Marisa Tomei Joins The ‘Spider-Man’ Reboot As Aunt May
It looks like the new Spider-Man reboot has found its Aunt May.
Marisa Tomei, 50, will play the role of Aunt May, to Tom Holland’s Peter Parker/ Spider-Man. It makes sense that Marvel would cast such a vibrant actress like Tomei, given how young Holland is.
Before we had heard official casting news, it was said that Marvel was looking for a very youthful Spider-Man to put him back in high school.
Back in April, Marvel’s Kevin Feige said of the decision to go even younger than the last incarnation, “We want to play with Spider-Man in the high school years because frankly there’ve been five Spider-Man films and the amazing thing about it is, even though there’ve been five Spider-Man films, there are so many things from the comics that haven’t been done yet.”
“The most obvious being the ‘young, doesn’t quite fit in’ kid before his powers, and then the fella that puts on a mask and swings around and fights bad guys and doesn’t shut up, which is something we want to play with and we’re excited about.”
According to Variety, Tomei was made an offer last week to fill Aunt May’s shoes. So far we don’t know who will play Uncle Ben, but so far Uncle Ben has been played by Martin Sheen in The Amazing Spider-Man series, and prior to that Cliff Robertson in the original Spider-Man series. As for Aunt May, Rosemary Harris played the role in the original series while Sally Field embodied the character in the latest reboot.
This is a big move for Marisa Tomei, who usually sticks to independent films. Not like the actress needs exposure to a wider audience, but it would be nice to see what kind of oomph she gives a character that has been, up until now, in the background of Spidey’s adventures.
Here’s a few responses to Marisa Tomei joining the new Spider-Man reboot.
@Variety @marisatomei She’s too young for the role, but I have no doubt she’ll do a good job.
— Scott Free (@scottfreeactor) July 8, 2015
I feel so old. MT @Variety: Marisa Tomei will play Aunt May in the new #SpiderMan movie http://t.co/ygW8orFqse
— Sean Campbell (@Melanism) July 8, 2015
@Variety @marisatomei She is too young! But she can definitely play it well.
— Tony Lam (@tonydalibrarian) July 8, 2015
@Variety @Steele131 That’s some odd ass casting.
— ZAK (@Zakiyyah6) July 8, 2015
Fans have been equally turned off by the casting of Tom Holland as Spider-Man but we’ll just have to see how the rest of this cast shapes up.
[Photo by Tullio M. Puglia / Getty Images]
