Andrew Garfield On Spider-Man
Poor Andrew Garfield can’t catch a break! One of the better aspects of Sony’s Amazing franchise, Andrew Garfield was quite passionate about playing Marvel’s beloved Wall-crawler and in a recent interview gave his thoughts on playing the iconic character.
“Well, nothing, because I was never Spider-Man. Because Spider-Man’s a fictional character. He’s not real. [laughs] You know what’s funny, to give you the vulnerable answer, I thought I was going to be Spider-Man, you know? I went into it going…ego shit came in. It’s like, “Okay, here it is. I’m f***ing Spider-Man. I f***ing made it.” All that shit. [laughs] I didn’t actually make it. I was never Spider-Man.
I was the actor that I am. The person that I am. Struggling with trying to match up with something that I’d elevated so high in my mind. Elevated beyond what I could attain, what I could achieve. The great thing is, that’s what Peter Parker was doing as well. Peter Parker created this symbol that he couldn’t live up to. It was never enough. He never felt enough, and I never felt enough. I never felt like I was able to do enough. And I couldn’t rescue those films…even though I didn’t sleep. [laughs]
And I wanted to…not to say that I needed to rescue those films, but I couldn’t make them as deep and soulful and…life-giving as I could ever dream. And I’m never gonna be able to do that, with any film. It was especially difficult in that situation because…well, just because. And it was especially important because that character has always meant so much to me, and you saw that if you saw the Comic Con thing, which, thank you for reminding me about that.”
When the interviewer showed Andrew Garfield a video of his Comic Con appearance in 2011, the actor expressed these thoughts. “Thank you for sharing that with me, ’cause that was probably the highlight of the whole experience for me, ’cause it felt like, just me. Vulnerable. And terrified. And that could’ve really failed. That whole idea could’ve failed. And everyone told me it was going to. Emma [Stone] told me it was not a good idea. The studio said, “What the f*** are you thinking?!” And I was, “Just let me do one thing! Just one thing!” And to their credit they allowed it, and they saw that it worked. They trusted me a lot more after that, to their credit. So thank you for saying that. That was a gift you just gave me. Really.”
Whatever your thoughts are on The Amazing Spider-Man, one definitely feels bad for Andrew Garfield! Do you think he deserves another chance to play the Webhead?