Given that the sprawling final Twilight story Breaking Dawn is being split across two films, there are naturally a lot of roles to fill. One of them has an actor in place, as Rami Malek has told Entertainment Tonight that he’s signed on to play the vampire Benjamin.
Despite his ordinary sounding name, Benjamin is Egyptian, and boasts the power to control the elements. Think Aang from The Last Airbender, except without the silly dance-fu stuff. A carefree yet confident type, he’s a member of the Egyptian coven that Bella and Edward call on to help them defend against the Volturi when the ancient clan decides to destroy the newly formed Cullen family (Edward, Bella and baby Renesmee).
Malek was last seen playing Ahkmenrah in the Night At The Museum movies, and he’ll crop up next in Tom Hanks' next directing/starring job, Larry Crowne.
Bill Condon is the man in charge of bringing regular Twilight screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg’s doorstopper of a screenplay to life, aiming to start shooting soon in Vancouver and Louisiana. The first chunk of Breaking Dawn will be released on November 18, 2011, with the second following a year later on November 16, 2012. Yes, you really do have to wait that long/Yes, it really will be that long before the whole Twilight thing is safely over with, cinematically. *
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