Spider-Man: No Way Home Star Willem Dafoe Offers Praise for Tom Holland’s Performance

January 18, 2022, 7:46pm

Tom Holland’s Spider-Man: No Way Home has been credited as a savior of the box office, reinvigorating cinemas at a time when it seemed no blockbusters could walk away with a major haul. Holland’s portrayal is a big part of the film’s success, and Willem Dafoe certainly knows it. In a recent profile with GQ, the Spider-Man alumnus praised the second Peter Parker he’s acted opposite of.

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“I admire greatly his discipline and his commitment to the role. And physically, he was incredible,” Dafoe said in the profile. In the same piece, Dafoe revealed he had no interest in doing a cameo or small piece—he wanted to be a star in the ensemble. Furthermore, he needed to do his own stunts.

“It’s fun to do the action sequences, it’s fun to have resources,” he added. “I make a lot of budget-challenged movies. So it’s nice to have all the technical stuff to work with. It’s really fun to do those things because they’re pure. They’re pure because what you’re doing is what you’re doing. And your heart and mind follow.”

Holland’s recounting of meeting Dafoe on set for the first time was much more humorous, with the actor accidentally bumping into Dafoe between takes.

“It was actually a funny story of when I met Willem for the first time,” Holland said. “Obviously at that time all of the villains in the film it was a huge secret that they were in the film. So they would walk around set with these cloaks on and naturally you know these guys were very excited to be coming back and bringing these roles back to life that they came to set a week before they started shooting to just see what it was like. Meet Jon (Watts, director), meet myself, hang out on set and have a good time. I just sort of bumped into this guy in a cloak. I was like, ‘Watch out mate.’ And he took his hood off and I almost got really scared. ‘Oh sh-t, the Goblin is here.’ He was lovely, he was really wonderful. A real joy to work with.”

Spider-Man: No Way Home is now in theaters.

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