Twihard With a Vengeance

BY BENNETT CAMPBELL FERGUSON @thobennett

As of Nov. 12, 2012, Jenna Vesper had been sleeping on the streets of Los Angeles for four nights with one goal in mind: to be one of the lucky fans to attend the premiere of Breaking Dawn Part 2, the final film in The Twilight Saga

Having read Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight novels since high school, Vesper knew how the tale of Bella Swan (Kristen Stewart) and her vampire husband Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) would end. So you can imagine her astonishment at the carnage of the film’s climax, which departs from the book by staging a gruesome battle that begins with fan-favorite Carlisle (Peter Facinelli) being decapitated.

“People got out of their seats and they were on the floor crying and almost throwing up,” Vesper tells WW. “I will never forget that. I was worried for the safety of the people around me.”

Happily, the battle is revealed to be (decade-old spoiler alert!) a mere prophecy that never comes to pass. But fans’ explosive reaction to the brutality stands as a testament to the passion of “Twihards,” who may chuckle at the series’ soap-operatic shenanigans, but are unashamedly sincere in their enthusiasm for Meyer’s creation.

That enthusiasm fuels Twilight Forever, a four-month film festival at the Clinton Street Theater produced and hosted by Vesper and Blue Holgate, two local podcasters who are fixtures of fan culture. Beginning with New Moon (2009) on Aug. 21, the festival is a rare chance to experience the series on the big screen, with plenty of trivia and costumes along the way.

“I didn’t want to just watch the movie,” Vesper says. “Blue and I love fandom events and connecting with community—and the Twilight fandom is so rich. People have been in it for so long and are so great and kind of like little misfits.”

The Clinton’s first congregation of Twilight misfits took place in November 2022, when Holgate and Vesper screened the original 2008 Twilight film. Clinton co-owner Aaron Colter had never seen any of the movies in the series, but agreed to a one-night event— which sold out.

“One of the neat things about running the theater is hearing from people in the community, like Jenna and Blue, and helping arrange the details so that people can see their ideas flourish,” Colter says.

“This is probably something we would have never done if it wasn’t for them.”

The first Twilight has long been a local obsession, given that scenes were filmed at Madison High School and other Portland locations. Yet it was New Moon that solidified Twilight as an irrevocable part of pop culture, dominating the global box office and minting Taylor Lautner, who played the werewolf Jacob Black, as a comically pouty sex symbol.

In the books and films, Jacob is a member of the Quileute Tribe in Washington. Fans recognize there’s something dubious about Meyer, who is white, portraying several of the series’ Indigenous characters as mythic shape-shifters forever on the sidelines of the story.

“ When the movie came out, there was not a lot of money given back to the Indigenous group that Stephanie Meyer used to tell her tale,” Vesper says. “Since the books and the movie series got so popular, there’s been a ton of tourism to that area.”

To help address that imbalance, Holgate, Vesper and the Clinton are donating 10% of their New Moon ticket sales to the Native American Youth and Family Center. “We are romanticizing these movies, but we wanted to acknowledge problematic parts and give back,” Vesper says (future screenings will feature similar fundraisers).

That, Holgate and Vesper believe, is the essence of being a Twilight fan: understanding that you can embrace the series even as you recognize its flaws. “I didn’t expect this, but [at the first screening] there were people in the crowd who would call ‘Gaslighting!’ when Edward said some shit,” Vesper says. “We can love this movie and love the love story, but also, now we’re all adults.”

For progressive readers and viewers, it can be tempting to dismiss Meyer, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. (“My goal, with this whole thing, is to make sure everyone in the audience understands that you should wait until you’re married to have sex,” Vesper jokes.)

Still, what makes the series problematic to some makes it perversely fascinating to others—and Twilight acolytes often start out as agnostics. Take Holgate, for instance, who reluctantly started reading the books in their 20s after their mother died.

“I thought it was stupid: ‘You’re never going to see me reading a teenage vampire love story!’” Holgate says. “I picked it up randomly…and it was just endgame for me. I teasingly say that Twilight saved my life.” and their supernatural discoveries—only here, the heroes are a Western Pennsylvania town’s septuagenarians, including alien caretakers played by Jane Curtin (SNL) and Harriet Sansom Harris (Frasier), being instructed by their adult children to stop imagining things. Heartfelt to the end, Jules has no ambitions to ascend to the alien-encounter movie canon, but by toying with the E.T. formula, it makes clear a gentle point well taken: Before life ends, the need for childlike wonder comes back around. PG-13. CHANCE SOLEM-PFEIFER. Bridgeport, Cascade, Clackamas, Evergreen Parkway, Fox Tower, Living Room, Progress Ridge.

SEE IT: New Moon screens at the Clinton Street Theater, 971-808-3331, cstpdx.com. 7 pm Monday, Aug. 21. $15, series pass $50.