Andrew Garfield will always be widely and warmly regarded as one of the most beloved actors to ever portray Marvel’s web-slinging superhero, but playing Peter Parker and his alter ego Spider-Man wasn’t a given following his original audition. Before even showing up for the tryout, Garfield actually thought he was far “too old” to portray the character in director Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man (2012), so it didn’t go swimmingly during that first go-round. Garfield said during his new interview on the Happy Sad Confused podcast:
“I did the first audition, and I felt, ‘Oh, then that’s that. I’m too old.’ I felt like I was too told. Just generally, I’m 26, 27 [years old and] I’m playing at high school still at like 24, 25, 26, I’m playing at high school still… I know I got good genes and all, but I’m like, ‘Um, I don’t know.’ But I could just feel like, ‘Oh, no, that’s not going my way, whatever.’ Um, I dodged a bullet probably [laughter]. And then I was surprised to be given an opportunity to screen test.”
Garfield, who is now starring in the rom-dram We Live in Time with Oscar-nominee (Little Women) Florence Pugh, has come a long way since second-guessing himself in that initial Amazing Spider-Man audition. However, everyone needs a little help sometimes, and it was acting coach Greta Seacat who set off the actor’s “Spider-Sense” with some exemplary acting advice.
Andrew Garfield Takes Sage Acting Advice into Screen Test
Andrew Garfield’s portrayal of Spider-Man/Peter Parker has gone down as one of the actor’s most memorable characters, especially after his riveting performance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe Spidey team-up, Spider-Man: No Way Home, also starring Tobey Maguire and Tom Holland as Garfield’s super-powered on-screen contemporaries. But after a shaky first audition for The Amazing Spider-Man, Garfield heeded Greta Seacat’s sage advice going into the actor’s follow-up screen test. Garfield told host Josh Horowitz during the same interview:
“I was prepping with Greta, and Greta was like, ‘I have an adjustment for you when you go on to this screen test,’ because I was like vibrating with nerves. ‘So, I’m going to give you an acting adjustment.’ And the acting adjustment is: ‘You have to treat this screen test as if, with your imagination, just as if you’re making a short film with all your high school friends.’ And I think it was that that allowed me to go, ‘Okay, fu*k it’ [laugher].
Needless to say, things worked out quite well for Garfield, who has portrayed Spider-Man a total of three times now in feature films. And for those who would love to see him suit up again as Marvel’s “amazing” wallcrawler, Garfield is down to reprise the role of Spider-Man under the right conditions, of course. While doing a new interview on the press tour to promote his aforementioned film, We Live in Time, Garfield also admitted to loving the character of Peter Parker. Garfield said during his sit-down with Esquire:
“For sure, I would 100 percent come back [as Spider-Man] if it was the right thing, if it’s additive to the culture, if there’s a great concept or something that hasn’t been done before that’s unique and odd and exciting and that you can sink your teeth into. I love that character, and it brings joy. If part of what I bring is joy, then I’m joyful in return.”
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Until the day that the revered Spider-Man actor returns to the Silver Screen as Marvel’s indelible, web-slinging wallcrawler, fans can check out the Spider-Man actor’s latest cinematic contribution, which has officially begun its own theatrical run. Andrew Garfield’s new film, We Live in Time, also starring Florence Pugh, is now playing in limited release and expands to more theaters on October 18.