Robert Pattinson’s Twilight was infamous for a number of reasons, the actor himself launching his career off the back of the controversial film. But he was not the Brit Stephenie Meyer had in mind when her work was picked up for live-action adaptation. Henry Cavill, who has hardly ever starred in a critically bad film, was very close to committing to the $3.4 billion franchise that would have spelled career suicide for him. Twilight‘s author, Stephenie Meyer, on the other hand, famously claimed that the role of Edward Cullen, her male protagonist, was envisioned with Cavill in mind. But the series director Catherine Hardwicke, it seems, had other plans in mind.
Henry Cavill Loses Out on Another Role Because of Age
Henry Cavill has always raced against time to secure hard-hitting career-defining roles in Hollywood but in return, the element of time has not been kind to the actor. He has made a habit of either arriving too early or too late for the role. It happened with Cavill’s audition for James Bond in Casino Royale – it was down to him and Daniel Craig, but Cavill was deemed unsuitable because he was too young. It is happening again with 007 as now he is too old for the role, despite being the most-voted candidate for the role. With Twilight, it was more of the same.
Also read: Twilight Star Says The Franchise Is Prime For A TV Series Reboot
Stephenie Meyer began penning her first Twilight novel in 2003. Cavill was 20 at the time. In 2007, after Summit Entertainment put the series in development, the author, in her blog, wrote:
“The most disappointing thing for me is losing my perfect Edward. Henry Cavill is now twenty-four years old. Let us have a moment of quiet in which to mourn…”
Despite Cavill being Meyer’s first choice for the role, he was deemed too old to play Edward, the perpetual 17-year-old vampire. In his stead, Robert Pattinson, who walked into the audition looking jetlagged, wearing a stained T-shirt, with his hair all over the place won over Hardwicke’s heart. Something about his cold and sharp eyes, the typical grungy look and pallor struck the director, mesmerizing her the first time they met. Cavill stood no chance.
Henry Cavill Comments on Losing the Lead in Twilight
It is hard to imagine Henry Cavill enacting the same way Robert Pattinson did in the Twilight series. No matter how hard the movies were trolled after the initial novelty wore off, absolutely no one could have looked the part better than Pattinson. The actor owned the role, in all its faults and glory, and did the best with what he was given. Even in the limited scope of his role, he put the audience in a trance – something a 2008 Cavill could hardly pull off convincingly.
In the Happy, Sad, Confused podcast in 2022, the former Superman actor claimed:
“I didn’t know about them wanting to cast me and the internet wasn’t quite the tool that it is now and so I only found out afterward. I was like, ‘Oh okay, that would have been cool.'”
The feverish obsession that had set in a decade and a half ago with the premiere of the first Twilight film in 2008 was unprecedented in its scale and magnitude. One would like to reason that the mix of the supernatural and the theme of forbidden romance could have set off the frenzy but the trope had already existed even before this franchise came into being. Perhaps then, the story of love, death, and desire, blended with an eccentric mix of haunting cinematography, alluring music, and the element of danger combined so perfectly that it brought out a dormant fascination from the deepest recesses of every mind on the planet.
Source: Movie Web
