired Thursday. The occasion? Eclipse, the third chapter in an already billion-dollar worldwide franchise that arrives June 30.
The actors are unfazed by the shrieking adoration of a largely female audience, many in black Twilight T’s — Team Edward and Team Jacob are duly represented — and all handpicked for their passion for the epic movie series based on author Stephenie Meyer’s four-part saga.
“It’s so nice sometimes, preaching to the converted,” says Pattinson, 24, the London-born overnight sex symbol and primary reason for the screams. Thanks to his devoted worshipers, he has been elevated from a little-known Harry Potter supporting player to one of Time’s 100 most influential people in the world in less than three years. They were out in force the night before at a Winfrey-sponsored screening of an unfinished print of Eclipse. Afterward, a firestorm of fan Tweets rife with “OMGs” gushed about the much-anticipated sequel to 2008’s Twilight and last year’s New Moon.
Once Stewart, 20, painstakingly signs Winfrey’s guest book and Lautner, 18, stops practicing his grape-tossing parlor trick, the castmates settle into a buttery leather sofa to talk about such topics as the iconic moments that are re-created in Eclipse, run-ins with other celebrities and what the post-Twilight future holds.
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Gallery Link: 2010: Session 018 (USA Today Portraits)
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