Celebs who cringe at the movie that made them famous

News broke this week that Twilight star Taylor Lautner resents his role as Jacob Black in the famous saga that launched his career, alongside Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson.

During an interview on The Happy Hour radio show, Taylor went into detail about how he needed time and space to appreciate the film years later, but during the media whirlwind, he felt disassociated from normalcy, which affected him negatively

“[...] There was a little bit of, like, resentment deep in there going like, ‘I wish I could have just experienced this part of normalcy,’” he told the show. “Now, I wouldn’t change it. But I think it needed the growth to get to that place.”

This isn’t the first time he has lamented the role of Jacob and all that came tied up with it. He had to seriously bulk up for the role, even though he was still a teenager, and had to maintain a strict protein-heavy diet that caused him to have some issues with his body.

“For this little role that I did starting when I was 16, I was 140 pounds and I had to put on 35 pounds of muscle to keep my role,” he told Yahoo Life back in 2022. 

“That was an absolute nightmare in the diet compartment — raw sweet potatoes and turkey patties and protein shakes that were essentially just mud. That was rough…I had to consume at least 5,000 calories a day to maintain the weight that I was at.”

Taylor isn’t the first celeb to harbour some resentment to the role that made them famous and launched their career into the stratosphere. Here’s our roundup of celebs who cannot help but cringe when their star-making roles are brought up.

Natalie Portman

The Black Swan Oscar-winner has big regrets about playing Padmé Amidala in the Star Wars prequels, which she filmed when she was just 16 – especially after the backlash and criticism the films received. "Everyone thought I was a horrible actress," she told New York Magazine in 2014. "I was in the biggest-grossing movie of the decade, and no director wanted to work with me." Portman also revealed that director Mike Nichols, who was a mentor to her, had to "vouch for her" so she could get a part in "Cold Mountain" after the second prequel film "Attack of the Clones" was released.

Miley Cyrus

The daughter of country star Billy Ray Cyrus was thrust into the spotlight with Hannah Montana, but she secretly hated the experience even as it was happening, she revealed to Marie Claire, explaining that the aesthetics severely hurt her self-esteem.

"From the time I was 11, it was, 'You're a pop star! That means you have to be blonde, and you have to have long hair, and you have to put on some glittery tight thing.' Meanwhile, I'm this fragile little girl playing a 16-year-old in a wig and a ton of makeup. It was like Toddlers & Tiaras," she said. 

"I was told for so long what a girl is supposed to be from being on that show. I was made to look like someone that I wasn't, which probably caused some body dysmorphia because I had been made pretty every day for so long, and then when I wasn't on that show, it was like, 'Who the f**k am I?'"

She also told CBS Sunday Morning that touring as both herself and as Hannah Montana was difficult, and that it may have led to "extreme damage in [her] psyche as an adult person." While she did laugh off that last part, and acknowledged that she doesn't regret her work for the House of Mouse, she admitted "it's a lot to put on a kid."

Robert Pattinson

Yes, yet another Twilight star who cannot stand the franchise. Robert, who played Edward, hates the Twilight saga so much that there are actual supercuts of him slamming the franchise that made him a star. In one clip, he says of Stephenie Meyer's source material, "When I read it, it seemed like a book that wasn't supposed to be published. I was convinced that Stephenie was convinced she was Bella ... It's like, this woman is mad." In another, he compares his character, Edward Cullen, to an ax murderer, and in another that the pay for the movies could have been better. 

Megan Fox

Megan was a budding actress when Transformers fell into her lap, but she has been very vocal over the years about the franchise, and director Michael Bay, not holding back her disdain for the movies, and her performance therein. She told Entertainment Weekly of the first movie, "I'm terrible in it. It's my first real movie and it's not honest and not realistic. The movie wasn't bad, I just wasn't proud about what I did. On the new one, I tried. But unless you're a seasoned veteran, working with Michael Bay is not about an acting experience." 

She added of the sequel, "I can't s**t on this movie because it did give me a career and open all these doors for me. But I don't want to blow smoke up people's a**. People are well aware that this is not a movie about acting."

This, of course, was in addition to comparing Michael Bay to Hitler and calling him a “nightmare” to work with,so it’s hard to misinterpret and misread her true feelings. 

Kate Winslet

Her heart will not go on! The Oscar-winning Brit has a major bone to pick with her performance in James Cameron’s epic Titanic, which turned her into an international star. When promoting the 3D re-release of the film, she lamented to press, "I haven't seen the whole film in a very long time ... but it's a whole different me and we look much younger and our acting was different, hopefully not as good as now."

She also hated her wonky American accent. "I can't listen to it," she said. "It's awful. Hopefully it's so much better now. It sounds terribly self indulgent but actors do tend to be very self-critical. I have a hard time watching any of my performances, but watching Titanic I was just like, 'Oh God, I want to do that again.'"

Winslet also revealed to MTV News that she really, really hates Celine Dion's megahit, "My Heart Will Go On," admitting that every time she hears it, she has a "massive internal eye roll" and wants to vomit. 

Um, excuse me Winslet, Celine Dion is Canadian royalty. Show some respect!