Taylor Lautner has told why he shed his clothes in the new series of BBC sitcom Cuckoo.

After showing off his chest in the Twilight movies, the hunk said he'd only take his shirt off if the part demanded it.

In BBC Three sitcom Cuckoo, his character Dales is caught wearing just a towel in episode one.

Taylor told Radio Times: "Yeah I did (say he wouldn't disrobe unless the role demanded it).

"And it was a conversation I had with all the producers, and they justified it, saying they really wanted to take a poke and a stab for the fun of it. You guys do that so well, making fun of yourselves."

He told the mag: "My goal following the Twilight franchise was to challenge myself with a wide variety of roles and genres.

"Cuckoo was unlike anything I'd done before and I knew I'd have the time of my life!"

One scene sees Taylor's character step into moving traffic.

"We didn't even talk about how we were gonna do the scene! If I was making Cuckoo in the States we would have had to rehearse it 5,000 times, hire 10 stunt drivers and I would have had to maintain a 10-foot distance between me and the cars!," he revealed.