Sofia Coppola has said she turned down the chance to direct the final Twilight film Breaking Dawn because she thought the concept was “too weird”.
READ MORE: ‘The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part Two’ review
The last book in Stephanie Meyer’s vampire saga was split into two films, with Breaking Dawn – Part 1 coming out in 2011 and Part 2 following in 2012. In the end, both instalments were directed by Bill Condon.
Speaking to Rolling Stone, however, Coppola has said that she met with producers to discuss jumping on board the project when it was still in development.
“We had one meeting, and it never went anywhere,” she said.
“I thought the whole imprinting-werewolf thing was weird. The baby. Too weird! But part of the earlier Twilight could be done in an interesting way. I thought it’d be fun to do a teen vampire romance, but the last one gets really far out.”
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Coppola, who has directed films including Lost in Translation, The Bling Ring and The Virgin Suicides, is preparing to release her new feature Priscilla, a biopic of Elvis’ ex-wife Priscilla Presley. Starring Cailee Spaeny and Jacob Elordi, the film is set to be released in the US on October 27, before hitting big screens in the UK on December 26.
In August, it was revealed that the Presley estate had refused the film permission to use Elvis’ music. Speaking to Hollywood Reporter, Coppola said, “They don’t like projects that they haven’t originated, and they’re protective of their brand.”
It transpires that Twilight is not the only directing project that Coppola has come close to helming. In the same Rolling Stone interview, she revealed that she also met studio executives about the possibility of joining a live-action version of The Little Mermaid, albeit not the 2023 Disney version.
“I was in a boardroom and some development guy said, ‘What’s gonna get the 35-year-old man in the audience?’ And I just didn’t know what to say,” the director said.
“I just was not in my element. I feel like I was naive, and then I felt a lot like the character in the story, trying to do something out of my element, and it was a funny parallel of the story for me.”
In a four-star review of Priscilla, NME’s Matthew Turner said that “Elordi makes a terrific Elvis, capturing the King’s powerful charisma and making the performance seem somehow effortless, rather than a finely calibrated impression.”