Author Cassandra Clare talks casting of Jamie Bower in ‘The Mortal Instruments’ film

It was announced this week that Jamie Campbell Bower will play opposite Lily in the role of Jace Wayland, the snarky and sexy shadowhunter. The internet was in an uproar (à la Robert Pattinson after his casting for Edward Cullen) about the casting choice. So Cassandra Clare took to her blog by way of Hollywood Crush to explain her feeling about the audition and final casting.

What does it feel like to finally have Jace cast? It’s been such a long process.
First, it’s an incredible relief. There have been so many… There is all this stuff that goes on behind the scenes and fans are like, ‘Nothing is happening.’ And I’m like, ‘Lots and lots of stuff is happening.’ They’re auditioning hundreds of guys and looking at all of these people, and nobody is quite right. It feels like the search for the Fountain of Youth—you’re never going to find it. So you can’t go forward with the project until Jace is signed off on.


I think another thing that people don’t realize is how many people have to sign-off on something like that. There’s like seven or eight producers on this movie. I don’t even know who they all are. And they all have to sign-off on this. And then it has to go to Sony and the head of the studio, Amy Pascal, and she has to sign-off on Jace. So everyone has to agree that this is the right guy. Getting everyone to agree—imagine trying to get a group of eight randomly selected people to agree on something. I really was starting to think that they were never going to find a guy that everyone agrees on. Then Jamie comes along and does this blow-you-away audition. So they were like, ‘Okay, this audition is amazing. We have to bring him back and test with Lily.’

Another thing that impressed me about him was that he asked—I got a message relayed to me through the studio, wanting to know what Jace would wear. He is the only actor who tested for this role who asked this.

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