Simu Liu Talks About Having to Pay Spider-Man for Photos in Hollywood

Simu Liu is the star of Marvel's Shang-Chi franchise now, but when he first came to Hollywood, Simu's Marvel love almost immediately got him hustled on the streets. While appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live, Simu Liu recounted a story about first coming to the (in)famous Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles as a broke actor, and getting to meet "Spider-Man" in the form of a local street performer. The only problem is:  Simu Liu didn't know he'd have to pay for the pleasure. 

"My very first trip down to Hollywood I had no money to my name," Liu told guest host Chelsea Handler. "I was meeting a manager that I had never met, we were communicating via email, and he was like 'Yeah I guess I'll sign you.' So... I didn't have any money to get myself a hotel so I booked myself a hostel right off of Hollywood Boulevard, because that was the only real neighborhood in LA that I knew, I was like 'Yeah I want to be in Hollywood!' 

And I show up to Hollywood Boulevard and... I'm having a good time and... this guy dressed up as Spider-Man shows up and he's like 'You want a picture?' and I was like 'Oh cool, the people in LA are so nice!' And so he takes my phone, he snaps some pictures of me, then he snaps some pictures of us, in a selfie, and then he's like 'That'll be twenty dollars for Spider-Man.'" 

It was an expensive prospect for Liu to consider, given how broke he was at the time: 

"I literally just got there, I had like so little spending money. Like keep in mind, I'm staying at a hostel – I'm staying in a bed with nine other dudes... but yeah... I ended up paying the guy: I talked him down to like ten bucks. So Im like 'Dude what are you doing? I'm so poor you have no idea!" 

Handler raised the intriguing notion of this Spider-Man street performer ever realizing that he took a picture with Shang-Chi. It would be awesome (and oh so petty) if Simu Liu ever tracked this guy down and gave him an invoice for being in a picture with an international Marvel movie star. 

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is streaming on Disney+.