Move over all you teenage actors and actresses, because it looks like Taylor Lautner may soon become Hollywood’s highest paid teen actor. Bonkers, I know, especially since you’d immediately expect other names to own the top of that list. Not according to Deadline Hollywood, though, who say Lautner has just scored $7.5 million to star in the film Northern Lights alongside Tom Cruise and an actress who hasn’t yet been named.
That $7.5 million is more money than kids like Zac Efron and Miley Cyrus have ever made on a film, making Lautner the new king of the teenage payday. One assumes Robert Pattinson may top that, but I think Lautner has a lot more going for him than Pattinson – especially when it comes to action films, which is where it seems Lautner’s “people” want his career to move toward.
The film itself sounds kinda like a Top Gun sequel of sorts, as it follows “a gifted, young, aerobatics pilot who faces off with his controlling, billionaire father and falls in love with a gifted, female pilot.” Supposedly Cruise will be playing Lautner’s controlling, billionaire father (an ex Top Gun pilot we hope), while Lautner would play the young pilot. John Moore (Max Payne) is attached to direct, and Paramount will most likely distribute. That same studio has also brought Lautner on to star as the superhero Max Steel, so it’ll be interesting to see if he continues to make this kind of money per movie.
I guess in the end it all depends on whether he sells a lot of tickets. What do you think? Does Taylor Launter deserve to be the top earning teenage actor, or does he still need to prove himself in more roles?
