EW.COM: SECRETS FROM THE ‘NEW MOON’ SET WITH THE FALL PREVIEW ISSUE

Entertainment Weekly has Kristen Stewart and Taylor Lautner gracing their cover this week with their fall preview issue. Included with the fall preview is a special on New Moon, with secrets from the set:

NEW YORK – With a new director, a new level of fame for stars Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson, and a new set of washboard abs for Taylor Lautner, the second film in the Twilight series promises even more swooning for its legions of fans. This week’s double issue of Entertainment Weekly places Stewart and Lautner on the cover, while revealing secrets from the New Moon set inside.

New Moon, a different beast than Twilight, is steeped in heartbreak and sadness, focusing on Bella’s Stewart) road to recovery after Edward (Pattinson) breaks her heart. In addition to that, the movie has to make do with very little of the dreamy Edward Cullen. Instead, it mainly concerns the burgeoning relationship between Bella and her friend Jacob (Lautner). Pattinson couldn’t be happier with his downsized role. “It was a stress-free job for three months,” says the actor. “All the pressure was on Taylor.”

While there have been some minicontroversies surrounding the set – director Chris Weitz replaced Twilight helmer Catherine Hardwicke, Lautner had to publicly campaign to keep the role of Jacob, and actress Rachelle Lefevre was replaced by Bryce Dallas Howard for the soon-to-be-shot third film in the series. When the studio was debating about whether Lautner should reprise his role as Jacob, he eventually secured the spot partly because he had a fan not just in Weitz but in Kristen Stewart. “It’s completely understandable why they wanted to make sure he was right,” says the actress. “He was so young, 16, so I got it. But I knew he had [to do] it. Just because of how I felt around him. I literally saw Jacob in him.” And how did the Bella-Jacob chemistry play out on set? “We have that relationship,” she says. “It’s lamely cute. I love that kid. I would do anything for him. I would kill for him, literally.”

Lautner also found it important to bond with Kristen. “It was vital. Edward and Bella’s relationship is so intense, but Jacob and Bella’s is very laid-back. Sometimes there’s a question of, Is it going to go past best friends? And sometimes it looks like it,” he says. “But they are so open, and they can tell each other everything. So it was very important for me and Kristen to grow very close before doing this. It wasn’t like we went out to, like, theme parks together or anything. It was just, like, going to each other’s houses, hanging out, going and getting some dinner. A lot of nothing – just spending time together.”

And the tabloids are always speculating. “It’s so absurd,” Stewart says. “I walk out of my trailer with my pants undone – and they think I’m pregnant? I mean, really?! [She looks down at her stomach.] They think I’m pregnant? Come on! [Laughs.] Like, dude, I don’t get it.”

From the look of things on set, Lautner will delight the contingent of fans known as Team Jacob. Not only does he look good, but it seems he can actually act. “I think that Taylor is really going to surprise people in the movie,” says Weitz. “People have seen his body and all that stuff and it’s a shocker because it’s hard to believe that anyone can be quite so carved. But he actually delivers a really great performance. He wasn’t just exercising all day, he was also reading the book quite a lot.” Lautner says the most difficult part about adding 32 pounds for the role was eating. “The hardest part is not the working out,” he says. “I knew what I was working for, so to get to the gym and work really hard was easy for me. My body fat got so low that we actually needed to increase it a little bit to be able to build muscle on top of that. Sometimes my trainer would literally be like, ‘Go have a huge milk shake just so I can get a thousand calories into your body.’ The hardest part was always shoving food down your mouth. I had to be eating every two hours.”

While making the first movie, Summit kept urging Stewart and Pattinson to ease up on the teenage angst. Now Stewart’s diving headlong into heartache. She says she reached her breaking point while filming the pivotal scene where Edward abandons her. “Before the scene, I was sitting in my car, like f—ing crying – crying so hard you can’t breathe,” she says. “Because I was really overwhelmed and intimidated by the scene. Everyone says, ‘She better be able to pull off the emotion in this movie!’ And it’s such an important moment in the book, when he leaves.” The scene exhausted her. “I’m thinking, ‘We have to be done now,’” she remembers. “‘Just tell me we’re done.’”

In the end, she’s very positive about how the film turned out. “[Making Twilight] was much more of a fight,” says Stewart. “Everyone was a little more scared. We needed to make something commercial but stay true to the book. We didn’t have enough money. It was all very impulsive, and that’s what I love about that —-ing movie…But I think New Moon is gonna be even better.”

You can read more about the New Moon secrets and fall preview here.

(Thanks Ana!)

I am excited to get the new Entertainment Weekly this week. I love it when they feature our Twilight and New Moon cast!

Are you going to buy this week’s Entertainment Weekly? Do you like the cover?