"Twilight" Actor Michael Welch Talks Thirst Project in Africa and Breaking Dawn

“Twilight” actor Michael Welch is taking a break from bloodsucking vampires to help quench a more urgent kind of thirst.

Welch, who plays Bella’s high school bud Mike Newton, in the “Twilight” films, recently contributed a PSA in support of The Thirst Project, a non-profit organization seeking to answer the urgent need for clean drinking water and proper sanitation in Africa – and one charitable Twi-hard may help him provide hands-on help.

“I will be taking a trip to Africa, preferably Swaziland, but we have to raise enough funds in order to do that,” Welch tells PopcornBiz. “If enough people donate, we made a deal with the fans that I'm going to bring one of them with me and they'll get to see firsthand as well.”

Welch recently had his own awareness raised on the issue. “When I take a particularly delicious sip of cold water or take a shower that feels really good, I have said to myself, 'It's unbelievable to me that not everybody has access to this.’ So when [Thirst Project founder] Seth Maxwell introduced this cause to me it immediately struck me as something that I wanted to be a part of. It turns out that this crisis is drastically severe: one out of every six people who don't have clean water in the world. I just thought about myself and five people that I care about, thinking that one of them doesn't have water. It's inconceivable. And the effectiveness of the organization as well has been astonishing. In two and a half years they've been able to provide clean drinking water to 35,000 people.”

The actor appreciates the opportunity to use the fame and following he’s amassed via “Twilight” to make a difference. “This is one of the things that I really do like about being in this position – what some might call a celebrity, at least within the 'Twilight' world: the fact that I can reach people and I have the opportunity to make an impact.”

Meanwhile, he’ll back for the next film, “Breaking Dawn.”

“I will be in at least the first of the last two films, and I'm not sure about the second film yet,” he says. “It's going to be a little strange when it's finally over, when we take the last shot or when we have the last premiere and then that's going to be it and there's going to be no more ‘Twilight.’ This has been going on for I guess a little over two and a half years now, and shoot, it's going to be really interesting to see where we all go from here.”


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Michael Welch Joins Twitter

Michael Welch has just joined Twitter like his other co-stars in Twilight. Follow him @MichaelWelchAct

Twilight Star Michael Welch Dazzled Military Teens on First USO Education Tour

“Traveling with the USO and meeting military families has been a new experience for me, and one that I will never forget. Hearing firsthand what it’s like to have a loved one deployed is humbling and it makes me realize how much military families sacrifice, and how grateful I am for their service.” – Michael Welch

Twilight star Michael Welch recently completed his first USO education tour to Germany. During his six-day adventure, Welch visited 10 teen and youth centers, signed autographs, posed for photos and participated in acting workshops. In addition to visiting with over 600 military kids and teens, the young star made a trip to the Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, where he met with wounded warriors, as well as children recovering in the hospital’s pediatric ward.

As part of his USO tour, the 86th Services Squadron hosted an online contest and two lucky young winners were treated to dinner with Welch. Best known for his role as ‘Mike Newton’ in Twilight and most recently seen in the newly released Eclipse, Welch has also made appearances on hit TV series such as “CSI: Miami,” “Numb3rs” and “Law & Order: SVU.” Check out our photo essay below!
















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New Moon Cast Pictures at Comic Con

Enjoy 287 photos of New Moon stars from Comic Con event!

Happy 22nd Birthday Michael Welch!

Mike Welch in ACZone Musical

Once in a while something comes along that is so fresh, such a bold step forward, that it's a complete game changer. On the surface, www.aczonethemusical.com leverages the success of High School Musical or Spring Awakening, but that's where the similarities end. To start, www.aczonethemusical.com is an exceptional mix of originally produced glam rock with dazzling motion graphics and first-class choreography. The casting is a pitch-perfect fusion of all the classic high school archetypes: The Sympathetic Nerd, The New Girl, the Queen Bee, the Bubble-headed Cheerleader, the Bad Boy, the Jock, and the shy little Book Worm but with a modern sensibility custom-crafted for today's teen audience.

"ACZONE: THE MUSICAL": is driven by three interrelated stories -- all relatable to the teen market. The school's Queen Bee and her minions makeover the new girl leading to unexpected consequences involving the school jock and the sympathetic nerd; the spunky cheerleader pulls a Cyrano de Bergerac by having the shy book worm write her love letters to the school's bad boy; and lastly, the sympathetic nerd builds a robot called "Lovebot" that can calculate love with absolute certainty that he uses to help woo the girl of his dreams.

"ACZONE: THE MUSICAL" is backed up by a full-scale marketing campaign featuring rising star Michael Welch of "Twilight." In addition to being the centerpiece of the musical itself, he will also promote the musical at various red carpet events, high-profile exclusive interviews, and user-generated contests. The campaign will reach a broader audience by partnering with pop-culture, music and teen-empowered community sites complemented by a robust social media campaign.

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Michael Welch Unrequited Upcoming Movie

Mike plays the lead in the movie that is described as a, “Psychological thriller UNREQUITED tells the story of Ben Jacobs, a troubled young man who, on his 18th birthday, must leave the group home for “troubled teens” where he has been living for the past several months. After moving back in with his mother, Ben discovers that his girlfriend, Jessica Morgan, has moved on with her life and is now dating an older college guy. Desperate for love and unable to cope with losing Jessica, Ben’s troubled past catches up with him as he kidnaps her in an attempt to regain her affection. Spiraling out of control and on a very dangerous path, Ben must ultimately decide whether to let her go, or hold on to the one person he loves, even if it means destroying them both in the process.”

Pictures of Twilight cast: Vampire Baseball Event

The Casting Scoop has photos from Vampire Baseball Event in Portland of the Twilight stars Peter Facinelli, Rachelle Lefevre, Edi Gathegi, Michael Welch and Christian Serratos together with Alex Meraz and Kiowa Gordon the new addition in the cast of upcoming movie New Moon.

As well as, Twilight Portland local actors, including Solomon Trimble, Ayanna Berkshire, Trish Egan, Sean McGrath, Gavin Bristol, Catherine Grimme, Logan Welch and Tyler Nordby; crew members such as Bruce Lawson, Chris "Chalky" Chalk, Dan Gorczyca and others.

The Twilight FanTrips Vampire Baseball Event will benefit the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

Twilight star Robert Pattinson Appears as Hallucination in 'New Moon'

Twilight actor Michael Welch playing the role of Mike Newton in Twilight saga explains Robert Pattinson's Edward role in New Moon.

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'In the film, it's more of like a hallucination kind of thing,' Welch says of fitting the largely absent Edward Cullen into the second movie installment.

Without a doubt, huge groups of Twilighters all over the world fantasize about Edward Cullen every day. But as popular as breakout star Robert Pattinson has become, those who've read "New Moon" know that his character Edward is absent for much of the story. Now, we've got the scoop on director Chris Weitz's dreamy solution to the problem.

"They figured out a very clever way to get Edward back in the film much more than he is in the book," revealed "Twilight" series star Michael Welch when he stopped by the MTV studios recently, acknowledging that Weitz and screenwriter Melissa Rosenberg have devised a plan to work around the "New Moon" plot — which has Edward breaking up with Bella (Kristen Stewart) early in the story and fleeing to Italy. "It's more of, like, a hallucination kind of thing."

As any good Twilighter knows, Bella is heartbroken by their breakup but slowly begins dealing with her Edward-less existence through the realization that dangerous activities — motorcycle riding, cliff diving, etc. — cause her to hear the sexy vampire's voice in her head. Welch was fascinated by Stewart's pretend hallucinations on set and explained to us that Weitz intends to insert sequences of her seeing Edward as "New Moon" inches closer to its November 20 release date.

"It's tricky," he said of the filmmaker's dilemma. "I mean, [Edward] leaves for months."

"In the book, she just hears his voice," continued Welch, who plays rival Bella pursuer Mike Newton in the movies. "In the film, it's more of like a hallucination kind of thing. He will be [in the movie more than the book] for sure."

While the news of more RPattz is sure to excite some fans, others may be concerned about the tweak — and the manner in which Edward will be glimpsed in Bella's hallucinations. Will he be an Obi-Wan Kenobi-like figure, giving her advice from the great beyond? Will Edward come across more like a god, overseeing her safety from half a world away? Will the sequences play like a bad acid trip from a '60s movie, or more like Bella interacting with an imaginary friend?

"It's going to be interesting to see — I have no idea," Welch explained. "You can sort of picture it reading [the script], but I don't know how they actually went about filming that stuff."

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Twilight' Actor Michael Welch Talks Mini-Movie Details and the 'three-way date' scene in 'New Moon

"I really should've checked with someone if this is information I can give away or not," grinned Welch, the fan favorite who plays puppy dog-like Mike Newton in the blockbuster series. "But, whatever — here we are."

Welch stopped by the MTV studios to discuss such far-ranging topics as his concern for Robert Pattinson's safety and the "three-way date," a scene that has Bella, Mike and Jacob at a movie theater, watching a horror film. But, in the grand tradition of such films as "The Player," "Bowfinger" and "The Purple Rose of Cairo," director Weitz is inserting his own mini "movie within a movie" into the mix.

"The film is called 'Face Punch,' " revealed Welch, telling us about the tongue-in-cheek movie that Bella, Mike and Taylor will be seen watching on the big screen. "It's an action film."

When the cast of "New Moon" began planning out the pivotal date scene, they got a laugh out of some of the silly, fictional action-movie names that Weitz and his crew had assembled. But in the end, "Face Punch" was the winner.

"We started out with a few other comical names, but it turned out those were actual films so we couldn't use those titles," Welch laughed. "I forget the first few titles, but it was like 'Crazy Explosion' — and it turns out, there actually was a 'Crazy Explosion.' "

"Chris came up with the title," he continued. "And apparently there is no 'Face Punch' that we know of."

And although Welch and the other "New Moon" stars weren't able to watch "Face Punch" while they shot their scenes inside the movie theater (they were repeatedly shown the trailer for "Defiance" while Weitz's camera caught the flicker on their faces), he hopes that the filmmaker will shoot some silly action footage for his "Face Punch" mini-movie.

"That'd be interesting — maybe for the DVD, if there's a 'Face Punch' trailer," he grinned. "That's actually not a bad idea."

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Interview with Michael Welch on the Set of New Moon

Mike Welch sat down with Interview Magazine and shared about his latest movie project, on the set of New Moon, Twilight saga's third installment, Eclipse and experience with the paparazzi.

LUCY MADISON: How's it going? Where are you? Are you guys done filming New Moon?

MICHAEL WELCH: I'm great! Right now I am in Silverlake, California. I'm outside and it's a beautiful day. New Moon is, is all wrapped up, and we're going to be doing Eclipse in August or September, I think, so we're knocking them out pretty fast.

LM: What are you doing in the meantime?

MW: I'm actually leaving Los Angeles in two days to go to Lexington, Kentucky to work on a film called Unrequited. It's a very intense little independent project, sort of a modern-day teen version of Misery. R-rated, though, so not for all of the Twilight fandom.

LM: Speaking of which... When you went into Twilight, did you have any idea what a huge success it would become?

MW: No, none of us had any clue that it would turn into—well, what it has. I originally went in auditioning for Edward, because that's sort of how it works: Your representatives always send you out for the lead first, and then you work backwards from there. So then I auditioned for Eric, and then finally with Mike. I went in probably four or five times, but the last time we all read together it just clicked. It just felt right.

LM: Had you read the books before you went in there?

MW: No, I hadn't. Frankly, I had never heard of the series—but I certainly did afterwards! I'm reading one book one at a time.

LM: But don't you want to know what happens?

MW: I don't like to get too ahead of the story. So far I've only read the first two. Although we're going to be shooting the third one pretty soon, so I need to get on that.

LM: But the third one is where the story starts to get really crazy.

MW: Right! Apparently there's a vampire war, and the director that they're getting for this one, David Slade, he did Hard Candy and 30 Days of Night, which are pretty dark movies. They're going dark, which I think is smart. Maybe trying to appeal to the boys a little more—‘cause they seem to have the young girl demographic locked down. [LAUGHS]

LM: Tell me about the new movie. I haven't read the second book, but I assume there will be equally swoon-worthy material in this one?

MW: The girls are going to melt for this second film. Edward recites Shakespeare; and obviously Jacob has totally transformed himself. He's been working out like crazy. People are going to go nuts.

LM: Was it very different filming the second film, in comparison to that first one, when none of you had any idea how big Twilight would become?

MW: A lot had changed. By the time the second film rolled around, we all pretty much knew what we were getting ourselves into. There was a lot more money to put in to the film, and a lot more prep time, and, you know, there were a lot more fans. In Vancouver, where we shot the film, we tried really hard to keep it a secret where our locations were, but, you just couldn't—all it took was one person to see, you know, Taylor or Kristen on the street and then that person would text message one of her friends and then, you know, ten minutes later there would be hundreds of people on set. It was crazy.

LM: What about the paparazzi? Did you guys have to deal with that a lot?

MW: [LAUGHS] It's funny you ask; we did, actually. It was my first experience with the paparazzi. They even got us when we were coming off the plane. I learned that they can just take a situation and put it into any context. There was one point when Taylor was talking to some people and the paparazzi took a picture and then I saw it online with a caption underneath that was like, "Taylor Lautner takes the time to talk to his fans, while Michael Welch is a jerk and just sits in his trailer ..." It was just so weird. It's a fascinating process to be a part of something this big, and this popular, ‘cause it's sort of a double-edged sword. But I mean, I certainly have nothing to complain about; I'm very grateful to be involved.

LM: What's happening with your character this time around?

MW: Well, you know, Mike Newton doesn't go through too much of a journey, I'll be honest. He sort of has his role to play in Bella's life. In the movie it's pretty much all about Bella, and how he relates with her, and him just being hopelessly in love—the character that is just really empathetic, and a little bit tragic in a lot of ways.

LM: There's so many of you guys. Are you all good friends? Do you spend a lot of time together off-set as well?

MW: Yeah, absolutely. We try and hang out, get dinner, you know, see movies or whatever. I love my little group of high school kids, I think they're just so fantastic and talented and great. You know, in most films you get to know people, you become really close, and then, after a month or so, chances are you will probably never see each other again. So I'm happy that I get to work with this particular group over the course of four films. This has been a journey for all of us; we've all been on this train together.

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New Moon Cast: Movie is Like the Book on Acid

The Twilight Saga: New Moon doesn’t hit theatres until November 20th, but there's already a lot of buzz surrounding the movie.

Twilight star Rob Pattinson even confesses the new movie looks "amazing!"

"From what I've seen from playback and stuff when I've been shooting it, it looks amazing. So I think ['New Moon'] should be [good]. I'm keeping it as a surprise from myself."

Judging from the photos of him kissing co-star Kristen Stewart, we're in for a wild ride! The on-screen couple caused quit a stir when they were photographed kissing on set in Montepulciano, Italy, on May 27. The red-hot scene features Bella and Edward reuniting "just moments before he sacrifices himself."

According to onlookers, the couple would continue to kiss even after the director called "cut." We don't blame Kristen, it would be hard for any girl to stop kissing Rob!

We still have to wait a few months to catch more of Kristen and Rob's on-screen chemistry, but in the meanwhile, here's some scoop from the film's stars on what we can expect from the upcoming thriller:

Michael Welch: “Well first of all it's going to look different. It's going to feel different and frankly I think it's going to be better. With Twilight we didn’t really know, I mean you could never really know, with New Moon we knew so we all came in with a level of focus and commitment to just pleasing the fans …cause if you can keep the fans happy you're going to be good. “

Christian Serratos:”I think everyone’s going to be very pleased, the film and the books and everything they just evolved it keeps getting better and better. I read the New Moon script already having read the book and I was still like 'what’s going to happen next'. It’s the same as the book but imagine the book on acid.”

Ashley Green: “It’s a little bit more darker. It's just better all around we kind of had this Twilight platform and just stepped up from it so it's great.”

Peter Facinelli:[You can expect] “more of the unexpected.”

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