Lautner Chooses 'Stretch Armstrong' Over 'Max Steel'

Taylor Lautner is probably the hottest star in Hollywood at the moment, certainly if we place an age filter on the discussion. Since The Twilight Saga: New Moon was released in November, Lautner has been linked to a few big projects, so many, in fact, that he now has to drop out of one. Curiously enough, the talk immediately after Twilight centered around casting somebody new in the role of Jacob Black. Now keeping Lautner on board seems like a very smart decision. In December, two weeks after New Moon opened, Paramount announced it had signed Lautner for Max Steel, pushed as an action franchise and based on the Mattel toy/doll/action figure. In short order, he was also recruited by Universal and Brian Grazer and Ron Howard from Imagine to star in the film version of Hasbro's Stretch Armstrong. Now those properties have butted heads and the winner, according to New York Magazine is Hasbro. Lautner will play Stretch, not Steel. The reason, the magazine reports, is because Hasbro has its shit together:

"Lautner became increasingly convinced that Hasbro was playing its hand better than Mattel. Thanks to [William Morris Endeavor Entertainment], Hasbro was moving with far greater speed through Hollywood's development maze than Mattel, not only setting up projects, but quickly moving them forward - At Universal, Imagine Entertainment Über-producer Brian Grazer was working to get Stretch made into a 3-D movie by 2012; Candy Land had a script from Tropic Thunder screenwriter Etan Cohen, with Enchanted director Kevin Lima aiming for a 2011 release; Hancock's Peter Berg would direct Battleship next year; and Will Smith and James Lassiter were producing Risk at Sony's Columbia Pictures."

So that was a lot for Mattel to overcome. It's still planning that Hot Wheels movie, though. Meanwhile, Hasbro...er...Universal has been talking with Rob Letterman (Monsters vs. Aliens) to direct Stretch Armstrong, so it really became a situation where Lautner and his people - WME represents the actor and Hasbro, conveniently enough - looked at the writing on the wall instead of the writing on the contracts.