Tom Holland asked Zendaya and Jacob Batalon to be his 'support system' when he met Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield for 1st 'No Way Home' rehearsal
- Tom Holland spoke about working with Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield for "Spider-Man: No Way Home."
- Holland said the date of their arrivals was noted on his calendar and he got nervous as it got closer.
Tom Holland said that he was so nervous to meet Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield at their first rehearsal together for "Spider-Man: No Way Home" that he asked costars Zendaya and Jacob Batalon to join him.
"It was daunting," Holland said while accompanied by Maguire and Garfield for a virtual interview with Deadline's Pete Hammond. "It was very daunting because we were a long way into shooting before you guys showed up. We were maybe three months into principal photography."
Holland continued: "The date of the other Spider-Mans coming was etched on my calendar and I was getting closer and closer and closer, and the closer and closer I got, the more and more nervous I was. And then as soon as I met you guys in Atlanta, I realized I had nothing to be nervous about."
Holland, who made his debut as Peter Parker/Spider-Man in 2016's "Captain America: Civil War," said that he asked his on- and off-screen best friends Zendaya (MJ) and Batalon (Ned Leeds) to do him a favor when he met with Maguire and Garfield.
"At our first rehearsal, I had asked Zendaya and Jacob to come with me and be there as my support system," he said. "Like 'I'm going to meet these guys, I'm really nervous about it, we have to read the scene and I don't know how it's going to go because we're all playing the same character and we all have to bring our own heart and soul into this and it means a lot to them and it means a lot to me.'"
Prior to the release of Jon Watts' "No Way Home" on December 17, Holland alluded to experiences on set with Maguire, Garfield, and the returning actors who portrayed villains in the past iterations, though he hedged in interviews to avoid spoiling specific details.
In an interview with Den of Geek, Holland, Zendaya, Batalon spoke about working with returning Marvel stars like Willem Dafoe (Norman Osborn/Green Goblin in Raimi's trilogy) and Alfred Molina (Dr. Otto Octavius/Doc Ock in "Spider-Man 2").
"It was crazy," Zendaya said. "Unreal. In fact, there were days when Tom would ask us to come in, just as emotional support, because it's a crazy thing."
"That one day that we can't talk about, when you guys came in, it made me feel very comfortable," Holland said. "It was like you were my cheerleaders."
"There were a lot of heavy hitters, for sure," Batalon said.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Zendaya said that a noteworthy memory was her and Batalon acting like Holland's parental figures.
"A special moment for me was us being your parents and coming with you to set to play with the big kids, the big villains," Zendaya said. "We were like, 'Good job, sweetie. You're doing a good job.' I was taking pictures."
"They are villains we grew up with, it's intimidating so we had to be there for your first day," she added.