'Twilight' buzz: Dakota, Sheen new to 'New Moon'
Photo credit: Getty/Jason Merritt | Actress Dakota Fanning arrives at the Los Angeles premiere of Summit Entertainment's 'The Twilight Saga: New Moon' at Mann Westwood on November 16, 2009 in Westwood, California.
New Moon: Meet Jacob Black
The Twilight Saga: New Moon trailer 3
Trailer: The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Robert Pattinson
Photos: Taylor Lautner
Kristen Stewart
While much of the attention being paid to "The Twilight Saga: New Moon" - opening Friday - has been on Kristen Stewart, Taylor Lautner and Robert Pattinson, the cast includes two notable new performers:
WHO Dakota Fanning
HER CREDITS "Coraline," "Push," "Taken"
'NEW MOON' ROLE The much-feared Jane - a member of the vampire group Volturi who has the power to make a person feel pain by using her mind.
THE DEAL Fanning says she read the four books in the "Twilight" series in less than a week and agreed to do the role because she likes the books and because it's the first time she's been able to play an evil role.
"I was certainly a big fan and just to be a little part of it was a big deal to me," Fanning says. "I wanted to be a part of this and this was the only way. So, it didn't matter about the size of the role."
She says the series is so appealing because it is a fairy-tale, love-at-first-sight story. As for being one of the film's villains, Fanning says the Volturi don't think they are bad. It's just that, she adds with a smile, Jane doesn't always use her special powers for good.
WHO Michael Sheen
HIS CREDITS "Frost/Nixon" (as David Frost), "The Queen" (as Tony Blair)
'NEW MOON' ROLE Head vampire Aro
THE DEAL His vampire sounds a bit like characters from The Beatles' animated movie, "Yellow Submarine." "You remember the Blue Meanies?" Sheen asks.
Sheen wanted to come up with a voice that would reflect how Aro was almost 2,000 years old, and be true to Stephenie Meyer's books: "It was from Stephenie, in the book she describes Aro having a voice like feathers. That made me sort of try to think about what would it sound like if a person had a voice like feathers."
That's when he realized he sounded like the animated character. He was OK with the voice decision when he remembered how much the Blue Meanies disturbed him when he was a child growing up in Wales.
- McClatchy Newspapers
She's 'Moon' shadowed
Kristen Stewart and her fellow "New Moon" star Robert Pattinson, with whom she's been romantically linked, have become constant media fodder. She's been on more magazine and tabloid covers than Kate Gosselin.
Stewart's take on all the tabloid attention is that it is "false" and "mean."
"It's like a ridiculous show. Like a soap opera that seems real but you're not quite sure," the 19-year-old Stewart says. "It doesn't bother me. I don't take it personally, because I've had so much experience it's gotten easier to talk about the work."
Beyond the 'Moon'
The stars of "New Moon" will be back in the third "Twilight" film, "Eclipse," due out in 2010 (and presumably the fourth, "Breaking Dawn"). But the actors have other projects as well. Here's what's coming up for them:
Kristen Stewart (Bella Swan) - "The Runaways," the biopic of Joan Jett's groundbreaking, all-female band.
Taylor Lautner (Jacob Black) - "Valentine's Day," a Garry Marshall directed romantic comedy. Cast includes Taylor Swift, with whom Lautner has been linked romantically.
Robert Pattinson (Edward Cullen) - "Remember Me," a drama co-starring Pierce Brosnan and Chris Cooper.
Ashley Greene (Alice Cullen) - The supernatural thriller, "The Apparition."
Nikki Reed (Rosalie Hale) - In "K-11," she plays a man who has become a woman. The cast includes Kristen Stewart and was directed by Stewart's mother, Jules Mann-Stewart.
