Taylor Lautner of The Twilight Saga: New Moon is going to steal the hearts of fans in the second installment of the franchise. Casual observers who haven’t read the books have openly stated that Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) must be insane to choose the broody Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) over his forthright and friendly Jacob Black. Lautner is flattered by sentiments like that, but he’s understanding.

Take a gander at some Taylor Lautner photos.

“I think it depends on what kind of girl you are, what kind of guy you like,” he says. “Edward and Jacob are complete opposite guys. They’re hot and cold, literally. I personally love Bella and Jacob’s relationship, how they begin with best friends and it starts to grow into something more and more. Both guys are in love with Bella. Both guys are always going to be there for Bella, and they’re protective. I just think it’s what kind of guy you like.”

There had been loose talk that maybe the young Lautner (he’ll turn 18 in February, ladies) would need to be recast given how ripped Jacob would need to be, but it’s quite obvious that was quickly not a concern. “I couldn’t control things outside,” he explains. “I couldn’t control the media. But I could control what I was doing to portray Jacob Black correctly. So that’s what I stayed focused on the whole entire time. Jacob transforms a lot in New Moon, not only physically but mentally and emotionally as well. So it was a matter of getting to the gym and eating the right food and a lot of it I was in the gym about five days a week, because it’s important to get your recovery time and not overworking yourself. I was trying to put on weight, and if I was in the gym too much I’d be burning the calories I’m trying to take in. The most important thing was the eating side. Everybody thinks it was getting in the gym. That was easy. I was motivated. But the eating was pretty hard. It was just eating a lot. I found out that I had to consume at least 3200 calories a day just to maintain – and I’m not trying to maintain, I’m trying to gain. So I had to eat more than that, and putting something in your mouth every two hours. I’m busy, I’m in downtown L.A., from meeting to meeting. There’s not time for me to be eating. So I literally would have to carry a little baggie of beef patties, raw almonds, sweet potatoes. So it’s not like every two hours I’m eating ice cream. It was difficult.”

And for the record, his answer to the question of using steroids was a firm “definitely not.”

The results, however, are incredibly impressive, and there’s a lot of Lautner showing those results off in New Moon. The first time you really see it is in a scene after Bella wipes out on a motorcycle, and Jacob has to peel his shirt off to help clean up the blood. It’s certainly designed to get the teen girls squealing, but Taylor can’t really handle it. “I start laughing so hard every time I see that scene. ‘You’re bleeding? OK, let me fix it.’ It’s so embarrassing,” he admits. “Here’s the thing – there’s a reason that he’s not wearing clothes all the time. One, when he transforms, all his clothes get shredded. He can’t help it. When he goes into the woods to get something to put on so he’s not naked, it’s just a ripped pair of jean shorts. He’s also hot. He’s 108 degrees. So that’s another reason. I love this character, I love this story, and putting on the weight and not wearing much clothing was required by the role. A year from now, if I love a story and I love a character that requires me to lose 40 lbs. I’m ready to do it.”

Aside from general embarrassment, the shirtlessness also threatened to make him sick. “The challenging thing is Jacob is supposed to be extremely hot, so he’s not supposed to feel cold at all,” he notes, “and the worst scene for that was the rain scene, the breakup scene where Bella first sees Jacob after his transformation. We’re standing on this little hill right behind Jacob’s house and it was 35 degrees and it was pouring rain on top of us – not regular rain, but rain tower rain, which comes straight from the springs – and the scene was very long. It took four minutes of film on screen, but we filmed the same scene all day long. So it was really, really rough. As soon as we’d call cut, we’d run over to a heater quick and wrap ourselves in blankets and we’d have like two minutes off before we’d have to go do another take. So the weather was definitely extremely challenging. I just had to take myself to another world so I wasn’t sitting there shivering during the scene. It was hard. Sometimes I’d catch myself and I’d have to stop. I thought for sure I was going to get sick. I didn’t.”

The most exciting bit of transformation for Taylor? Losing that huge wig. “It was very freeing,” he admits. “One, I’d look at myself in the mirror and I wouldn’t even be able to recognize myself. It was so weird just to see that hair on me. Two, it was very itchy, hot, whatever, annoying. Also, it slowed down the filming process. Whenever it got caught in my eye or whatever, we’d have to cut and start over. It got caught in my mouth and I’m spitting hair out in the middle of the scene. I’m coming this close to kissing Bella and ’sorry, I’ve got to spit my hair out.’ It was annoying. My last day of filming with the wig, we ripped it off, held it up in the air, like ‘that’s a picture wrap on Taylor’s wig.’ The whole crew gave it a standing ovation. It was amazing. It was great to chop that thing off.”

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