Robert Pattinson Had Shirtless Anxiety During 'Twilight' Audition

"MTV First: The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2" was meant to serve many purposes for fans of the books and movies — a fond farewell to our group interviews, a look back at the series' best moments — but one special look back took Robert Pattinson, Kristen Stewart, and Taylor Lautner all the way back to their auditions.

The two leading men recalled what it was like auditioning for the first film and its director, Catherine Hardwicke, but their experiences didn't exactly line up.

Taylor Lautner's start on the road to Jacob Black was anything but the thrilling story one might expect. "It was just so generic. It just felt like any other audition," he said. "I had no idea what 'Twilight' was. I asked people. I said, 'What is this thing?' They said, 'There's vampires, and you're in a forest.' That's really all I heard about it."

Stewart called out Lautner for auditioning for a role that came with that dubious logline."So that's how you maneuver your career?" she asked.

"That was before I did my research," he replied.

Stewart also said she had championed both Pattinson and Lautner during the audition process, confirming the rumor. "I take credit for both of these guys actually, fully and completely," she said.

When asked if he credits Stewart for giving him his career, Pattinson offered a contrarian point-of-view. "I'm going to take credit for Kristen's. I'm just going to say it," he said. "You can say anything you want in an interview."

Pattinson, on the other hand, had a rough go with his audition, which involved a little more skin than he had hoped for. "I was extremely nervous. It was crippled by self-consciousness when I was doing auditions, and also Catherine [Hardwicke] did this thing where you had to — as a kind of gesture of good will to the 'Twilight' universe — you had to take your shirt off in the audition," Pattinson said. "All these other guys are just literally out there with their shirts off for a photograph. I just said to Catherine, 'If that's what we're being judged on, I haven't got the job.' It was a lot of crying."

Check out everything we've got on "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2," opening in theaters on November 16.