Despite over two decades in the industry Jake Gyllenhaal will tell you that sometimes it doesn’t get easier when prepping for a part, especially not one in a massive universe like what Marvel Studios has going. Though he’d starred in huge blockbusters before, Gyllenhaal opened up in a new interview about his time on the set of Spider-Man: Far From Home brought out his anxieties at times and that franchise star Tom Holland helped him navigate. Speaking with Howard Stern, Gyllenhaal noted that he felt a need to approach director Jon Watts and reassure him that yes, he can in fact act.
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“The first day of shooting I remember not being able to memorize my lines. I was the wooden board,” Gyllenhaal revealed (H/T THR). “And they were like, ‘Whoa.’ And I went up to Tom Holland and was like, ‘Dude, help me out.’ He’s like, ‘It’s all good, man. Just relax.‘ It was like he was me in so many situations. And I finally did. I just put a lot of pressure on [myself] because I love that world. It’s not me coming in as an actor going ‘I’ve made 60 films, I know what I’m doing,’ it’s me coming in every time being like ‘I love Spider-Man, I love this world, I wanna kill it here.’”
He added, “I had to walk up and be like, ‘Look man, I just came off Broadway doing a one-man show for an hour and a half onstage, so I got this. Please, believe me.’”
The actor also spoke about how open Marvel Studios is to changes and new ideas at the table, revealing that despite a structure in place they would change all their plans for production if a better idea came along.
“It’s hard, man,” he added. “That acting is hard….All of it. That world is enormous. And I joined that world way into that run; a train that was already moving. Normally, I come in way early on, and I get to figure it out. It was like you gotta deliver in that space and it was a whole different craft. They’re moving with ideas which is so fun about it, it’s actually really creative….They have a structure for the movie but like if someone has a good idea, if you bring a better idea, they will shift an entire day around that idea. For me, I loved it.”
Gyllenhaal’s time in the world of Spider-Man might be over after Far From Home, but considering the multiversal, variant-populated .
