A couple of days ago, word broke that a full-on announcement of “Twilight: Breaking Dawn” was being held up as C-list stars Ashley Greene, Kellan Lutz, Nikki Reed and Jackson Rathbone were holding out for better offers from Summit. In order to make “Breaking Dawn” into two films, Summit has had to go back to the drawing board and renegotiate deals for the cast as they were only contracted to do four films. So irreplaceable lead stars Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner got some lucrative cheese and now the supporting players want their share.
According to EW, the four supporting actors were formerly a united front in salary negotiations, but that Reed and Rathbone have now settled with studio, accepting the initial offer of about $1 million per film. However, Greene and Lutz continue to play hardball saying that since they will be logging just as much PR miles and set hours as the leads, their pay should be bumped. While they are asking for $4 million each per picture, apparently they will settle for $2 million (thus confirming the wisdom of De La Soul who rap in “The Grind Date,” “Momma said that if you need 5 cents don’t ask for 3 ask for 10”).
While many are saying Greene and Lutz are replaceable and being demanding given their small roles in the franchise, you know what, we think they should totally try and get theirs. “Breaking Dawn” is going to be a behemoth money machine and a few more million dollars is a drop in the bucket compared to what will be spent/earned on this. That said, Summit is not going to want to look like they rolled over for their cast or for demanding fans and they definitely haven’t been shy about replacing cast members in the past (Bryce Dallas Howard subs for Rachelle LaFevre in upcoming “Twilight: Eclipse”). Whatever, we don’t particularly care what happens but we’re not going to hate on actors for trying to get a bigger slice.