SPIDER-MAN™: HOMECOMING
Production Information
“Spider-Man is an icon, one of the greatest superheroes of all time. We are finally able to bring him home to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.”
– Kevin Feige, Marvel Studios President and Producer of Spider-Man: Homecoming
A young Peter Parker/Spider-Man (Tom Holland), who made his sensational debut in Captain America: Civil War, enters the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Embraced all over the world, Spider-Man is the most popular comic book character in history and the crown jewel of Marvel comics. Now, he comes home in a film with a fresh, fun tone and new take, produced by Marvel Studios, that brings the Peter Parker of the comic books to the screen alongside MCU heroes for the first time.
Thrilled by his experience with the Avengers, Peter returns home, where he lives with his Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), under the watchful eye of his new mentor Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.). Peter tries to fall back into his normal daily routine – distracted by thoughts of proving himself to be more than just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man – but when the Vulture (Michael Keaton) emerges as a new villain, everything that Peter holds most important will be threatened. His moment has arrived as he is challenged to become the hero he is meant to be.
Columbia Pictures presents a Marvel Studios / Pascal Pictures production, Spider-Man™: Homecoming. Starring Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Jon Favreau, Zendaya, Donald Glover, Tyne Daly, with Marisa Tomei and Robert Downey Jr. Directed by Jon Watts. Screenplay by Jonathan Goldstein & John Francis Daley and Jon Watts & Christopher Ford and Chris McKenna & Erik Sommers. Screen Story by Jonathan Goldstein & John Francis Daley. Based on the Marvel Comic Book by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Produced by Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal. Executive Producers are Louis D’Esposito, Victoria Alonso, Patricia Whitcher, Jeremy Latcham, Stan Lee, Avi Arad, and Matt Tolmach. Mitch Bell, Eric Hauserman Carroll, and Rachel O’Connor serve as Co-Producers. Director of Photography is Salvatore Totino ASC, AIC. Production Designer is Oliver Scholl. Editors are Dan Lebental ACE and Debbie Berman. Visual Effects Supervisor is Janek Sirrs. Costume Designer is Louise Frogley. Music by Michael Giacchino. Music Supervision by Dave Jordan.
ABOUT THE FILM
In Spider-Man: Homecoming, Peter Parker strives to join the Avengers as the most popular character in comic book history takes his rightful place as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Marvel’s crown jewel, Spider-Man made a cameo debut in the MCU in Captain America: Civil War last summer; the overwhelming positive reaction by both the critics and fans to the new vision for the character has whetted the appetite as now, Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios team for this new adventure.
Tom Holland, who plays the web-slinger, adds that before Peter can join his heroes, he has a host of challenges to face. “Peter goes from having the time of his life battling with the Avengers in Civil War to suddenly feeling like he’s got nothing to do,” explains Holland. “Tony Stark has assigned him to be the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, which means helping get cats out of trees, helping old ladies across the street and stopping petty thieves – nothing too hairy. But then Spider-Man stumbles across high-tech weapons, which leads him down a path of learning and mastering his new abilities and powers.”
And if Peter is going to prove himself worthy of being an Avenger, he will have to face a mentor like no other. “Tony Stark has taken a continued interest in Peter Parker,” says Robert Downey Jr. “He’s helping him up his game with a new suit and tech. But he’s kind of keeping a real close eye on him and making sure that he’s worthy of being a potential recruit for the Avengers.”
For producer and Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, bringing the character into the Marvel Cinematic Universe in an original way that film audiences have never seen before was a top priority. “Over the past 15 years, we have built the Marvel Cinematic Universe with so many characters and movies, and now we have the opportunity to introduce Peter Parker and the Spider-Man franchise into that universe for the first time,” says Feige. “It’s exciting because that’s how he truly was in the comics, from the very beginning – he didn’t enter the comics as the only hero; he entered a world in which Tony Stark, Captain America and the Avengers all were there. And now, for the first time, we get that in an entire film, which makes it fresh and new.”
Producer Amy Pascal speaks to the unprecedented collaboration. “This movie is a product of Sony and Marvel working closely together,” says Pascal. “It’s a Sony movie and a Marvel production. Everyone came together and decided if we can put Spider-Man back in the MCU, which he always was a part of in the comics, everybody wins – and the biggest winner is the fans, as they finally get to see what they’ve been waiting a long time to see.”
“Putting Spider-Man in the MCU is the best thing in the world for me as a storyteller,” says director Jon Watts, who takes the helm of Spider-Man: Homecoming. “Not only did they take care of the origin story and heavy lifting in Captain America: Civil War – which they did so economically and beautifully – we also didn’t have to spend any time explaining why this 16-year-old kid would come up with the idea of becoming a superhero. He’s grown up in the MCU; when Peter Parker was eight years old, he saw Tony Stark say ‘I am Iron Man’ on TV. So the idea of this being a world where superheroes exist means that we don’t have to spend any time addressing any of these issues. We just get right into the fun of it.”
Keeping with the mantra of wanting a fresh new story and tone for the franchise, the filmmakers chose Watts to direct the film. Watts’ persistence and previous work convinced Feige and Pascal that he was the right person for the job. “Kevin and I saw a small film Jon wrote and directed called Cop Car,” says Pascal. “It was incredibly impressive. He was able to get incredible performances from two children who were not actors. It was completely tense; you love these kids. He showed he has that rare quality of being able to tell a story through action.”
“What was important to us was not that he proved that he could shoot a big action sequence, because a lot of directors can do that,” says Feige. “It was that every time he showed us something, it came from the place and humor of Peter Parker himself.”
For Watts, being tapped to direct Spider-Man: Homecoming was something he never thought was a possibility when he first met with Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige. “When Marvel called for a meeting, I assumed it was just to see what I was like,” he recalls. “Then, they started to talk about what they wanted to do with Spider-Man and this amazing new opportunity where Sony and Marvel were teaming up. I was incredibly excited when I left and proceeded to beat them into submission until they said yes.”
Watts’ film Cop Car was an influential film in the boardrooms and creative studios of Hollywood. “I think one thing that people really responded to in Cop Car was the performances felt like the way real kids would talk and act,” explains Watts. “I really remember what it was like to be in high school, when your brain isn’t an adult brain yet – you’re thinking about things in a very skewed, specific way. That’s was one of things I wanted to inject into the story and film.”
Watts also connected with Peter Parker specifically in a very personal way, with parallels to his own youth. “I’ve always sympathized with Peter Parker, because I was a science nerd in high school, just like Peter is before he gets bit by the spider,” he reveals. “I loved chemistry and was going to college to be a chemical engineer. I would hang out in the chemistry room at lunch. My friends were other kids who were into chemistry, physics… we were just the nerdiest group of people.”
“Imagine if you had Spider-Man’s abilities – you would spend every moment of your day trying to maximize the amount of time you get to be Spider-Man, because it would be the best feeling in the world,” Watts continues. “Sure, there are all these responsibilities that come with the power of being Spider-Man, but it’s also important to remember how much fun it would be to be swinging from building to building. It’s a great yin and yang effect: having to deal with all the complications and stress from having these powers, but at the same time the fun and excitement of it all.”
“I hope what we’re doing is telling a relatable Spider-Man story,” says Pascal. “What has always been great about the character of Peter Parker is that he has the same sort hopes, dreams, and problems that we all had. So audiences who are going to be able to instantly identify with Peter Parker, but at the same time see a Spider-Man interacting in a world he was not able to be a part of before.”
“We introduced Spider-Man in Civil War and you got to see the banter and the fun and contrast between he and the other heroes there,” says Feige. “And now, after the greatest vacation of all time, in which he got to spend this time with these rock stars, he’s got to go back to high school. So, it exacerbates his problem – a problem that I certainly had and I think most people who go to high school have – ‘Is there something more for me out there?’ But Peter knows there is because he just did it. He thinks he’s ready, and of course when you’re fifteen years old you often think you’re ready for something before you really are. That’s the fun of this movie, that’s the relatability of Peter Parker, and that’s why we wanted to do this and reintroduce Spider-Man to audiences through the lens of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.”
In selecting Tom Holland for the role, the filmmakers cast an actor who has the youth the character needs in this story. “That’s the character as he was in the comics originally,” says Feige. “That was the miracle when we found Tom Holland, because we found someone who could clearly look and play fifteen years old. We wanted to keep that as the contrast to some of our other superheroes who look good, but are not fifteen.”
And Peter’s arc in this film, as he rises to be a hero, is one that fits perfectly with his age. “Peter Parker loves being Spider-Man but he doesn’t necessarily love being Peter Parker,” says director Jon Watts. “Peter Parker sort of represents everything that he was – an awkward, weird science nerd – but now, he has a whole new life ahead of him being a superhero who hangs with Tony Stark and Captain America and all the Avengers. But even though he has all these new powers and connections, he hasn’t come to terms with who he is as Peter Parker. One of the journeys for him is realizing that you can’t move ahead to be Spider-Man until you’ve really figured out who you are as Peter Parker.”
Playing Spider-Man is a dream long in the making for Holland. “Five years ago, I was at the Empire Awards in London and one of the interviewers asked me if I could be a superhero, who would I be,” recalls the actor. “I said, ‘In ten years, I’d like to be the Spider-Man after Andrew Garfield.’ I would never have guessed that it would have come true so quickly.”
After several rounds of sending in tapes of himself, Holland recalls his final test: meeting with Robert Downey Jr. But before he could meet Tony Stark, he got the next-best thing. “I actually met Robert’s stand-in first – he looks a lot like Robert. I thought, ‘Wow, you look really different in real life’ – and got the immediate nerves of meeting him out of the way. When Robert came in, we improvised and riffed off each other, which was great.”
And Iron Man himself vouches for the casting. “Tom Holland is just the perfect man for the job,” says Downey. “He’s enthusiastic, bright and gifted, a very physically talented guy by virtue of his dance and acrobatic background. He has just the right combination of elements required to bring a new take on the character.”
“Tom was astonishing during the casting process,” says Amy Pascal. “He brought a whole other quality to Peter Parker that was so true in the comics. We screen-tested a lot of kids, but from the first second we saw him on the monitor with Robert Downey Jr., we knew he was the one.”
“The energy of Tom Holland meeting Robert Downey Jr. for the first time was exactly what we wanted out of Peter Parker meeting Tony Stark,” says Kevin Feige. “The audition scene was the bedroom scene in Captain America: Civil War, and so we wanted to continue that relationship between Peter Parker and Tony Stark that we set up in the film.”
“Tom Holland has a wide-eyed innocence, he seems awkward and stumbly, but you feel like there’s a rightness and deep morality at the heart of it. To see this kid totally hold his own and bring the scene to life was impressive,” says Watts. “It was just the three of them – Marisa Tomei, Robert Downey Jr. and Tom Holland – doing this scene, and it felt so alive and exciting that it blew open the doors for the possibilities of where I could take the story in Spider-Man: Homecoming.”
Holland says that the give-and-take between the director and star was natural, organic, authentic, and easy. “Jon is great at collaborating and letting you have your own voice in bringing your own version of the character to the screen,” he says. “He’s an actor’s director. We were both thrown in the deep end a bit – I’ve never been in a movie of this scale as the lead before, and he’s never directed a movie of this scale – so we helped each other out as much as we could, and we built a really nice relationship around it.”
Spider-Man: Homecoming picks up the action directly following the epic battle scene of Captain America: Civil War, with Tony Stark returning “underoos” back home to Queens. “Peter really believes he has a mentor in Tony Stark, and Tony really likes Peter, but he can’t be babysitting this kid,” Feige explains. “Tony gives Peter a little bit of rope to see what he can do on his own.”
Peter believes that his “internship” with Stark Industries is merely a prelude and test toward becoming a full-fledged member of the Avengers – but the spider needs to learn to crawl before it can fly, as Holland explains: “We go back in time to relive the Civil War splash panel fight from Peter’s perspective. We see him having the time of his life. He’s on a private jet with Happy, he’s staying in this crazy beautiful hotel room to suddenly him being crammed on a subway late for school. No one’s called him to give him another mission. That’s the contrast: the kid at summer camp is suddenly the kid back at school.”
“Tony becomes a kind of father figure to Peter,” says Holland. “Peter’s trying to prove himself to Tony that he is old and wise enough to take on bigger tasks, but Tony keeps putting him down and telling him he isn’t ready yet. I think that’s what really drives Peter to possibly go down the wrong path, before he figures it out and we see why Peter Parker is the most beloved and powerful super hero of the MCU.”
It’s one thing for Peter Parker to have a father figure in Tony Stark – but he actually does have a familial guardian who cares deeply for him: his Aunt May. While Tony Stark helps Peter Parker up his game with a new suit and tech and monitors him as he navigates his newly found superhero powers, May is his guiding light.
“The character of Aunt May is so important to Peter Parker,” explains co-producer Eric Hauserman Carroll. “In this telling, we all agreed that the character should be more like a big sister or someone much closer to him in age.”
“How do we play Aunt May as a young single mom still trying to figure out her own way through life?” asks Kevin Feige. “She clearly did an amazing thing in the past by taking in Peter and raising him. She’s had tragedies in her past that we allude to, but ultimately, she is a woman who, like Peter, is trying to find her way. It gives her character a much more contemporary arc.”
With that in mind, the filmmakers cast Oscar® winner Marisa Tomei. “We took the spirit of who Aunt May is – in many ways, she’s Peter’s conscience – and see her dealing with things in the same way that Peter is. I think making the character younger and hipper is just a great way make that feel vital,” says Watts.
“In the vein of Spider-Man history, Aunt May takes over the maternal duties and gives guidance to Peter,” says Tomei. “In this iteration, we live in Queens, and it’s just May and Peter, and she is all about encouraging him to get out his shell a little bit. He’s super studious and very smart, which is great, but May also encourages him to have some more fun and experience life a little bit.”
This is an Aunt May who is much more in tune with her own youth as she raises a teenager. “Their relationship is very close and tender – she really is the person who gave him his values – but it’s clear to her that he’s hiding things from her,” says Tomei. “She’s concerned about what might be going on inside him, because she knows that high school can be a very difficult and awkward time. Of course, she doesn’t have any idea that what he’s hiding is that he’s a superhero.”
Tomei says that May’s relationship with Tony Stark is a careful one. “She thinks that Peter is an intern for Stark Industries, and she’s thrilled that he has that position – the potential to learn and have a mentor in Tony Stark. She’s been watching Tony Stark for a while and seen how he’s changed from being a hypercapitalist into a person who does more good on his own redemption trail. But she is keeping a close eye on how he is influencing Peter, so he doesn’t just become a workhorse. He is still a boy becoming a man, and needs space to explore his inner life and just be a kid.”
So, Peter is yearning for independence, and Tony and May are both willing to give him a bit to see how he handles it… and that independence leads him directly into the path of a dangerous new villain – The Vulture, Adrian Toomes, brought to life by Academy Award® nominee Michael Keaton. “Michael’s body of work is amazing,” says Feige. “He has so many qualities that made him perfect for the role, and there’s also the fun, meta quality in that he played Batman and Birdman. He’s at an incredible point in his career and comes to roles with such gravitas that elevated this character beyond our expectations.”
Holland has been a fan of Keaton’s for a long time, but he says that work took precedence when they first met. “I’ve been a huge fan of his ever since Beetlejuice,” says Holland. “The first time I’d met him, we shot the most intense scene of the whole film. It was just so intimidating and in all honesty required very little acting on my behalf because he brings this focused intensity that made me feel truly terrified. He’s also very generous and giving as an actor and his presence in the film really raises the stakes and action in the film.”
Spider-Man: Homecoming begins with a ground-level result of the previous MCU films: as thrilling as the Avengers’ battles have been, they’ve left ordinary New Yorkers with a mess to clean up – an effort that is still ongoing. The restoration effort has been very good for Adrian Toomes, whose salvage company has been awarded the contract of collecting the various alien articles and weaponry left behind in the wreckage… until Tony Stark swoops in by teaming with the government to create the Department of Damage Control, taking the entire business away from Toomes.
“Toomes is a hardworking guy who’s built a great business,” says Keaton. “He’s not wealthy, but he works hard, by dealing with the destruction that some of the Avengers’ adventures have caused. But when orders come down that this job is going to be under the auspices of Tony Stark, he thinks, well, what’s fair about that?”
This is what separates the heroes from the villains. Toomes, desperate to continue to provide for his family, begins stealing exotic alien technology, even building himself a wing suit that he and his men use to continue to rob the DODC trucks – repurposing their loot as weapons to sell on the black market.
“I wanted Spider-Man: Homecoming to be a ground-level super hero movie in the MCU, so we needed a ground-level villain,” says Watts. “I really liked the idea of having villains with problems that people can relate to. It’s not about world domination; it’s not about some crazy revenge plot; it’s about not having enough money to get by and really wanting to have a place in the world.”
“What’s cool about the Vulture is the same thing I thought was cool about Bruce Wayne – he builds his suit and armor and what he needs,” says Keaton. “He doesn’t have any kind of inherent super power; he’s just a man, though one who has all these other things going for him.”
Many actors, when called upon to play the villain, will say that the challenge is to find the universal human drive in the character and to almost be convinced by their misguided approaches. Keaton is no exception. “What’s kind of cool about the underlying plot in the story is that in some ways Peter doesn’t see the bigger picture; Toomes is a mature man who has seen first-hand how the world works,” he says. “Adrian Toomes looks at the real world and has experienced all its unfairness and inequity firsthand. That is how the Vulture thinks, and I think he’s kind of right.”
If Tony Stark is the father figure for Peter, Happy Hogan is the big brother. Irascible, annoyed, busy, but ultimately deeply caring, Tony’s right-hand man has been placed in charge of checking up on Peter’s progress while Tony does whatever it is genius billionaire playboy philanthropists do all day long.
“To Peter, Happy is that slightly older sibling who’s always giving you a hard time,” explains Carroll. “Happy thinks, ‘Wait a minute, you meet this new kid and make him a fancy suit, and he gets to fight alongside the Avengers?’ He takes a little bit of that jealousy out on Peter.”
Favreau grew up in Queens and attended a school not unlike Midtown Science, where Peter attends. For these reasons, he says, Spider-Man: Homecoming was a bit of a homecoming for the actor. “Because of what we had in common, I’ve always had an affinity for the character,” he says. “Seeing it depicted on film as it was in the books gives me a bit of a kick.”
Peter also has an ordinary life to lead – helped out by his best friend, Ned, played by Jacob Batalon.
While many of the actors in Spider-Man: Homecoming have experience with the behind-the-scenes demands of promoting an MCU film, Batalon is making his motion picture debut. (Not a bad way to start one’s career.) He got his first taste last year at Comic-Con, which culminated a long casting process. “The gravity of it didn’t sink in until we went to Comic-Con,” he says. “I could see how much fans love this character and go crazy for him. I’ve never felt an energy like that – and knowing that they support us really made me feel great. The first super hero film I saw was the first Spider-Man and those first films were such a big part of my childhood. It’s hard to explain what it feels like to know that you’re now part of building that story.”
In the film, Ned Leeds is Peter’s best friend and confidant. But when Peter begins his journey into the solitary world of Spider-Man, it leaves Ned as more of an outlier than his best buddy. “Ned’s very sweet, genuine – well, I guess you’d say he’s nerdy,” says Batalon. “He loves technology. He’s super-duper smart. And all he wants to do is be Peter’s right hand man. It is very tough on him not knowing what Peter is keeping from him – he finds it very frustrating and thinks that Peter is just getting too cool for him, like when you think you may lose a person who’s very important to you at one point in your life. So when Ned finally finds out Peter’s secret, it’s the greatest thing in the world for him – it’s going to be so cool having Spider-Man as his best friend.”
“The relationship between Peter and Ned is probably the most important relationship in the movie because Ned is the only person who Peter confides in and talks to about being Spider-Man,” says Tom Holland. “Tony Stark and Happy Hogan seem a little distant, so Ned is almost like a shrink that he can just really let it out to.”
And, Holland says, that’s similar to their off-screen dynamic. “Since day one, Jacob and I hit it off immediately. Jon sent us off on some tasks to sort of start bonding, but we didn’t really need to do that. We were already really good friends and we just gelled, and it’s exactly what happens in the movie.”
Even though Batalon was not the most experienced actor who was up for the role, Carroll says it was an easy call to cast him. “He brought an authentic, high school innocence,” he says. “He really is this young kid who’s super excited about everything. That came through in his screen test and auditions and translates perfectly to the way Ned Leeds would be excited about finding out that his best friend is Spider-Man. And he was the perfect Ned Leeds -- the entire crew loved him, he hugged every single person on his way to and from set, and he became the unofficial mascot of the production.”
At school, Peter and Ned face the toughest challenge of all: girls. Liz, played by Laura Harrier, is the ambitious, beautiful object of Peter’s affections, while Michelle, played by Zendaya, is the straight-shooter who sees through whatever game Peter thinks he has.
“Liz is very driven and smart. She’s a senior, so she’s a bit older – the other characters are sophomores,” says Harrier. “She goes through a huge character arc in this movie – at the beginning of the film, she’s completely focused on getting into college, going to MIT early decision, winning the academic decathlon… but by the end, after her experience with Peter, she completely reevaluates everything – there are so many bigger and more important things that she could’ve been focusing on than her chemistry test.”
At the outset of the story, Liz doesn’t really see any romantic possibilities with Peter – in fact, she doesn’t even notice his mooning over her. “But after a life-threatening event at the Washington Monument, she begins to rethink her perspective begins to see Peter as smart, interesting and cool,” says Harrier.
“It’s fun to play those scenes because Peter has a golden ticket he can’t use – he could get any girl in the world if he just said that he was Spider-Man. But he knows he can’t do that,” says Holland. “He knows he’s different and he knows he can be the best at everything, but he has to be mature enough not to make that wrong decision and tell everyone his secret.”
If Liz is the gorgeous, popular genius, Zendaya’s Michelle has chosen to stake out different ground. “My character is very smart, intellectual – but I’m not gonna lie: she’s super-weird,” says Zendaya. “She’s super-cool to me, because she’s constantly thinking about something, sits back and observes, and only says little things – but what she does say is very true and real.”
“Even by the end of the movie, we don’t know everything that’s going on with Michelle,” says Holland. “But she seems to follow Peter and Ned around quite a lot, so that might suggest that there’s a friendship to progress in the future.”
“Zendaya herself really informed her character,” adds Carroll. “In a school full of really smart kids who build computers at home in their spare time, she’s the kid walking around with a novel in her pocket and any spare moment she has is spent reading. She’s the artsy kid in a school full of nerds.”
For Zendaya, as cliché as it sounds, being cast in the film was a dream come true. “My first reaction was that this is one of the coolest things I’ve ever been a part of,” she says. “Everybody says ‘I always was a fan of Spider-Man’ but to be completely honest it’s true. The character was always my favorite growing up because I always felt like he was like the realest superhero. He wasn’t born with his powers, it just happened to him. He’s not well off financially; he deals with tragedy and normal everyday problems like paying rent and helping around the house, which I always thought that that was cool. I think that’s why a lot of people like Spider-Man; you can connect to him. When I was 16, my first date was to see Spider-Man. And now here I am now in a Spider-Man movie. Pretty crazy.”
Zendaya says that she especially appreciated the filmmakers’ approach, bringing a grounded, honest and real look to the superhero story. “The movie is full of diverse, real characters,” says Zendaya.
Standing in the way of a potential date with Liz is Flash Thompson, played by Tony Revolori, who moviegoers will recognize as Ralph Fiennes’ protégé in The Grand Budapest Hotel.
It’s very personal rivalry for Flash. “He can’t stand Peter Parker because Peter is so talented and smart and doesn’t need to study to get good grades. Flash studies extremely hard and works his butt off and still is always second fiddle to him,” says Revolori. “Flash has no idea that Peter is Spider-Man and will probably never realize that, because he does not want Peter to exist at all. There’s no way those two will ever come together in his mind.”
Among the villains, actors Bokeem Woodbine and Logan Marshall-Green join the cast as two of Adrian Toomes’ top guys, Schultz and Brice.
“Within the crew, Brice wants in bad in the superhero world, which is why he calls himself ‘The Shocker,’” adds Logan Marshall-Green. “That’s his idea. I think he’s a guy who’s gotten in over his head – a guy who Toomes probably did a favor for by putting him on his crew but is now compromising the crew, himself, and of course Toomes.”
Rounding out the talented cast of Spider-Man: Homecoming is Angourie Rice as academic decathlon team member Betty Brandt; Michael Chernus as Mason, Adrian Toomes’ salvage technician; Donald Glover as Aaron Davis; Tyne Daly as Anne Marie Hoeg, head of the DODC agency; Martin Starr as Mr. Harrington, the academic decathlon coach; Hannibal Buress as gym teacher Coach Wilson; Kenneth Choi as Principal Morita, Tiffany Espensen academic decathlon team member Cindy; Abraham Attah, the young actor acclaimed for his performance in Beasts of No Nation, as academic decathlon team member Abe; and Michael Barbieri as academic decathlon team member Charles.
“There’s no template in New York City schools – there’s every race, shape, and creed of kid at pretty much every school,” says Carroll. “So that freed us – we didn’t have to cast a type for any role – we could just find the best actor for each part, no matter how tall, short, what body shape they have or their race, let’s just find the best.”
ABOUT THE PRODUCTION
Spider-Man: Homecoming called Pinewood Studios Atlanta its home base, but for the first two weeks of shooting, Jon Watts set the tone by filming at a real Atlanta-area high school, which doubles as Midtown High School of Science.
This was not the only practical set in the film; on the contrary, Watts’ sensibilities as a director and his approach to making Spider-Man: Homecoming a grounded superhero film combined to make practical filming a priority.
“I come from the world of independent filming, where you really don’t have the luxury of building sets on stage. You’re basically on location the entire run of show,” says Watts. “It gets much tougher to do that on a big spectacle film with a lot of action and the need for secrecy, but our locations team came up with so many great practical locations that were not only able to double Queens and New York seamlessly, but also let us fly under the radar most of the time. Our production designer Oliver Scholl did a great job of augmenting physical locations and designing and building sets within existing practical locations.”
“Shooting on all of the practical sets was really a godsend for me,” says Tom Holland. “You forget all the cameras, crew and people and you get a much better sense of all the real tangible elements within the environment in which to act and react off.”
Scholl was able to give the Vulture’s lair a real-world authenticity by enhancing a massive, old abandoned warehouse that once printed phone books. “The Vulture and his gang were supposed to be located across the river from Manhattan, with a sight line to the Avengers tower,” Scholl explains. “Our location manager, Mike Fantasia, found a location in Atlanta that used to be occupied by a phone book printing company. There were several connected spaces and architectural styles that we could enhance. The hero space used to house the printing press with an existing platform; we added another staircase, matching the industrial style, and built big vertical yellow I-beams that supported a heavy-duty crane rig to frame a VFX rooftop opening, where the Vulture could fly in. The Vulture’s landing platform also had built-in shock absorbers to soften his landing and articulate, to give us realistic impression of weight upon the landing. Our Set Decorator Gene Serdena had found and built interesting hardware that we interspersed with our props to simulate an assembly and packing line for the Tinkerer’s crazy inventions.”
“The first day I walked onto the salvage company set, I was really impressed with the size and scope of the set,” says Michael Keaton. “It really exceeded what I had envisioned in my head – it was such a great visceral environment to work within and was perfect for the creation of the Vulture and his suit.”
The old phone book warehouse would also serve as the set for an action sequence that harks back to one of the all-time classic Spider-Man comic books. “In the film, the Vulture has used his wing suit to collapse a warehouse, and Spider-Man gets trapped under the rubble,” explains Carroll. “It is straight out of the comics, one of the most famous Spider-Man comics of all time – Amazing Spider-Man #33. Everyone at Marvel has been excited to bring that sequence to the big screen for a long time now, and we’ve gone to great lengths to try to replicate the look.”
It was Scholl’s challenge to pull it off. “We used another space in the facility, which was an old, empty packing warehouse where we could sleeve some of the existing I-beams to make them look like concrete pillars and load charges for special effects explosions. Our visual effects supervisor Janek Sirrs and pre-viz had keyed out the flight path that determined the placement of the charges for a crazy destruction choreography. The collapsed warehouse aftermath was then built on stage as a pile of rubble back at Pinewood Studios.”
But perhaps the benefits of practical sets and effects is best seen in one of the film’s biggest action sequences, in which Spider-Man ends up in a perilous situation on the Staten Island Ferry. “Spider-Man is determined to prove himself a real superhero,” explains Jon Watts. “He wants the name Spider-Man to be right up there next to Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor. He thinks he’s going to take down a bunch of dangerous thugs who are doing a black-market deal on the bottom deck of the Staten Island Ferry and he gets in over his head. While they weren’t expecting him, the criminals are more than capable of holding their own against him and before too long the Vulture appears and the ferry is split in half, and Spider-Man just hoping to get out of this without anyone getting hurt.”
For the filmmakers figuring out how to pull of the sequence started long before the production started. At first, the producers assumed that it would be a VFX sequence – only to be surprised by the production team. “Our amazing team – Oliver Scholl’s art department, John Hoskins’s construction department, Dan Sudick’s special effects team – all said what we should build the front end of the ferry, raise it six feet off the ground, rig it with hydraulics, and split the thing in half. It also allowed us to film the ship cracking apart practically as opposed to filming it together and hoping that the visual effects team can make it look like it’s split.”
Scholl started by modelling the real Staten Island Ferry. They located a wooden scale model, and took photos and measurements of the real Ferry they would later film on: the Spirit of America. From there, set designers Richard Mays and Kil Won Yu were able to create a 3D model and generate blueprints for the construction crew. In the end, the production team built an enormous set, 64 feet wide, 45 feet high, and 100 feet long, that stood in for roughly one-quarter of the real ferry. Each half of the set was built onto of a steel gimbal, able to split the ship as determined in the computer model and matching to what VFX would extend in post-production. Sudick’s effects team even had to cut the concrete on the backlot to add deeper concrete enforced footings for the hydraulics to enable the tilt.
The chaotic aftermath of the split, with rushing water and panicked New Yorkers, is also a practical effect, says Scholl: “Each side of the gimbal and set came in at about 210,000 pounds of weight plus approximately 25,000 pounds for the shooting company and equipment. Dan Sudik actuated it with giant hydraulic rams to tilt the parts while 40,000 gallons of water were dumped down the middle of the car bay. Building the ferry probably took five months, between prefabricating ship pieces on stage, prepping the backlot concrete slab to receive the steel gimbal. Then stacking the steel and wood ship elements on the frames. Painting, dressing and rehearsing the water dump. The end result was it provided the big, real playground for effects, stunts and our actors to portray the scene and ferry split event more realistically.”
For Tom Holland, the productions efforts were well spent once he was able to get up on the wires and shoot his scenes on one of a kind set. “The day we shot the sequence on the incredible Staten Island Ferry set really was one of my favorites,” he says. “The ferry was spitting in half and we had tip tanks and cars being tossed all over the place. And at one point we have this great shot, in which Spider-Man flips in, lands and then camera goes all the way around him as he has a fight scene – it’s incredibly all in one shot as the whole thing’s revolving. It took a really long time to rehearse it and get it right, but the end result is just so awesome and cool. It’s the most badass part of Spider-Man I think I’ve ever seen.”
Later, the production shot parts of the sequences (with an intact ferry) on the ferry itself. “There’s nothing that can bring the actual scale of the Staten Island Ferry to the big screen better then shooting on the actual ferry,” says Carroll. “While we did build that amazing four story section of it on the backlot of Pinewood Studios, the pieces we shot on the real ferry combine to make it feel like a huge, epic action sequence in the film. We were incredibly fortunate that the city, state, film commission and Department of Transportation all worked with us in helping us pull this off.”
It was a sequence that struck especially close to home for Jon Watts. “I have many great childhood memories riding on the Staten Island Ferry,” says Jon Watts. I think many people would agree that it is one of the most beautiful ways to come into New York City, with the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and the spectacular iconic view of downtown skyline of Manhattan. It was important for the film to incorporate those iconic New York images without actually going into Manhattan – I wanted to keep the action deep in Queens.”
In addition to shooting on the Staten Island Ferry, the production would shoot for two weeks in New York that included many locations in Queens including locations in Astoria, Sunnyside, Richmond Hill, Lefferts Blvd., Jamaica Ave., and Queens Blvd. as well as Coney Island, Brooklyn, Long Island, and Staten Island.
“Shooting in New York is so important on a Spider-Man film,” says Amy Pascal. “Peter Parker is from Queens, and Spider-Man is New York City’s hero. They are baked into each other.”
SPIDEY’S SUIT
You might think that putting on the Spider-Man suit for the first time is a special, life-changing moment – and it is – but Tom Holland says that the magic feeling doesn’t go away. “Putting on the Spider-Man suit is one of the coolest things that has ever happened to me in my entire life. I still to this day can’t really believe that it’s happened,” he says. “There’s always a real special moment when I put the suit on, especially in front of little kids and they see the suit and their eyes light up and it reminds you of what a real privilege it is to bring that sort of happiness to people.”
“When Tom Holland puts on the Spider-Man costume, he just becomes Spider-Man in every sense of the character,” says Amy Pascal. Part of that is inside the actor, of course, but part of is the Spider-Man suit he wears. When Holland puts it on, she says, “his posture changes, he walks differently, and the suit looks perfect on him. Our costume designer Louise Frogley did such an amazing job creating the physical costume – or re-creating it, because we did something that was unfair: we took the digitally created suit from Captain America: Civil War and told them, ‘We want you to build this.’ They nailed it.”
Even for veterans of a decade’s worth of superhero franchises, there’s something different about working with the Spider-Man suit. “The Spider-Man costume is probably, with no exaggeration, one of the best graphic-designed elements in the history of graphic design,” enthuses Kevin Feige. “It is unbelievably well done image – I see kids and babies who can’t speak come into our offices and they all gravitate over to the Spider-Man drawing or toy. It really is a testament to the design. So, when you sit down to make a Spider-Man movie, you don’t start thinking about how you’re going to change the most perfect piece of graphic design in history of superhero films. You think about how you can pull that to the surface in a unique way, taking it places that you haven’t seen in the other films, while staying true to the conceit of the image.”
For costume designer Louise Frogley, that meant working closely with Marvel’s concept design team and source material. “We are all very influenced by the work of Steve Ditko and try as hard as possible to follow the strong imprint that he created,” says Frogley. “For the Spider-Man suit, we worked very closely with Marvel’s Head of Visual Development Ryan Meinerding to achieve the look – Ryan even worked with us to place the lines on suit. Robyn Gebhart was the person responsible for the construction of the suit.”
The way that the filmmakers were able to fulfill their mission of honoring the design of the suit while taking it to new places is – as audiences saw in Civil War – to imagine that it is a creation of Tony Stark. “It’s purely Spider-Man, but it also has just the right amount of high tech and a lot more bells and whistles – which you might imagine for anything that Tony Stark builds,” says Feige.
For example: “The suit now has web wings under his arms, which pays homage to early comic books. The very first issue of the very first Spider-Man he’s swinging across, and he’s got web wings,” says Feige. “Stark Industries has designed a version of the wings that come out when Spider-Man needs to glide down a cityscape. They can retract when he doesn’t need them. It’s something we have seen in the comics, but never before on film.”
Another new development for the Spider-Man costume is his eyes. “The new eyes in the costume bring us something that has been in every issue ever drawn of Spider-Man, but we’ve never been able to do in the movie before, which is create movement in the eyes,” says Feige. “Tony has been able to construct a mask with an eye form that allows them to open and close and get wider, which within our story allows Peter Parker to focus his spider sense as he takes in massive amounts of information. But they will also now give us for the very first time the ability to see emotion expressed while Peter is wearing the suit, which in the comic books the artist would always do. In the comics, if Peter was angry the eyes would get a little bit smaller; if he was surprised, the eyes would get a little bit bigger. You can’t do that in a movie unless there is a reason and technological explanation for how that’s possible. We now have that.”
And that’s just the beginning – in fact, there’s a whole array of features in Spidey’s suit that Peter Parker has only begun to explore. “If you think about Tony Stark building a suit for a 16-year-old, you would want to include some stuff for ‘just in case,’” says Watts. “The idea that the suit could be Stark tech really just opened up the door to a lot of possibilities. Some of the new tech has never appeared in comics before – including capabilities that Tony Stark puts in that he thinks would be helpful to Peter in the future, but isn’t quite ready for yet… and it’s up to Spider-Man to prove otherwise.”
CREATING THE VULTURE
The Vulture is one of the classic Spider-Man villains, first appearing in The Amazing Spider-Man #2.
“In the comics, the Vulture was traditionally drawn in a very cartoony suit that features almost real birdlike wings,” notes Carroll. “We took a step back and looked at other flying characters to see how we could differentiate The Vulture and make him feel scarier and more dangerous.”
For one example, they didn’t have to look too far. “Falcon is another flying character in the MCU, but the Vulture’s rig isn’t some small backpack that he straps on and wings pop out of it. The wingspan on the Vulture suit is 36 feet. It’s more like a vehicle, an aircraft that he straps himself into, rather than a jetpack or a set of wings that he just pulls on.”
For Michael Keaton, seeing the Vulture’s full costume was very exciting for the Academy Award® nominee. “It’s intense and really cool looking,” he says. “One of the things that knocked me out about being the Vulture was the amazing artistry from the people who built the vulture suit. It was extraordinary down to the tiny little nuts and bolts, literally. They told me one time how many nuts and bolts it took to build it and it was mind blowing and I was just knocked out by how talented those people are.”
Like many of the new Marvel Cinematic Universe characters, as well as the Spider-Man suit, the concept and look of the Vulture again started with drawings from Marvel’s Head of Visual Development Ryan Meinerding, who produced the template from which costume designer Louise Frogley would design the costume and practical suit.
“Marvel is always very involved with the look of the characters,” says Frogley. “To that end they have amazing concept/visualization artists. We worked very closely with Ryan to achieve the look for The Vulture. The Vulture costume was really a question of proportion on the actor, and once Michael was cast, the rest flowed. We used original World War II fabric for the pants; they had a slight sheen that lit well, especially at night. We also made a straggly fur collar for the jacket to hint at the feathers on a real vulture and, once again, to respect Steve Ditko’s original Vulture.”
ABOUT THE STUNTS
As part of his pitch to get the role, Tom Holland sent Marvel tapes of himself performing gymnastic stunts and parkour – which gave Holland a unique combination of acting and athletic skill.
Holland says that these are skills he honed while playing in the musical “Billy Elliot” on the West End. “I think probably one of the main reasons why I’m here today is because of my work on ‘Billy Elliot,’” says Tom Holland. “The training I was given on that show was just so good. They trained me in everything that I know really in gymnastics. There wasn’t a day on this movie where I didn’t use some sort of athletic ability.”
When Holland proved what he could handle, the stunts team began to put the actor in a position bring those skills to the fore. “It’s nice to have that ability to work with the stunt guys and say, ‘I think it would be cooler if I jump down from there and the wire then pick me up later on,’” he says. “The fact that the stunt coordinator and team trusted me to make suggestions and then to perform later was a real privilege. I really think we’ve benefitted on the movie by having me in the suit to do the stunts and pull the suit off so you can see that I did it. I couldn’t have asked for a better people to work with and [stunt coordinator] George Cottle and his stunt team are so loving and supportive and have your back at every turn.”
For Holland, the collaborative nature of the set was in full effect during a sequence in which Spider-Man jumps off the roof onto the golf course. “In the script, it was supposed to be a swing into the golf course, which we’ve seen it countless times,” he says. “George Cottle and I thought it would be more interesting to see him jump down in a different way, so when we first started shooting, we went through all the previous movies and took pictures of every Spidey pose that he lands in. Then Holland Diaz, my stunt double, and I worked through finding ten new poses so that we could mix it up and bring new things – and fortunately, Jon loved them.”
Even as the filmmakers sought to deliver the film’s exciting action sequences, it was important to remember the character and tone of the film. “Whenever something really badass happens, we will then remind the audience that Peter Parker is not a badass character,” says Holland. “I’ll do something cool and then immediately after that I’ll walk into something or do something really stupid. Even when we are doing the final battle scene on the beach, the thing he’s thinking about is going to do his homework. There are loads of different ways for us to make sure that while these fight scenes are incredibly cool, action-packed, and scary, they’re also a lot of fun.”
Keaton says he was impressed by what Holland was able to bring to his role. “Tom has a ton of energy and he’s really physically formidable. It’s impressive how he started and how he had to learn to dance for ‘Billy Elliot.’ But from a flat out acting standpoint, he’s a pro and 100% committed.”
ABOUT THE CAST
Tom Holland (Peter Parker / Spider-Man) is quickly emerging as Hollywood’s most exciting and versatile young actors. He recently debuted in his role as Spider-Man in Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War.
Audiences can currently see Holland starring in James Gray’s The Lost City of Z opposite Charlie Hunnam, Rob Pattinson and Sienna Miller. Holland also appears in Alfonso Gomez Rejon’s period drama, The Current War, alongside Benedict Cumberbatch, which will be released December 22, 2017.
Holland made his screen debut opposite Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts in Juan Antonio Bayona’s captivating film The Impossible. Other film credits include, the 2015 Warner Bros. drama In the Heart of the Sea, Edge of Winter alongside Joel Kinnaman, How I Live Now, and Locke.
In 2008, he made his stage debut at the Victoria Palace Theatre in London in which he played ‘Billy’ in Billy Elliot the Musical.
Holland was honored with the 2017 BAFTA Rising Star Award. In addition, he was named Breakthrough Actor of the Year by the National Board of Review and received a Critics Choice Nomination for Best Young Actor /Actress for his role in “The Impossible.”
Holland currently resides in London.
As the star of the 2015 Academy Award® Best Picture winner Birdman: Or (The Unexpected Virtue of Innocence), MICHAEL KEATON (Adrian Toomes / Vulture) garnered critical and public acclaim for his role as Riggan, a one-time celebrated, now washed-up actor battling to regain his ego and career by mounting a Broadway play. For his work in Birdman, Keaton was nominated for an Academy Award® and won the Golden Globe, Independent Spirit, and National Board of Review Awards for Best Actor, as well as many other nominations and honors including a SAG Ensemble Cast win.
Keaton first achieved national attention with the hit comedy Night Shift, followed by starring roles in such popular films as Mr. Mom, Johnny Dangerously and Dream Team.
In 1998, Keaton earned the Best Actor Award from the National Society of Film Critics for Clean and Sober and for Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice. He re-teamed with Burton to play the title role in the blockbusters Batman and Batman Returns.
Keaton also starred in HBO’s highly-regarded true-life drama Live From Baghdad, for which he received a Golden Globe nomination for his role as intrepid CNN reporter Robert Weiner. He also starred in the Universal thriller White Noise and in Game Six, which premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival.
Keaton starred in the Academy Award® Best Picture winner Spotlight, the compelling true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered a massive scandal within the Catholic Church. In 2016, starred in The Founder, in which he portrayed Ray Kroc, the founder of McDonald’s.
Keaton will next be seen in September starring in American Assassin for Lionsgate and CBS Films. Keaton is a member of American Rivers.
JON FAVREAU (Happy Hogan) began his career in the industry as an actor in the inspiring sports film Rudy. He went on to establish himself as a writer with the acclaimed hipster comedy Swingers. Since then, he has continued to challenge himself with a variety of eclectic projects.
Last year, Favreau directed and produced Disney’s live-action adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s epic adventure The Jungle Book. The film has received universal acclaim and was one of the highest grossing films of 2016. Favreau is currently working with Disney once again to direct a live-action reimagining of the animated classic The Lion King.
Favreau also works in the world of Virtual Reality. His latest project is Gnomes & Goblins, an interactive Virtual Reality experience set in the world of an enchanted forest.
An integral part of the formation and expansion of the Marvel Universe, Favreau directed the blockbuster hits Iron Man and Iron Man 2, which grossed a combined $1.3 billion at the worldwide box office. He also served as executive producer on Iron Man 3, Marvel’s The Avengers, and Avengers: Age of Ultron, which grossed a combined $4.1 billion worldwide, becoming three of the top ten highest grossing films of all time.
In 2014, Favreau wrote, directed, produced, and starred in the indie hit Chef, which also starred Sofia Vergara, Scarlett Johansson and Robert Downey Jr. In 2011, Favreau directed and produced Cowboys and Aliens, starring Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig. Prior to directing the first two installments of the Iron Man, franchise, Favreau directed Zathura: A Space Adventure, a children’s film starring Tim Robbins, for Radar Pictures and Sony Pictures Entertainment. In 2003, he directed the acclaimed holiday smash hit Elf, starring Will Ferrell, for New Line Cinema. Favreau made his feature-film directorial debut with Made, a script he wrote and starred in opposite Vince Vaughn and Sean Combs for Artisan Entertainment.
In front of the camera, Favreau has appeared in The Wolf of Wall Street, Identity Thief and People Like Us. His other film credits include Couples Retreat, I Love You Man, Four Christmases, The Break-Up, Wimbledon, Something’s Gotta Give, Daredevil, Love and Sex, The Replacements, Very Bad Things and Deep Impact. He also portrayed legendary heavyweight champion Rocky Marciano in the MGM biopic Rocky Marciano.
Favreau’s television credits include a recurring role on “Friends” and a special appearance on HBO’s “The Sopranos,” playing himself. Favreau also added the title of show runner to his multi-hyphenate list of credits as the creator, producer and host of the critically acclaimed and Emmy®-nominated IFC series “Dinner for Five.” He also executive produced the TV series “Revolution.” Presently, Favreau is an executive producer on the TV series “The Shannara Chronicles,” which was recently renewed for a second season.
Favreau was recently inducted into the Variety Home Entertainment and Digital Hall of Fame for his contributions to cutting edge innovation in content creation.
ZENDAYA (Michelle) began her rise to stardom in acting on the hit Disney Channel show “Shake It Up,” and, more recently, "K.C. Undercover," in which she currently stars as K.C. Cooper, a high school math whiz and martial arts expert who is living a double life as an international undercover spy.
The talented actress, singer and dancer received multiple NAACP Image Awards nominations for Outstanding Performance in a Youth/Children's Program (Series or Special) for her starring role in "Shake It Up.” Zendaya also captured the hearts of audiences - kids and families alike - when she danced her way to the finals in season sixteen of ABC's "Dancing with the Stars," and with her starring role in the hit Disney Channel Original Movie "Zapped."
In the music world, Zendaya released her self-titled debut album on Hollywood Records in 2013. It yielded the Platinum single "Replay" and earned the singer a NAACP Image Awards Nomination for Outstanding New Artist and the 2014 BMI Social Star Award. Additionally, the video for the single garnered over 77 million views.
Prior to her solo debut, Zendaya released numerous hit singles and videos in conjunction with "Shake It Up," including "Swag It Out" and "Something to Dance For." Zendaya and her "Shake It Up" co-star Bella Thorne also recorded hit singles "Contagious Love," "Fashion Is My Kryptonite," and "Watch Me," which hit Billboard's Hot 100 singles chart and received over 97 million online views.
In 2013, she authored the book Between U and Me: How to Rock Your Tween Years with Style and Confidence (Disney Publishing Worldwide).
Zendaya, which means "to give thanks" in Shona (a Bantu language native to the Shona people of Zimbabwe), was born September 1, 1996, in Oakland, California. She grew up with the nearby California Shakespeare Theater in Orinda where her mother worked as the house manager. In addition to training at the theater's student conservatory program, she performed in numerous stage productions and helped her mom seat patrons and sell raffle tickets to benefit the theater.
While attending the Oakland School for the Arts, she starred as a young Ti Moune in "Once on This Island" at the Berkley Playhouse and the breakout role of the male character Joe in "Caroline, or Change" at Palo Alto's TheaterWorks. She also studied her craft at the CalShakes Conservatory program and at the American Conservatory Theater. Her other stage credits include "Richard III," "Twelfth Night," and "As You Like It," among others.
The young star is also passionate about giving back and is currently an ambassador for Convoy of Hope, an organization dedicated to providing help and hope to those who are impoverished, hungry and hurting. She celebrated her 18th birthday by supporting Convoy of Hope’s feed ONE initiative to help feed at least 150 hungry children in Haiti, Tanzania and the Philippines. She also worked with UNICEF, serving as its 2014 Trick-or-Treat spokesperson to help inspire kids to raise funds for the organization’s lifesaving programs. Additionally, she worked with Make-A-Wish Foundation and Keep a Child Alive, and served as an ambassador for the Children's Miracle Network.
Zendaya resides in Los Angeles, California, with her family and dog, a Giant Schnauzer named Midnight.
DONALD GLOVER (Aaron Davis) is an award-winning actor, producer, director, comedian, writer, and Grammy-nominated artist.
Glover was most recently seen in FX’s critically acclaimed and award winning comedy series “Atlanta,” which he created and starred in. The first season ranks as the highest-rated comedy series in FX Networks history and has been renewed for a second season.
Coming off the success of “Atlanta,” Glover has set an overall deal with FX Productions, where he will develop new projects for FX Networks’ outlets.
In film, Glover is currently in production on the new untitled Han Solo Star Wars anthology film, in which he stars as Lando. The film will be released by Disney, Summer 2018. He was also recently cast as Simba in Disney's remake of The Lion King. This adaptation of the 1994 classic will be directed by Jon Favreau.
Last year, he appeared in Ridley Scott’s The Martian opposite Matt Damon and Jessica Chastain and in Magic Mike XXL, alongside Channing Tatum, Joe Manganiello, Matt Bomer and Amber Heard.
Past films include David Gelb’s The Lazarus Effect opposite Olivia Wilde and Mark Duplass; Miguel Arteta’s Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day; Maggie Carey’s The To Do List opposite Aubrey Plaza and Bill Hader, and James Bobin’s The Muppets. On television, Glover starred for five seasons as Troy on NBC’s critically acclaimed series “Community,” created by Dan Harmon. He has also made guest appearances on Judd Apatow’s HBO series “Girls” and on the cult favorite Adult Swim animated series “Adventure Time.”
Glover began his comedy career under the mentorship of Tina Fey, writing for the Emmy award-winning NBC series 30 Rock.
As a musician, Glover is known for his success under the stage name Childish Gambino. He released his first album, “Camp,” in 2011. His second album, “Because the Internet,” was nominated for two Grammy Awards. His third album, “Awaken My Love!,” released in December 2016, debuted #1 on the R&B Albums Chart and is his highest-charting album.
Tyne Daly (Anne Marie Hoag) is an accomplished American stage and screen actress and is best known for her work on the acclaimed television series “Cagney & Lacey” as title character Detective Mary Beth Lacey alongside Sharon Gless as Detective Christine Cagney. The two won the series a record six Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Leading Actress in a row, which remains unmatched to this day. Daly’s performance earned her four of the six Emmy Awards. Daly is also well known on television for her role as social worker Maxine Gray, who was the mother to the show’s title character on the CBS drama “Judging Amy” (1999-2005). More recently, Daly can be seen alongside Sally Field in the feature film Hello, My Name is Doris.
Daly has been in Broadway stage productions since 1967, including hits like “Gypsy,” (1989) for which she won the 1990 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, “The Seagull” (1992), as well as “Rabbit Hole” (2006), where she played the mother of the protagonist, played by Cynthia Nixon. Over the past several years, Daly has continued to appear in on and off Broadway plays. In 2012, she reprised her role as Maria Callas in the West End Production of “Master Class”.
Daly was born into a creative family in Madison, Wisconsin, and grew up in Westchester County, New York. Her father is actor James Daly and her younger brother is actor Timothy Daly. She started her career in New York by performing in summer stock with her family. Daly attended Brandeis University and The American Musical and Dramatic Academy.
MARISA TOMEI (Aunt May) continues to bridge the gap between rich, dramatic performances and smart, comedic turns. Tomei won an Academy Award® for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Mona Lisa Vito in My Cousin Vinny. Tomei subsequently earned Academy Award® nominations for her performances in In the Bedroom and The Wrestler.
Tomei currently stars in Lincoln Center Theater’s “How to Transcend a Happy Marriage.” This new play written by Sarah Ruhl and directed by Rebecca Taichman explores the boundaries of monogamy and the limits of friendship.
Tomei introduced her portrayal of Aunt May in Captain America: Civil War. She will next be seen in Behold My Heart opposite Charlie Plummer and Timothy Olyphant. She recently appeared as a recurring character in the second season of Fox’s critically acclaimed drama series “Empire,” for which she received a Critics Choice Award nomination. She plays Mimi Whiteman, a venture capitalist and Forbes list billionaire who becomes involved in the Lyon family drama. She also appeared in the Oscar®-winning film The Big Short alongside Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt for director Adam McKay.
Tomei appeared in Ira Sachs’ independent film Love is Strange, which premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and screened at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. Love is Strange was nominated for four Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature and Best Screenplay. The film was also nominated for a Gotham Award for Best Film, a Satellite Award for Best Motion Picture” and “Best Original Screenplay,” a Dorian Award for “LGBTQ Film of the Year” and Unsung Film of the Year, and Sebastiane Award for Best Film during the San Sebastian International Film Festival. Love is Strange won the WFCC Award for Best Male Images in a Movie at the 2014 Women Film Critics Circle Awards.
On the silver screen, Tomei has tackled a diverse range of roles, including Kate Taffety in Crazy, Stupid, Love, Ida Horowicz in Ides of March, Maggie McPherson in The Lincoln Lawyer, and Alice Simmons in Parental Guidance. Other notable film credits include Trainwreck, Cyrus, Sidney Lumet's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, What Women Want, Happy Accidents, Anger Management, Slums of Beverly Hills, Welcome to Sarajevo, Unhook the Stars, Four Rooms, and The Paper, Chaplin, and Loitering With Intent, which Tomei also produced.
A veteran of the theater, she last starred as the widow Serafina in director Trip Cullman’s staging of “The Rose Tattoo” at the Williamstown Theater Festival in Massachusetts. In 2014, she starred as Pony Jones in Will Eno’s The Realistic Joneses at the Lyceum Theatre in 2014. Tomei and the cast won the 2014 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance. Tomei previously starred in the Broadway production of Caryl Churchill's “Top Girls,” earning a Drama Desk Award nomination for her work. Her other theater credits include MCC Theater’s “Beirut,” “Oh! The Humanity and Other Good Intentions,” “Salome,” “Marie,” “Design for Living,” “We Won't Pay! We Won't Pay!,” “Waiting for Lefty,” “Rocket to the Moon,” “Demonology,” “Dark Rapture,” “Slavs!,” “The Comedy of Errors,” “The Summer Winds,” “What the Butler Saw,” and “Daughters.” Tomei is a founding member of the Naked Angels Theater Company in New York City.
ROBERT DOWNEY JR. (Tony Stark / Iron Man) is a two-time Academy Award® nominee who earned his most recent Oscar® nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his work in Ben Stiller’s comedy hit Tropic Thunder. His performance as Kirk Lazarus, a white Australian actor playing a black American character, also brought him Golden Globe, BAFTA, and Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Award nominations. Downey was honored with his first Oscar® nomination in the category of Best Actor for his portrayal of Charlie Chaplin in Richard Attenborough’s acclaimed biopic Chaplin, for which he also won BAFTA and London Film Critics’ Awards and received a Golden Globe Award nomination.
In early 2010, Downey won a Golden Globe Award for his performance in the title role of the 2009 hit Sherlock Holmes, under the direction of Guy Ritchie. In December 2011, Downey teamed up with Ritchie and co-star Jude Law to return to the role of the legendary detective in the sequel Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.
In summer 2008, Downey received praise from critics and audiences for his performance in the title role of the blockbuster hit Iron Man, under the direction of Jon Favreau. Bringing the Marvel Comics superhero to the big screen, Iron Man earned more than $585 million worldwide, making it one of the year’s biggest hits. Downey reprised his role in the successful sequel, which was released in May 2010. He returned to the role in Joss Whedon’s The Avengers, released in May 2012, which was the highest grossing film during its theatrical run and remains the 5th highest grossing film of all time, grossing over $1.5 billion at the worldwide box office. Downey also appeared in the third installment to the franchise Iron Man 3, directed by Shane Black, which was the 3rd highest grossing film that year, as well as in the 2015 summer blockbuster The Avengers: Age of Ultron, and was most recently seen the worldwide success Captain America: Civil War, which became the highest-grossing film of 2016.
Additionally, he will star in Universal Pictures’ The Voyage of Doctor Dolittle, which he will also produce under the Team Downey banner, the production company that he created with his wife, Susan.
In addition to his prolific work in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Downey was also seen in the culinary-inspired film Chef directed by Jon Favreau, which won the Audience Award at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. That year, Downey also starred in and executive produced The Judge, featuring Robert Duvall and Billy Bob Thornton, under the Team Downey banner.
Downey’s other recent films include Due Date, alongside Zach Galifianakis for director Todd Phillips; The Soloist, opposite Jamie Foxx for director Joe Wright; Zodiac, alongside Jake Gyllenhaal for director David Fincher; A Scanner Darkly, with Keanu Reeves for director Richard Linklater; Fur: An Imaginary Portrait Of Diane Arbus, opposite Nicole Kidman for director Steven Shainberg; and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, alongside Val Kilmer for director Shane Black. He also shared a SAG Award nomination as a member of the ensemble cast of George Clooney’s true-life drama Good Night, And Good Luck., and a Special Jury Prize won by the ensemble cast of A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, presented at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival.
Downey’s long list of film credits also includes: Gothika, The Singing Detective, Wonder Boys, U.S. Marshals, One Night Stand, Home For The Holidays, Richard Iii, Natural Born Killers, The Gingerbread Man, Short Cuts, Heart And Souls, Soapdish, Air America, Chances Are, True Believer, Less Than Zero, Weird Science, Firstborn, and Pound, in which he made his debut under the direction of Robert Downey Sr.
On the small screen, Downey made his primetime debut in 2001 when he joined the cast of the series “Ally McBeal.” For his work on the show, he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television and a Screen Actors Guild Award® for Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series. In addition, Downey was nominated for an Emmy Award for “Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series.”
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
JON WATTS (Director / Co-Writer) made his directorial debut in 2014 with the independent film Clown, which he also co-wrote, starring Peter Stomare and Laura Allen. He followed the film by writing and directing the critically acclaimed independent film Cop Car for Focus Features. The film starred Kevin Bacon and followed a small-town sheriff who sets out to find the two kids who have taken his car on a joyride.
Born in Fountain, Colorado in 1981, Watts studied at the Department of Film at New York University. After graduating in 2005, Watts begin to work in music videos, commercials and as a staff member on the web version of the satirical news agency The Onion News Network after working on a series of short films and the television movie "Eugene!" (2012).
KEVIN FEIGE (Producer) has been the driving creative force behind several billion dollar franchises and an unprecedented number of blockbuster feature films, all connected to create the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In his current role as producer and president of Marvel Studios, Feige is a hands-on producer and oversees Marvel Studios’ feature film productions, all of which have opened No. 1 at the box office and grossed over $10 billion worldwide collectively. Feige is currently producing the highly anticipated films Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Captain Marvel and Avengers: Infinity War.
Most recently, Feige produced Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which opened to over $146 million at the box office and has taken in more than $800 million worldwide. Last year, Feige launched another franchise with Doctor Strange, which continued the streak of No. 1 openings, and launched Captain America: Civil War, the highest grossing film of the year worldwide. In 2015, he launched another successful franchise with Ant-Man, starring Paul Rudd, and earlier in the year he produced Avengers: Age of Ultron, which currently ranks as the fifth largest opening of all time. In 2014, Feige produced Guardians of the Galaxy, starring Chris Pratt, and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which broke the opening record for an April release.
In 2013, Feige produced the megahits Thor: The Dark World and Iron Man 3. In 2012, Feige produced the critically acclaimed Marvel’s The Avengers, which set an all-time domestic three-day weekend box-office record. The film went on to become Disney’s highest-grossing global and domestic release at the time.
In 2011, Feige produced and successfully launched two Marvel film franchises, Captain America: The First Avenger, directed by Joe Johnston and starring Chris Evans, and Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh and starring Chris Hemsworth. In 2010, Feige produced Iron Man 2, directed by Jon Favreau and starring Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow.
In summer 2008, Feige produced the first fully developed and financed films from the new Marvel Studios, including the blockbusters Iron Man, directed by Jon Favreau, and The Incredible Hulk, directed by Louis Leterrier.
Feige joined Marvel in 2000 and served as executive producer on the second and third Spider-Man films, which took in combined worldwide box-office receipts of well over $1.5 billion. Feige also co-produced X2: X-Men United, the second instalment of the popular X-Men franchise, and executive produced X-Men 3: The Last Stand, among many other Marvel branded films.
A graduate from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts, Feige first worked for Lauren Shuler Donner and Richard Donner at their Warner Bros.–based production company, which released the action-adventure Volcano and the hit romantic comedy You’ve Got Mail. Feige earned his first producer credit on X-Men, a film that is credited with revitalizing the comic book genre.
AMY PASCAL (Producer) started Pascal Pictures, which is based at Sony Pictures Entertainment. It has a number of high-profile film projects in varied stages of development. Most recently the banner produced the hit comedy Ghostbusters starring Melissa McCarthy, Kristin Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones. Other films in development at Pascal Pictures include a film adaptation of the thriller novel Maestra by S.L. Knight; a film adaptation of David Lagercrantz’s The Girl in the Spider’s Web, which is the sequel to Stieg Larsson’s successful The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy; a film adaptation of Molly Bloom’s underground poker memoir Molly’s Game, which Aaron Sorkin will write and make his feature directorial debut; and a film adaptation of game designer Zoe Quinn’s memoir Crash Override: How To Save The Internet From Itself. Pascal Pictures will also be producing for television, and its first projects include “Darktown,” which they bought with Sony Pictures Television, and a series about 1960s and 1970s Los Angeles, based on Eve Babitz’s memoirs, that they will produce with TriStar Television.
Pascal joined Columbia Pictures in 1988, while Dawn Steel was president. Except for a brief stint when she started Turner Pictures for Ted Turner, Sony Pictures has been Pascal’s home for the past 27 years.
Pascal was Chairman of SPE’s Motion Picture Group for 20 years. During Pascal’s tenure, she and her team were responsible for some of the most profitable and beloved movies of recent years, including: American Hustle; Captain Phillips; the Spider-Man™ franchise; the James Bond films Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace and Skyfall; Moneyball; The Social Network; 21 Jump Street; Zero Dark Thirty; District 9; The DaVinci Code and Angels & Demons; Hitch; The Pursuit of Happyness; Big Daddy; Superbad; Stuart Little; Click; Charlie’s Angels; Something’s Gotta Give; 50 First Dates; Salt; Girl, Interrupted; The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; Panic Room; Julie & Julia; 2012; S.W.A.T.; Ghost Rider; The Grudge; Eat Pray Love; Michael Jackson’s This Is It; Big Fish; Zombieland; Easy A; Cloudy with a Chance of Meatball; A Knight’s Tale; Ali; Lords of Dogtown; The Interview; Pineapple Express; Step Brothers; Single White Female; The Ides of March; Cruel Intentions; 28 days; Adaptation; Fury; the Men in Black franchise; The Karate Kid; Memoirs of a Geisha; The Equalizer; and Bad Boys II.
During Pascal’s early years at Columbia, she oversaw such memorable motion pictures as Groundhog Day, Awakenings, A League of Their Own, Little Women, Sense and Sensibility and To Die For.
In 1994, Pascal joined Turner Pictures as President of Production. During her two years at Turner, the company was responsible for projects including: Michael; Wings of Desire; Any Given Sunday; You’ve Got Mail; and Fallen.
Pascal began her career working for legendary BBC producer Tony Garnett at Kestral Films, where they produced Earth Girls Are Easy.
In 2013, Pascal was elected to the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
She also serves on the Honorary Committee of the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Los Angeles and in 2008 was awarded the Humanitarian Award from the Simon Wiesenthal Center.
Pascal grew up in Los Angeles where she still lives with her husband and son.
JONATHAN GOLDSTEIN (Co-Writer / Screen Story) is a writer and director whose credits include the hit ensemble Horrible Bosses, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 the reboot of Vacation.
After graduating from Harvard law School in 1995 and practicing for two years at a large New York law firm, Goldstein ran screaming from his office, moved to LA and became a comedy writer. Over the next 12 years, he wrote and produced numerous network television comedies, including “The PJ’s” starring Eddie Murphy, “The Geena Davis Show,” “Good Morning Miami,” “Four Kings,” and “The New Adventures of Old Christine.” In 2007, in collaboration with his feature writing partner, John Francis Daley, Goldstein sold his first film script, The $40,000 Man, to New Line Cinema. That script landed on the Hollywood “Black List,” and launched the team’s screenwriting career.
In 2015, Goldstein and Daley made their directorial debut with the summer feature Vacation, which they also wrote. The film grossed over $104 million worldwide. In 2011, the pair wrote the hilarious comedy Horrible Bosses, which earned over $200 million at the worldwide box office and quickly became the highest grossing dark comedy of all time. Also among their feature writing credits are The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, starring Steve Carell and Jim Carrey, and the 2013 hit animated film Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, which earned over $200 million globally and opened at number one in its first weekend at the box office.
Up next, Goldstein and Daley co-wrote and directed the New Line comedy thriller Game Night starring Jason Bateman, Rachel McAdams, Kyle Chandler and Jesse Plemons. Game Night is set for release on Valentine’s Day 2018.
Goldstein lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the novelist Adena Halpern, and their son.
JOHN FRANCIS DALEY (Co-Writer / Screen Story) came to national attention as an actor when he was cast in the lead role of Sam Weir in the critically acclaimed Judd Apatow-produced television series “Freaks and Geeks” alongside Seth Rogen, James Franco and Jason Segel.
Following “Freaks and Geeks,” Daley starred on several television series, such as “The Geena Davis Show,” “The Kennedys,” “Regular Joe” and the Fox comedy “Kitchen Confidential” with Bradley Cooper. He can also be seen in the feature films A View from the Top, 77 and Waiting, alongside Ryan Reynolds.
For the past seven years, Daley has starred on the hit Fox series “Bones” as Dr. Lance Sweets. He most recently starred on the big screen alongside Anna Kendrick in the comedy fantasy Rapture-Palooza.
In 2007, Daley and his feature writing partner, Jonathan Goldstein, sold their first screenplay, The $40,000 Man, to New Line Cinema. The duo then made their debut as screenwriters with the hit ensemble comedy Horrible Bosses, which grossed over $200 million worldwide and became the highest grossing dark comedy of all time. They followed the success of Horrible Bosses with the 2011 comedy short Audio Tour, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone and the 2013 animated family comedy Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2. In 2015 Daley and Goldstein made their directorial debut with the summer feature Vacation, which they also wrote. The film grossed over $104 million worldwide.
Up next, Goldstein and Daley co-wrote and directed the New Line comedy thriller Game Night starring Jason Bateman and Rachel McAdams. They will make their producing debut on the upcoming action comedy All Day and a Night for Relativity studios.
Additionally, Daley plays keyboard, sings and writes music.
Christopher Ford (Co-Writer), an NYU film school grad, has written multiple features such as Robot & Frank, starring an all-star cast including Frank Langella and Susan Sarandon; Clown and Cop Car, both directed by Jon Watts; and the upcoming Clovehitch, starring Dylan McDermott. He also has a graphic novel series called Stickman Odyssey.
CHRIS McKENNA (Co-Writer), with feature writing partner Erik Sommers, most recently worked on the hit film The LEGO Batman Movie, as well as the upcoming releases Jumanji and Ant-Man and The Wasp. McKenna previously served as executive producer and co-showrunner of the critically acclaimed TV series “Community,” for which he earned nominations for both an Emmy Award© for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series and a Hugo Award for the episode “Remedial Chaos Theory.” He also shared a nomination for a Writers Guild of America Award for his work on “The Mindy Project.” McKenna began writing for TV on the long-running FOX animated series “American Dad.”
ERIK SOMMERS (Co-Writer) is a writer/producer who has written for a number of popular television series, including NBC’s “Community,” ABC’s “Happy Endings,” and FOX’s “American Dad,” for which he shared a 2012 Primetime Emmy nomination and voiced several characters. With writing partner Chris McKenna, his feature film credits include The LEGO Batman Movie as well as the upcoming Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and Ant Man and The Wasp.
LOUIS D’ESPOSITO (Executive Producer) is co-president of Marvel Studios. He served as executive producer on the blockbuster hits Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, Marvel’s The Avengers, Captain America: the Winter Soldier, Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Ant-Man, Captain American: Civil War, Doctor Strange, and Guardians of The Galaxy: Vol. 2, as well as working with Marvel Studios’ president Kevin Feige on the future Marvel slate that includes Thor: Ragnorok, Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther, Ant-Man and the Wasp, and Captain Marvel.
As co-president of the studio and executive producer on all Marvel films, D’Esposito balances running the studio with overseeing each film from its development stage to distribution.
In addition to executive producing Marvel Studios’ films, D’Esposito directed the Marvel One-Shot film Item 47, which made its debut to fans at the 2012 Comic-Con International in San Diego and was featured again at the LA Shorts Fest in September 2012. The project was released as an added feature on the Marvel’s The Avengers Blu-ray disc. With the success of Item 47, Esposito directed the second Marvel One-Shot, Agent Carter, starring Hayley Atwell, which premiered at 2013 Comic-Con to critical praise from the press and fans. The project is also an added feature on the Iron Man 3 Blu-ray disc.
D’Esposito began his tenure at Marvel Studios in 2006. Prior to Marvel, D’Esposito’s executive producing credits included the 2006 hit film The Pursuit of Happyness, starring Will Smith, Zathura: A Space Adventure, and the 2003 hit S.W.A.T., starring Samuel L. Jackson and Colin Farrell.
VICTORIA ALONSO (Executive Producer), executive vice president of Physical Production for Marvel Studios, recently worked on James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and is currently executive producing Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok for Marvel Studios; she is also in production on Marvel Studios’ Black Panther and Avengers: Infinity War.
In her executive role, she also oversees post-production and visual effects for the studio slate. She executive produced Scott Derrickson’s Doctor Strange, Peyton Reed’s Ant-Man, Joss Whedon’s Avengers: Age of Ultron, James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Joe and Anthony Russo’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Alan Taylor’s Thor: The Dark World, Shane Black’s Iron Man 3, Joss Whedon’s The Avengers, Kenneth Branagh’s Thor, and Joe Johnston’s Captain America: The First Avenger.
Alonso’s career began at the nascency of the visual effects industry, when she served as a commercial visual effects producer. From there, she VFX-produced numerous feature films, working with such directors as Ridley Scott (Kingdom of Heaven), Tim Burton (Big Fish) and Andrew Adamson (Shrek), to name a few.
JEREMY LATCHAM (Executive Producer) is the senior vice president of production and development at Marvel Studios. Latcham served as an executive producer on the 2012 blockbuster hit Marvel’s The Avengers, which shattered box-office records, becoming Disney’s highest-grossing domestic release of all time.
Latcham also served as executive producer on Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, which was the top grossing domestic film of 2014 with 332 million. Latcham also served as the associate producer on the 2008 critically acclaimed blockbuster Iron Man and as the co-producer on the hit 2010 follow-up Iron Man 2.
A graduate of Northwestern University, Latcham began his career at Miramax and Dimension Films and also worked at the Endeavor Agency. In 2004, he joined Marvel Studios where he has also held the titles of vice president, director of development and creative executive. In 2011, Latcham was featured as one of Hollywood’s New Leaders by Variety.
PATRICIA WHITCHER (Executive Producer) recently served as executive producer on Godzilla and Marvel’s The Avengers, which set the all-time, domestic three-day weekend box-office record at $207.4 million. The film went on to gross over $1.5 billion.
She also served as executive producer on Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh and starring Chris Hemsworth, and Tom Hiddleston, The film debuted in first place and grossed over $445 million worldwide at the box office.
Before entering the Marvel universe, Whitcher was an executive producer on The Soloist, the real-life drama filmed on L.A.’s skid row and onstage at Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2008. Adapted from newspaper articles written by Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez, the film starred Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx.
In 2006, Whitcher was executive producer of the film adaptation of the Broadway musical Dreamgirls, starring Jamie Foxx, Beyoncé Knowles, Eddie Murphy and Jennifer Hudson. Directed by Bill Condon, Dreamgirls won two Academy Awards® (for Hudson and for sound mixing) and earned eight nominations. Memoirs of a Geisha, which Whitcher executive-produced in 2005 for director Rob Marshall, was another big Oscar® contender with six nominations and three wins (art direction, cinematography and costume design).
Whitcher previously executive-produced Steven Spielberg’s dramatic comedy The Terminal, starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones. Her producing credits also include Brad Silberling’s Moonlight Mile, starring Dustin Hoffman and Susan Sarandon; Where the Heart Is, starring Natalie Portman and Ashley Judd; and P.J. Hogan’s smash hit My Best Friend’s Wedding, starring Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz. Additional producing credits include How to Make an American Quilt, High School High and A Dangerous Woman.
Before producing, Whitcher served as a unit production manager on True Lies, The Meteor Man, The Lawnmower Man, Iron Maze and Darkman. A lifelong Los Angeles resident, she is the mother of two children and a graduate of Loyola Marymount University.
STAN LEE (Executive Producer) is the founder of POW! Entertainment and has served as its chairman and chief creative officer since inception. Known to millions as the man whose superheroes propelled Marvel to its preeminent position in the comic book industry, Stan Lee’s co-creations include Spider-Man, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men, The Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Daredevil, Silver Surfer and Dr. Strange.
Now the chairman emeritus of Marvel Media, Lee first became publisher of Marvel Comics in 1972. He is recognized as the creative force that brought Marvel to the forefront of the comic publishing industry. In 1977 he introduced Spider-Man as a syndicated newspaper strip that became the most successful of all syndicated adventure strips and now appears in more than 500 newspapers worldwide—making it the longest running of all superhero strips.
From June 2001 until the formal creation of POW! in November 2001, Lee worked to form POW! and to create intellectual property for POW! and start the development of various POW! projects.
AVI ARAD (Executive Producer) was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Marvel Studios, the film and television division of Marvel Entertainment, and Chief Creative Officer of Marvel Entertainment. In June of 2006, Arad branched off to form his own production company — Arad Productions, Inc. Arad has been a driving force behind bringing many of Marvel’s most famous comic book characters to the screen, with a track record that has been nothing short of spectacular, including a string of No. 1 box office openings.
As a producer or executive producer, his credits include Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (Columbia Pictures); X-Men, X2: X-Men United; and X-Men: The Last Stand (Twentieth Century Fox); The Hulk (Universal Pictures); Daredevil (New Regency); The Punisher (Lionsgate); Blade, Blade II and Blade: Trinity (New Line Cinema); Elektra (Twentieth Century Fox); The Fantastic Four and its sequel Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (Twentieth Century Fox); Bratz: The Movie (Lionsgate); Ghost Rider and Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (Columbia Pictures); Iron Man (Paramount Pictures); and The Incredible Hulk (Universal).
Arad’s current feature film slate includes Venom (Columbia Pictures), an animated Spider-Man feature (Sony Pictures Animation), Uncharted (Columbia Pictures), Metal Gear Solid (Columbia Pictures), Naruto (Lionsgate), Borderlands (Lionsgate), and many more.
Arad has also been producing animation for over 20 years on such series such as “X-Men,” “Fantastic Four,” “Silver Surfer,” “Iron Man,” “Spider-Man,” “Conan the Adventurer,” “King Arthur & The Knights of Justice,” “Bots Master,” and on direct-to-video animated features such as Avengers, Iron Man and many others.
Additionally, Arad created “Mutant X” and produced sixty-six hours of the live-action TV series for Tribune Entertainment. He also produced thirteen hours of BLADE, the live-action TV series for Spike TV. Currently Arad is producing the Netflix Original Series “Tarzan and Jane,” “Super Monsters,” and others.
Born in Cyprus and raised in Israel, Arad came to the United States during his college years and enrolled at Hofstra University to study industrial management. He earned a bachelor of business administration from the University in 1972. A long- established expert in youth entertainment, Arad is one of the world’s top toy designers. He has been involved in the creation and development of over two hundred successful products, including action figures, play sets, dolls, toy vehicles, electronic products, educational software and video games. In fact, virtually every major toy and youth entertainment manufacturer, including Toy Biz, Hasbro, Mattel, MGA, Nintendo, Tiger, Ideal, Galoob, Tyco, Sega and THQ, has been selling his products for more than 30 years.
In addition to his toy, animation, and film projects, today, Arad served as the Executive Advisor of NAMCO BANDAI Holdings and as a Chairperson of Production I.G’s American affiliate – Production I.G., LLC.
Matt Tolmach (Executive Producer) is currently producing the highly anticipated feature film reimagining Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, directed by Jake Kasdan and starring Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, and Kevin Hart, which is currently in post-production for Sony Pictures and set for a Christmas release. Tolmach is executive producing the Hulu series “Future Man” with Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. He previously produced The Amazing Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man 2, directed by Marc Webb, as well as Alex Gibney’s The Armstrong Lie. He and Frank Marshall are executive producing the documentary “What Haunts Us,” directed by Paige Tolmach. As President of Columbia Pictures for many years, Tolmach oversaw some of the studio’s most acclaimed and successful films, including Moneyball, The Pursuit of Happyness, Superbad, Pineapple Express, Zombieland, Step Brothers, The Da Vinci Code, 2012, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man, Talladega Nights, The Panic Room, The Grudge, and many others.
SALVATORE TOTINO (Director of Photography) most recently worked with director Ron Howard on Inferno, In the Heart of the Sea, The Dilemma, Angels & Demons, Frost/Nixon and DaVinci Code and previously teamed with the director on Cinderella Man. His other recent credits include Concussion, Everest and People Like Us,
Totino first served as cinematographer on Oliver Stone’s Any Given Sunday, then went on to shoot Changing Lanes, starring Ben Affleck and Samuel L. Jackson. His first collaboration with Howard was the director’s suspenseful Western The Missing, starring Cate Blanchett and Tommy Lee Jones.
A CLIO Award winner, Totino has shot more than 300 commercials and music videos, working with such artists as Tina Turner, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, R.E.M., Radiohead and many others. A native of Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, and the son of Italian immigrants, Totino was interested in photography at an early age. He began his career as a production assistant on commercials and worked his way through the ranks of camera departments on television and film projects before becoming a director of photography.
Among his credits during this period was the New York portion of Jim Jarmusch’s Night on Earth, on which he served as a focus puller.
OLIVER SCHOLL (Production Designer) is a German-born production designer and artist. An avid reader of science-fiction and non-fiction, Scholl’s interest in the merging of art, technology and story began in his teens and continues to inform his work today. At the age of 15, Scholl’s first of many illustrations were published in the German science fiction series, Perry Rhodan. He studied industrial design while continuing illustration for advertising and publishing. Early development work for film director Roland Emmerich's Stargate led to Scholl’s transition into the motion picture industry and his relocation to Los Angeles in 1991.
Scholl most recently served as production designer on Nikolaj Arcel’s The Dark Tower starring Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey. He also recently designed the films Suicide Squad, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., and Edge of Tomorrow.
Scholl’s other credits as a production designer are Doug Liman’s Jumper, The Time Machine, Godzilla, Independence Day, and Moon 44.
LOUISE FROGLEY (Costume Designer) is currently designing the costumes for Marvel’s Ant-Man and the Wasp. Her most recent credits include Free State of Jones, The Finest Hours, Unbroken, The Monuments Men, and Iron Man 3, as well as Robert Zeimekis’ Oscar® nominated film Flight starring Denzel Washington. She has also collaborated with Steven Soderbergh five times, on the films Contagion, Ocean’s Thirteen, The Good German, The Limey, and Traffic. She earned Costume Designers Guild Award nominations for Excellence in Costume Design for a Contemporary Film for her work on both Oceans’ Thirteen and Traffic.
Frogley was also honored by her peers with guild award nominations for her work on Good Night, and Good Luck, directed by and starring George Clooney, and for Stephen Gaghan’s Syriana, also starring Clooney. She also teamed with Clooney on the comedy The Men Who Stare at Goats, the period romantic comedy Leatherheads, The Ides of March,” and The Monuments Men.
Her other recent credits include the Marc Forster’s James Bond adventure Quantum of Solace, starring Daniel Craig; the romantic drama The Last Song, Robert Redford’s period drama The Conspirator; and the pilot for the acclaimed CBS series “The Good Wife.”
Frogley began her career in London and Paris as a costume designer and set decorator. Her first movie assignment was as assistant costume designer on director Hugh Hudson’s Academy Award®-winning drama Chariots of Fire. She has since designed costumes for more than 30 features, including Neil Jordan’s Mona Lisa; Ron Shelton’s Bull Durham; Executive Decision; U.S. Marshals; Spy Game and Man on Fire for director Tony Scott; Francis Lawrence’s Constantine; and Stephen Gaghan’s directorial debut, Abandon.
DAN LEBENTAL, ACE (Editor) has been editing in Hollywood since 1990, the year he edited his first feature. That film was followed closely by the Hughes brothers’ Dead Presidents. He also collaborated with the brothers on From Hell.
After more than 25 years in the industry, Lebental has cut more than 30 feature films (both indies and tent-pole studio features) in a wide variety of genres as well as television dramas, documentaries and shorts. His enthusiasm for good stories is matched only by his total dedication to the craft of cutting, his world-class technical expertise
Lebental’s studio portfolio includes Marvel Studios’ blockbusters Iron Man and Iron Man 2, starring Robert Downey, Jr., which both opened No. 1 at the U.S. box office and have grossed more than $1 billion combined. He also edited the blockbusters Thor: The Dark World and Ant- Man as well as the Marvels short All Hail the King.
Lebental has a longtime collaboration with director Jon Favreau, including such films as New Line Cinema’s Elf, Columbia Pictures’ Zathura: A Space Adventure, and Universal Pictures’ Cowboys & Aliens. Lebental met Favreau as an actor, while he was cutting Peter Berg’s Very Bad Things. In addition to editing the majority of Favreau’s movies, Lebental also edited the first season of Favreau’s television show, “Dinner for Five,” and edited the pilot episodes of Favreau’s “In case of Emergency and Revolution.”
Throughout his career as an editor, Lebental has also maintained and developed a close professional relationship with actor/producer Vince Vaughn, for whom he cut Universal Pictures’ The Break-Up, Wild West Comedy Show: 30 Days & 30 Nights—Hollywood to the Heartland, Couples Retreat, and Term Life.
DEBBIE BERMAN (Editor) most recently served as editor on the films The Jesuit starring Tommy Flanagan and Ron Perlman and The Final Girls starring Malin Akerman and Alexander Ludwig.
Berman’s other editing credits include Black November, The Untitled, Touchback, The Zero Sum, Within and Space Chimps.
MICHAEL GIACCHINO (Composer) has credits that feature some of the most popular and acclaimed film projects in recent history, including Rogue One, Doctor Strange, Zootopia, Inside Out, Jurassic World, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, The Incredibles, Ratatouille and Mission: Impossible–Ghost Protocol. Giacchino’s 2009 score for the Pixar hit Up earned him an Oscar®, a Golden Globe®, the BAFTA, the Broadcast Film Critics’ Choice Award and two GRAMMY® Awards.
Giacchino’s next project is War for the Planet of the Apes; his music may also be heard in Colin Trevorrow’s The Book of Henry. He is also working on the upcoming sequels to Jurassic World and The Incredibles, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
Giacchino began his filmmaking career at the age of 10 in his backyard in Edgewater Park, New Jersey, and eventually went on to study filmmaking at the School of Visual Arts in NYC. After college, he landed a marketing job at Disney and began studies in music composition, first at Juilliard and then at UCLA. From marketing, he became a producer in the fledgling Disney Interactive Division, where he had the opportunity to write music for video games.
After moving to a producing job at the newly formed DreamWorks Interactive Division, he was asked to score the temp track for the video game adaptation of The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Subsequently, Steven Spielberg hired him as the composer and it became the first PlayStation game to have a live orchestral score. Giacchino continued writing for video games and became well known for his “Medal of Honor” scores.
Giacchino’s work in video games sparked the interest of J.J. Abrams, and thus began their long-standing relationship that would lead to scores for the hit television series “Alias” and “Lost,” and the feature films Mission Impossible: III, Star Trek, Super 8 and Star Trek Into Darkness.
Additional projects include collaborations with Disney Imagineering on music for Space Mountain, Star Tours (with John Williams) and the Ratatouille ride in Disneyland Paris. Giacchino also was the musical director of the 81st Annual Academy Awards®. His music can be heard in concert halls internationally with Star Trek, Star Trek Into Darkness and Ratatouille films being performed live-to-picture with a full orchestra.
Star Trek Beyond, directed by Justin Lin, marks his first third in a franchise and was released last summer.
Giacchino serves as the Governor of the Music Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and sits on the advisory board of Education Through Music Los Angeles.
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Production Information
“Spider-Man is an icon, one of the greatest superheroes of all time. We are finally able to bring him home to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.”
– Kevin Feige, Marvel Studios President and Producer of Spider-Man: Homecoming
A young Peter Parker/Spider-Man (Tom Holland), who made his sensational debut in Captain America: Civil War, enters the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Embraced all over the world, Spider-Man is the most popular comic book character in history and the crown jewel of Marvel comics. Now, he comes home in a film with a fresh, fun tone and new take, produced by Marvel Studios, that brings the Peter Parker of the comic books to the screen alongside MCU heroes for the first time.
Thrilled by his experience with the Avengers, Peter returns home, where he lives with his Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), under the watchful eye of his new mentor Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.). Peter tries to fall back into his normal daily routine – distracted by thoughts of proving himself to be more than just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man – but when the Vulture (Michael Keaton) emerges as a new villain, everything that Peter holds most important will be threatened. His moment has arrived as he is challenged to become the hero he is meant to be.
Columbia Pictures presents a Marvel Studios / Pascal Pictures production, Spider-Man™: Homecoming. Starring Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Jon Favreau, Zendaya, Donald Glover, Tyne Daly, with Marisa Tomei and Robert Downey Jr. Directed by Jon Watts. Screenplay by Jonathan Goldstein & John Francis Daley and Jon Watts & Christopher Ford and Chris McKenna & Erik Sommers. Screen Story by Jonathan Goldstein & John Francis Daley. Based on the Marvel Comic Book by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Produced by Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal. Executive Producers are Louis D’Esposito, Victoria Alonso, Patricia Whitcher, Jeremy Latcham, Stan Lee, Avi Arad, and Matt Tolmach. Mitch Bell, Eric Hauserman Carroll, and Rachel O’Connor serve as Co-Producers. Director of Photography is Salvatore Totino ASC, AIC. Production Designer is Oliver Scholl. Editors are Dan Lebental ACE and Debbie Berman. Visual Effects Supervisor is Janek Sirrs. Costume Designer is Louise Frogley. Music by Michael Giacchino. Music Supervision by Dave Jordan.
ABOUT THE FILM
In Spider-Man: Homecoming, Peter Parker strives to join the Avengers as the most popular character in comic book history takes his rightful place as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Marvel’s crown jewel, Spider-Man made a cameo debut in the MCU in Captain America: Civil War last summer; the overwhelming positive reaction by both the critics and fans to the new vision for the character has whetted the appetite as now, Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios team for this new adventure.
Tom Holland, who plays the web-slinger, adds that before Peter can join his heroes, he has a host of challenges to face. “Peter goes from having the time of his life battling with the Avengers in Civil War to suddenly feeling like he’s got nothing to do,” explains Holland. “Tony Stark has assigned him to be the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, which means helping get cats out of trees, helping old ladies across the street and stopping petty thieves – nothing too hairy. But then Spider-Man stumbles across high-tech weapons, which leads him down a path of learning and mastering his new abilities and powers.”
And if Peter is going to prove himself worthy of being an Avenger, he will have to face a mentor like no other. “Tony Stark has taken a continued interest in Peter Parker,” says Robert Downey Jr. “He’s helping him up his game with a new suit and tech. But he’s kind of keeping a real close eye on him and making sure that he’s worthy of being a potential recruit for the Avengers.”
For producer and Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, bringing the character into the Marvel Cinematic Universe in an original way that film audiences have never seen before was a top priority. “Over the past 15 years, we have built the Marvel Cinematic Universe with so many characters and movies, and now we have the opportunity to introduce Peter Parker and the Spider-Man franchise into that universe for the first time,” says Feige. “It’s exciting because that’s how he truly was in the comics, from the very beginning – he didn’t enter the comics as the only hero; he entered a world in which Tony Stark, Captain America and the Avengers all were there. And now, for the first time, we get that in an entire film, which makes it fresh and new.”
Producer Amy Pascal speaks to the unprecedented collaboration. “This movie is a product of Sony and Marvel working closely together,” says Pascal. “It’s a Sony movie and a Marvel production. Everyone came together and decided if we can put Spider-Man back in the MCU, which he always was a part of in the comics, everybody wins – and the biggest winner is the fans, as they finally get to see what they’ve been waiting a long time to see.”
“Putting Spider-Man in the MCU is the best thing in the world for me as a storyteller,” says director Jon Watts, who takes the helm of Spider-Man: Homecoming. “Not only did they take care of the origin story and heavy lifting in Captain America: Civil War – which they did so economically and beautifully – we also didn’t have to spend any time explaining why this 16-year-old kid would come up with the idea of becoming a superhero. He’s grown up in the MCU; when Peter Parker was eight years old, he saw Tony Stark say ‘I am Iron Man’ on TV. So the idea of this being a world where superheroes exist means that we don’t have to spend any time addressing any of these issues. We just get right into the fun of it.”
Keeping with the mantra of wanting a fresh new story and tone for the franchise, the filmmakers chose Watts to direct the film. Watts’ persistence and previous work convinced Feige and Pascal that he was the right person for the job. “Kevin and I saw a small film Jon wrote and directed called Cop Car,” says Pascal. “It was incredibly impressive. He was able to get incredible performances from two children who were not actors. It was completely tense; you love these kids. He showed he has that rare quality of being able to tell a story through action.”
“What was important to us was not that he proved that he could shoot a big action sequence, because a lot of directors can do that,” says Feige. “It was that every time he showed us something, it came from the place and humor of Peter Parker himself.”
For Watts, being tapped to direct Spider-Man: Homecoming was something he never thought was a possibility when he first met with Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige. “When Marvel called for a meeting, I assumed it was just to see what I was like,” he recalls. “Then, they started to talk about what they wanted to do with Spider-Man and this amazing new opportunity where Sony and Marvel were teaming up. I was incredibly excited when I left and proceeded to beat them into submission until they said yes.”
Watts’ film Cop Car was an influential film in the boardrooms and creative studios of Hollywood. “I think one thing that people really responded to in Cop Car was the performances felt like the way real kids would talk and act,” explains Watts. “I really remember what it was like to be in high school, when your brain isn’t an adult brain yet – you’re thinking about things in a very skewed, specific way. That’s was one of things I wanted to inject into the story and film.”
Watts also connected with Peter Parker specifically in a very personal way, with parallels to his own youth. “I’ve always sympathized with Peter Parker, because I was a science nerd in high school, just like Peter is before he gets bit by the spider,” he reveals. “I loved chemistry and was going to college to be a chemical engineer. I would hang out in the chemistry room at lunch. My friends were other kids who were into chemistry, physics… we were just the nerdiest group of people.”
“Imagine if you had Spider-Man’s abilities – you would spend every moment of your day trying to maximize the amount of time you get to be Spider-Man, because it would be the best feeling in the world,” Watts continues. “Sure, there are all these responsibilities that come with the power of being Spider-Man, but it’s also important to remember how much fun it would be to be swinging from building to building. It’s a great yin and yang effect: having to deal with all the complications and stress from having these powers, but at the same time the fun and excitement of it all.”
“I hope what we’re doing is telling a relatable Spider-Man story,” says Pascal. “What has always been great about the character of Peter Parker is that he has the same sort hopes, dreams, and problems that we all had. So audiences who are going to be able to instantly identify with Peter Parker, but at the same time see a Spider-Man interacting in a world he was not able to be a part of before.”
“We introduced Spider-Man in Civil War and you got to see the banter and the fun and contrast between he and the other heroes there,” says Feige. “And now, after the greatest vacation of all time, in which he got to spend this time with these rock stars, he’s got to go back to high school. So, it exacerbates his problem – a problem that I certainly had and I think most people who go to high school have – ‘Is there something more for me out there?’ But Peter knows there is because he just did it. He thinks he’s ready, and of course when you’re fifteen years old you often think you’re ready for something before you really are. That’s the fun of this movie, that’s the relatability of Peter Parker, and that’s why we wanted to do this and reintroduce Spider-Man to audiences through the lens of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.”
In selecting Tom Holland for the role, the filmmakers cast an actor who has the youth the character needs in this story. “That’s the character as he was in the comics originally,” says Feige. “That was the miracle when we found Tom Holland, because we found someone who could clearly look and play fifteen years old. We wanted to keep that as the contrast to some of our other superheroes who look good, but are not fifteen.”
And Peter’s arc in this film, as he rises to be a hero, is one that fits perfectly with his age. “Peter Parker loves being Spider-Man but he doesn’t necessarily love being Peter Parker,” says director Jon Watts. “Peter Parker sort of represents everything that he was – an awkward, weird science nerd – but now, he has a whole new life ahead of him being a superhero who hangs with Tony Stark and Captain America and all the Avengers. But even though he has all these new powers and connections, he hasn’t come to terms with who he is as Peter Parker. One of the journeys for him is realizing that you can’t move ahead to be Spider-Man until you’ve really figured out who you are as Peter Parker.”
Playing Spider-Man is a dream long in the making for Holland. “Five years ago, I was at the Empire Awards in London and one of the interviewers asked me if I could be a superhero, who would I be,” recalls the actor. “I said, ‘In ten years, I’d like to be the Spider-Man after Andrew Garfield.’ I would never have guessed that it would have come true so quickly.”
After several rounds of sending in tapes of himself, Holland recalls his final test: meeting with Robert Downey Jr. But before he could meet Tony Stark, he got the next-best thing. “I actually met Robert’s stand-in first – he looks a lot like Robert. I thought, ‘Wow, you look really different in real life’ – and got the immediate nerves of meeting him out of the way. When Robert came in, we improvised and riffed off each other, which was great.”
And Iron Man himself vouches for the casting. “Tom Holland is just the perfect man for the job,” says Downey. “He’s enthusiastic, bright and gifted, a very physically talented guy by virtue of his dance and acrobatic background. He has just the right combination of elements required to bring a new take on the character.”
“Tom was astonishing during the casting process,” says Amy Pascal. “He brought a whole other quality to Peter Parker that was so true in the comics. We screen-tested a lot of kids, but from the first second we saw him on the monitor with Robert Downey Jr., we knew he was the one.”
“The energy of Tom Holland meeting Robert Downey Jr. for the first time was exactly what we wanted out of Peter Parker meeting Tony Stark,” says Kevin Feige. “The audition scene was the bedroom scene in Captain America: Civil War, and so we wanted to continue that relationship between Peter Parker and Tony Stark that we set up in the film.”
“Tom Holland has a wide-eyed innocence, he seems awkward and stumbly, but you feel like there’s a rightness and deep morality at the heart of it. To see this kid totally hold his own and bring the scene to life was impressive,” says Watts. “It was just the three of them – Marisa Tomei, Robert Downey Jr. and Tom Holland – doing this scene, and it felt so alive and exciting that it blew open the doors for the possibilities of where I could take the story in Spider-Man: Homecoming.”
Holland says that the give-and-take between the director and star was natural, organic, authentic, and easy. “Jon is great at collaborating and letting you have your own voice in bringing your own version of the character to the screen,” he says. “He’s an actor’s director. We were both thrown in the deep end a bit – I’ve never been in a movie of this scale as the lead before, and he’s never directed a movie of this scale – so we helped each other out as much as we could, and we built a really nice relationship around it.”
Spider-Man: Homecoming picks up the action directly following the epic battle scene of Captain America: Civil War, with Tony Stark returning “underoos” back home to Queens. “Peter really believes he has a mentor in Tony Stark, and Tony really likes Peter, but he can’t be babysitting this kid,” Feige explains. “Tony gives Peter a little bit of rope to see what he can do on his own.”
Peter believes that his “internship” with Stark Industries is merely a prelude and test toward becoming a full-fledged member of the Avengers – but the spider needs to learn to crawl before it can fly, as Holland explains: “We go back in time to relive the Civil War splash panel fight from Peter’s perspective. We see him having the time of his life. He’s on a private jet with Happy, he’s staying in this crazy beautiful hotel room to suddenly him being crammed on a subway late for school. No one’s called him to give him another mission. That’s the contrast: the kid at summer camp is suddenly the kid back at school.”
“Tony becomes a kind of father figure to Peter,” says Holland. “Peter’s trying to prove himself to Tony that he is old and wise enough to take on bigger tasks, but Tony keeps putting him down and telling him he isn’t ready yet. I think that’s what really drives Peter to possibly go down the wrong path, before he figures it out and we see why Peter Parker is the most beloved and powerful super hero of the MCU.”
It’s one thing for Peter Parker to have a father figure in Tony Stark – but he actually does have a familial guardian who cares deeply for him: his Aunt May. While Tony Stark helps Peter Parker up his game with a new suit and tech and monitors him as he navigates his newly found superhero powers, May is his guiding light.
“The character of Aunt May is so important to Peter Parker,” explains co-producer Eric Hauserman Carroll. “In this telling, we all agreed that the character should be more like a big sister or someone much closer to him in age.”
“How do we play Aunt May as a young single mom still trying to figure out her own way through life?” asks Kevin Feige. “She clearly did an amazing thing in the past by taking in Peter and raising him. She’s had tragedies in her past that we allude to, but ultimately, she is a woman who, like Peter, is trying to find her way. It gives her character a much more contemporary arc.”
With that in mind, the filmmakers cast Oscar® winner Marisa Tomei. “We took the spirit of who Aunt May is – in many ways, she’s Peter’s conscience – and see her dealing with things in the same way that Peter is. I think making the character younger and hipper is just a great way make that feel vital,” says Watts.
“In the vein of Spider-Man history, Aunt May takes over the maternal duties and gives guidance to Peter,” says Tomei. “In this iteration, we live in Queens, and it’s just May and Peter, and she is all about encouraging him to get out his shell a little bit. He’s super studious and very smart, which is great, but May also encourages him to have some more fun and experience life a little bit.”
This is an Aunt May who is much more in tune with her own youth as she raises a teenager. “Their relationship is very close and tender – she really is the person who gave him his values – but it’s clear to her that he’s hiding things from her,” says Tomei. “She’s concerned about what might be going on inside him, because she knows that high school can be a very difficult and awkward time. Of course, she doesn’t have any idea that what he’s hiding is that he’s a superhero.”
Tomei says that May’s relationship with Tony Stark is a careful one. “She thinks that Peter is an intern for Stark Industries, and she’s thrilled that he has that position – the potential to learn and have a mentor in Tony Stark. She’s been watching Tony Stark for a while and seen how he’s changed from being a hypercapitalist into a person who does more good on his own redemption trail. But she is keeping a close eye on how he is influencing Peter, so he doesn’t just become a workhorse. He is still a boy becoming a man, and needs space to explore his inner life and just be a kid.”
So, Peter is yearning for independence, and Tony and May are both willing to give him a bit to see how he handles it… and that independence leads him directly into the path of a dangerous new villain – The Vulture, Adrian Toomes, brought to life by Academy Award® nominee Michael Keaton. “Michael’s body of work is amazing,” says Feige. “He has so many qualities that made him perfect for the role, and there’s also the fun, meta quality in that he played Batman and Birdman. He’s at an incredible point in his career and comes to roles with such gravitas that elevated this character beyond our expectations.”
Holland has been a fan of Keaton’s for a long time, but he says that work took precedence when they first met. “I’ve been a huge fan of his ever since Beetlejuice,” says Holland. “The first time I’d met him, we shot the most intense scene of the whole film. It was just so intimidating and in all honesty required very little acting on my behalf because he brings this focused intensity that made me feel truly terrified. He’s also very generous and giving as an actor and his presence in the film really raises the stakes and action in the film.”
Spider-Man: Homecoming begins with a ground-level result of the previous MCU films: as thrilling as the Avengers’ battles have been, they’ve left ordinary New Yorkers with a mess to clean up – an effort that is still ongoing. The restoration effort has been very good for Adrian Toomes, whose salvage company has been awarded the contract of collecting the various alien articles and weaponry left behind in the wreckage… until Tony Stark swoops in by teaming with the government to create the Department of Damage Control, taking the entire business away from Toomes.
“Toomes is a hardworking guy who’s built a great business,” says Keaton. “He’s not wealthy, but he works hard, by dealing with the destruction that some of the Avengers’ adventures have caused. But when orders come down that this job is going to be under the auspices of Tony Stark, he thinks, well, what’s fair about that?”
This is what separates the heroes from the villains. Toomes, desperate to continue to provide for his family, begins stealing exotic alien technology, even building himself a wing suit that he and his men use to continue to rob the DODC trucks – repurposing their loot as weapons to sell on the black market.
“I wanted Spider-Man: Homecoming to be a ground-level super hero movie in the MCU, so we needed a ground-level villain,” says Watts. “I really liked the idea of having villains with problems that people can relate to. It’s not about world domination; it’s not about some crazy revenge plot; it’s about not having enough money to get by and really wanting to have a place in the world.”
“What’s cool about the Vulture is the same thing I thought was cool about Bruce Wayne – he builds his suit and armor and what he needs,” says Keaton. “He doesn’t have any kind of inherent super power; he’s just a man, though one who has all these other things going for him.”
Many actors, when called upon to play the villain, will say that the challenge is to find the universal human drive in the character and to almost be convinced by their misguided approaches. Keaton is no exception. “What’s kind of cool about the underlying plot in the story is that in some ways Peter doesn’t see the bigger picture; Toomes is a mature man who has seen first-hand how the world works,” he says. “Adrian Toomes looks at the real world and has experienced all its unfairness and inequity firsthand. That is how the Vulture thinks, and I think he’s kind of right.”
If Tony Stark is the father figure for Peter, Happy Hogan is the big brother. Irascible, annoyed, busy, but ultimately deeply caring, Tony’s right-hand man has been placed in charge of checking up on Peter’s progress while Tony does whatever it is genius billionaire playboy philanthropists do all day long.
“To Peter, Happy is that slightly older sibling who’s always giving you a hard time,” explains Carroll. “Happy thinks, ‘Wait a minute, you meet this new kid and make him a fancy suit, and he gets to fight alongside the Avengers?’ He takes a little bit of that jealousy out on Peter.”
Favreau grew up in Queens and attended a school not unlike Midtown Science, where Peter attends. For these reasons, he says, Spider-Man: Homecoming was a bit of a homecoming for the actor. “Because of what we had in common, I’ve always had an affinity for the character,” he says. “Seeing it depicted on film as it was in the books gives me a bit of a kick.”
Peter also has an ordinary life to lead – helped out by his best friend, Ned, played by Jacob Batalon.
While many of the actors in Spider-Man: Homecoming have experience with the behind-the-scenes demands of promoting an MCU film, Batalon is making his motion picture debut. (Not a bad way to start one’s career.) He got his first taste last year at Comic-Con, which culminated a long casting process. “The gravity of it didn’t sink in until we went to Comic-Con,” he says. “I could see how much fans love this character and go crazy for him. I’ve never felt an energy like that – and knowing that they support us really made me feel great. The first super hero film I saw was the first Spider-Man and those first films were such a big part of my childhood. It’s hard to explain what it feels like to know that you’re now part of building that story.”
In the film, Ned Leeds is Peter’s best friend and confidant. But when Peter begins his journey into the solitary world of Spider-Man, it leaves Ned as more of an outlier than his best buddy. “Ned’s very sweet, genuine – well, I guess you’d say he’s nerdy,” says Batalon. “He loves technology. He’s super-duper smart. And all he wants to do is be Peter’s right hand man. It is very tough on him not knowing what Peter is keeping from him – he finds it very frustrating and thinks that Peter is just getting too cool for him, like when you think you may lose a person who’s very important to you at one point in your life. So when Ned finally finds out Peter’s secret, it’s the greatest thing in the world for him – it’s going to be so cool having Spider-Man as his best friend.”
“The relationship between Peter and Ned is probably the most important relationship in the movie because Ned is the only person who Peter confides in and talks to about being Spider-Man,” says Tom Holland. “Tony Stark and Happy Hogan seem a little distant, so Ned is almost like a shrink that he can just really let it out to.”
And, Holland says, that’s similar to their off-screen dynamic. “Since day one, Jacob and I hit it off immediately. Jon sent us off on some tasks to sort of start bonding, but we didn’t really need to do that. We were already really good friends and we just gelled, and it’s exactly what happens in the movie.”
Even though Batalon was not the most experienced actor who was up for the role, Carroll says it was an easy call to cast him. “He brought an authentic, high school innocence,” he says. “He really is this young kid who’s super excited about everything. That came through in his screen test and auditions and translates perfectly to the way Ned Leeds would be excited about finding out that his best friend is Spider-Man. And he was the perfect Ned Leeds -- the entire crew loved him, he hugged every single person on his way to and from set, and he became the unofficial mascot of the production.”
At school, Peter and Ned face the toughest challenge of all: girls. Liz, played by Laura Harrier, is the ambitious, beautiful object of Peter’s affections, while Michelle, played by Zendaya, is the straight-shooter who sees through whatever game Peter thinks he has.
“Liz is very driven and smart. She’s a senior, so she’s a bit older – the other characters are sophomores,” says Harrier. “She goes through a huge character arc in this movie – at the beginning of the film, she’s completely focused on getting into college, going to MIT early decision, winning the academic decathlon… but by the end, after her experience with Peter, she completely reevaluates everything – there are so many bigger and more important things that she could’ve been focusing on than her chemistry test.”
At the outset of the story, Liz doesn’t really see any romantic possibilities with Peter – in fact, she doesn’t even notice his mooning over her. “But after a life-threatening event at the Washington Monument, she begins to rethink her perspective begins to see Peter as smart, interesting and cool,” says Harrier.
“It’s fun to play those scenes because Peter has a golden ticket he can’t use – he could get any girl in the world if he just said that he was Spider-Man. But he knows he can’t do that,” says Holland. “He knows he’s different and he knows he can be the best at everything, but he has to be mature enough not to make that wrong decision and tell everyone his secret.”
If Liz is the gorgeous, popular genius, Zendaya’s Michelle has chosen to stake out different ground. “My character is very smart, intellectual – but I’m not gonna lie: she’s super-weird,” says Zendaya. “She’s super-cool to me, because she’s constantly thinking about something, sits back and observes, and only says little things – but what she does say is very true and real.”
“Even by the end of the movie, we don’t know everything that’s going on with Michelle,” says Holland. “But she seems to follow Peter and Ned around quite a lot, so that might suggest that there’s a friendship to progress in the future.”
“Zendaya herself really informed her character,” adds Carroll. “In a school full of really smart kids who build computers at home in their spare time, she’s the kid walking around with a novel in her pocket and any spare moment she has is spent reading. She’s the artsy kid in a school full of nerds.”
For Zendaya, as cliché as it sounds, being cast in the film was a dream come true. “My first reaction was that this is one of the coolest things I’ve ever been a part of,” she says. “Everybody says ‘I always was a fan of Spider-Man’ but to be completely honest it’s true. The character was always my favorite growing up because I always felt like he was like the realest superhero. He wasn’t born with his powers, it just happened to him. He’s not well off financially; he deals with tragedy and normal everyday problems like paying rent and helping around the house, which I always thought that that was cool. I think that’s why a lot of people like Spider-Man; you can connect to him. When I was 16, my first date was to see Spider-Man. And now here I am now in a Spider-Man movie. Pretty crazy.”
Zendaya says that she especially appreciated the filmmakers’ approach, bringing a grounded, honest and real look to the superhero story. “The movie is full of diverse, real characters,” says Zendaya.
Standing in the way of a potential date with Liz is Flash Thompson, played by Tony Revolori, who moviegoers will recognize as Ralph Fiennes’ protégé in The Grand Budapest Hotel.
It’s very personal rivalry for Flash. “He can’t stand Peter Parker because Peter is so talented and smart and doesn’t need to study to get good grades. Flash studies extremely hard and works his butt off and still is always second fiddle to him,” says Revolori. “Flash has no idea that Peter is Spider-Man and will probably never realize that, because he does not want Peter to exist at all. There’s no way those two will ever come together in his mind.”
Among the villains, actors Bokeem Woodbine and Logan Marshall-Green join the cast as two of Adrian Toomes’ top guys, Schultz and Brice.
“Within the crew, Brice wants in bad in the superhero world, which is why he calls himself ‘The Shocker,’” adds Logan Marshall-Green. “That’s his idea. I think he’s a guy who’s gotten in over his head – a guy who Toomes probably did a favor for by putting him on his crew but is now compromising the crew, himself, and of course Toomes.”
Rounding out the talented cast of Spider-Man: Homecoming is Angourie Rice as academic decathlon team member Betty Brandt; Michael Chernus as Mason, Adrian Toomes’ salvage technician; Donald Glover as Aaron Davis; Tyne Daly as Anne Marie Hoeg, head of the DODC agency; Martin Starr as Mr. Harrington, the academic decathlon coach; Hannibal Buress as gym teacher Coach Wilson; Kenneth Choi as Principal Morita, Tiffany Espensen academic decathlon team member Cindy; Abraham Attah, the young actor acclaimed for his performance in Beasts of No Nation, as academic decathlon team member Abe; and Michael Barbieri as academic decathlon team member Charles.
“There’s no template in New York City schools – there’s every race, shape, and creed of kid at pretty much every school,” says Carroll. “So that freed us – we didn’t have to cast a type for any role – we could just find the best actor for each part, no matter how tall, short, what body shape they have or their race, let’s just find the best.”
ABOUT THE PRODUCTION
Spider-Man: Homecoming called Pinewood Studios Atlanta its home base, but for the first two weeks of shooting, Jon Watts set the tone by filming at a real Atlanta-area high school, which doubles as Midtown High School of Science.
This was not the only practical set in the film; on the contrary, Watts’ sensibilities as a director and his approach to making Spider-Man: Homecoming a grounded superhero film combined to make practical filming a priority.
“I come from the world of independent filming, where you really don’t have the luxury of building sets on stage. You’re basically on location the entire run of show,” says Watts. “It gets much tougher to do that on a big spectacle film with a lot of action and the need for secrecy, but our locations team came up with so many great practical locations that were not only able to double Queens and New York seamlessly, but also let us fly under the radar most of the time. Our production designer Oliver Scholl did a great job of augmenting physical locations and designing and building sets within existing practical locations.”
“Shooting on all of the practical sets was really a godsend for me,” says Tom Holland. “You forget all the cameras, crew and people and you get a much better sense of all the real tangible elements within the environment in which to act and react off.”
Scholl was able to give the Vulture’s lair a real-world authenticity by enhancing a massive, old abandoned warehouse that once printed phone books. “The Vulture and his gang were supposed to be located across the river from Manhattan, with a sight line to the Avengers tower,” Scholl explains. “Our location manager, Mike Fantasia, found a location in Atlanta that used to be occupied by a phone book printing company. There were several connected spaces and architectural styles that we could enhance. The hero space used to house the printing press with an existing platform; we added another staircase, matching the industrial style, and built big vertical yellow I-beams that supported a heavy-duty crane rig to frame a VFX rooftop opening, where the Vulture could fly in. The Vulture’s landing platform also had built-in shock absorbers to soften his landing and articulate, to give us realistic impression of weight upon the landing. Our Set Decorator Gene Serdena had found and built interesting hardware that we interspersed with our props to simulate an assembly and packing line for the Tinkerer’s crazy inventions.”
“The first day I walked onto the salvage company set, I was really impressed with the size and scope of the set,” says Michael Keaton. “It really exceeded what I had envisioned in my head – it was such a great visceral environment to work within and was perfect for the creation of the Vulture and his suit.”
The old phone book warehouse would also serve as the set for an action sequence that harks back to one of the all-time classic Spider-Man comic books. “In the film, the Vulture has used his wing suit to collapse a warehouse, and Spider-Man gets trapped under the rubble,” explains Carroll. “It is straight out of the comics, one of the most famous Spider-Man comics of all time – Amazing Spider-Man #33. Everyone at Marvel has been excited to bring that sequence to the big screen for a long time now, and we’ve gone to great lengths to try to replicate the look.”
It was Scholl’s challenge to pull it off. “We used another space in the facility, which was an old, empty packing warehouse where we could sleeve some of the existing I-beams to make them look like concrete pillars and load charges for special effects explosions. Our visual effects supervisor Janek Sirrs and pre-viz had keyed out the flight path that determined the placement of the charges for a crazy destruction choreography. The collapsed warehouse aftermath was then built on stage as a pile of rubble back at Pinewood Studios.”
But perhaps the benefits of practical sets and effects is best seen in one of the film’s biggest action sequences, in which Spider-Man ends up in a perilous situation on the Staten Island Ferry. “Spider-Man is determined to prove himself a real superhero,” explains Jon Watts. “He wants the name Spider-Man to be right up there next to Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor. He thinks he’s going to take down a bunch of dangerous thugs who are doing a black-market deal on the bottom deck of the Staten Island Ferry and he gets in over his head. While they weren’t expecting him, the criminals are more than capable of holding their own against him and before too long the Vulture appears and the ferry is split in half, and Spider-Man just hoping to get out of this without anyone getting hurt.”
For the filmmakers figuring out how to pull of the sequence started long before the production started. At first, the producers assumed that it would be a VFX sequence – only to be surprised by the production team. “Our amazing team – Oliver Scholl’s art department, John Hoskins’s construction department, Dan Sudick’s special effects team – all said what we should build the front end of the ferry, raise it six feet off the ground, rig it with hydraulics, and split the thing in half. It also allowed us to film the ship cracking apart practically as opposed to filming it together and hoping that the visual effects team can make it look like it’s split.”
Scholl started by modelling the real Staten Island Ferry. They located a wooden scale model, and took photos and measurements of the real Ferry they would later film on: the Spirit of America. From there, set designers Richard Mays and Kil Won Yu were able to create a 3D model and generate blueprints for the construction crew. In the end, the production team built an enormous set, 64 feet wide, 45 feet high, and 100 feet long, that stood in for roughly one-quarter of the real ferry. Each half of the set was built onto of a steel gimbal, able to split the ship as determined in the computer model and matching to what VFX would extend in post-production. Sudick’s effects team even had to cut the concrete on the backlot to add deeper concrete enforced footings for the hydraulics to enable the tilt.
The chaotic aftermath of the split, with rushing water and panicked New Yorkers, is also a practical effect, says Scholl: “Each side of the gimbal and set came in at about 210,000 pounds of weight plus approximately 25,000 pounds for the shooting company and equipment. Dan Sudik actuated it with giant hydraulic rams to tilt the parts while 40,000 gallons of water were dumped down the middle of the car bay. Building the ferry probably took five months, between prefabricating ship pieces on stage, prepping the backlot concrete slab to receive the steel gimbal. Then stacking the steel and wood ship elements on the frames. Painting, dressing and rehearsing the water dump. The end result was it provided the big, real playground for effects, stunts and our actors to portray the scene and ferry split event more realistically.”
For Tom Holland, the productions efforts were well spent once he was able to get up on the wires and shoot his scenes on one of a kind set. “The day we shot the sequence on the incredible Staten Island Ferry set really was one of my favorites,” he says. “The ferry was spitting in half and we had tip tanks and cars being tossed all over the place. And at one point we have this great shot, in which Spider-Man flips in, lands and then camera goes all the way around him as he has a fight scene – it’s incredibly all in one shot as the whole thing’s revolving. It took a really long time to rehearse it and get it right, but the end result is just so awesome and cool. It’s the most badass part of Spider-Man I think I’ve ever seen.”
Later, the production shot parts of the sequences (with an intact ferry) on the ferry itself. “There’s nothing that can bring the actual scale of the Staten Island Ferry to the big screen better then shooting on the actual ferry,” says Carroll. “While we did build that amazing four story section of it on the backlot of Pinewood Studios, the pieces we shot on the real ferry combine to make it feel like a huge, epic action sequence in the film. We were incredibly fortunate that the city, state, film commission and Department of Transportation all worked with us in helping us pull this off.”
It was a sequence that struck especially close to home for Jon Watts. “I have many great childhood memories riding on the Staten Island Ferry,” says Jon Watts. I think many people would agree that it is one of the most beautiful ways to come into New York City, with the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and the spectacular iconic view of downtown skyline of Manhattan. It was important for the film to incorporate those iconic New York images without actually going into Manhattan – I wanted to keep the action deep in Queens.”
In addition to shooting on the Staten Island Ferry, the production would shoot for two weeks in New York that included many locations in Queens including locations in Astoria, Sunnyside, Richmond Hill, Lefferts Blvd., Jamaica Ave., and Queens Blvd. as well as Coney Island, Brooklyn, Long Island, and Staten Island.
“Shooting in New York is so important on a Spider-Man film,” says Amy Pascal. “Peter Parker is from Queens, and Spider-Man is New York City’s hero. They are baked into each other.”
SPIDEY’S SUIT
You might think that putting on the Spider-Man suit for the first time is a special, life-changing moment – and it is – but Tom Holland says that the magic feeling doesn’t go away. “Putting on the Spider-Man suit is one of the coolest things that has ever happened to me in my entire life. I still to this day can’t really believe that it’s happened,” he says. “There’s always a real special moment when I put the suit on, especially in front of little kids and they see the suit and their eyes light up and it reminds you of what a real privilege it is to bring that sort of happiness to people.”
“When Tom Holland puts on the Spider-Man costume, he just becomes Spider-Man in every sense of the character,” says Amy Pascal. Part of that is inside the actor, of course, but part of is the Spider-Man suit he wears. When Holland puts it on, she says, “his posture changes, he walks differently, and the suit looks perfect on him. Our costume designer Louise Frogley did such an amazing job creating the physical costume – or re-creating it, because we did something that was unfair: we took the digitally created suit from Captain America: Civil War and told them, ‘We want you to build this.’ They nailed it.”
Even for veterans of a decade’s worth of superhero franchises, there’s something different about working with the Spider-Man suit. “The Spider-Man costume is probably, with no exaggeration, one of the best graphic-designed elements in the history of graphic design,” enthuses Kevin Feige. “It is unbelievably well done image – I see kids and babies who can’t speak come into our offices and they all gravitate over to the Spider-Man drawing or toy. It really is a testament to the design. So, when you sit down to make a Spider-Man movie, you don’t start thinking about how you’re going to change the most perfect piece of graphic design in history of superhero films. You think about how you can pull that to the surface in a unique way, taking it places that you haven’t seen in the other films, while staying true to the conceit of the image.”
For costume designer Louise Frogley, that meant working closely with Marvel’s concept design team and source material. “We are all very influenced by the work of Steve Ditko and try as hard as possible to follow the strong imprint that he created,” says Frogley. “For the Spider-Man suit, we worked very closely with Marvel’s Head of Visual Development Ryan Meinerding to achieve the look – Ryan even worked with us to place the lines on suit. Robyn Gebhart was the person responsible for the construction of the suit.”
The way that the filmmakers were able to fulfill their mission of honoring the design of the suit while taking it to new places is – as audiences saw in Civil War – to imagine that it is a creation of Tony Stark. “It’s purely Spider-Man, but it also has just the right amount of high tech and a lot more bells and whistles – which you might imagine for anything that Tony Stark builds,” says Feige.
For example: “The suit now has web wings under his arms, which pays homage to early comic books. The very first issue of the very first Spider-Man he’s swinging across, and he’s got web wings,” says Feige. “Stark Industries has designed a version of the wings that come out when Spider-Man needs to glide down a cityscape. They can retract when he doesn’t need them. It’s something we have seen in the comics, but never before on film.”
Another new development for the Spider-Man costume is his eyes. “The new eyes in the costume bring us something that has been in every issue ever drawn of Spider-Man, but we’ve never been able to do in the movie before, which is create movement in the eyes,” says Feige. “Tony has been able to construct a mask with an eye form that allows them to open and close and get wider, which within our story allows Peter Parker to focus his spider sense as he takes in massive amounts of information. But they will also now give us for the very first time the ability to see emotion expressed while Peter is wearing the suit, which in the comic books the artist would always do. In the comics, if Peter was angry the eyes would get a little bit smaller; if he was surprised, the eyes would get a little bit bigger. You can’t do that in a movie unless there is a reason and technological explanation for how that’s possible. We now have that.”
And that’s just the beginning – in fact, there’s a whole array of features in Spidey’s suit that Peter Parker has only begun to explore. “If you think about Tony Stark building a suit for a 16-year-old, you would want to include some stuff for ‘just in case,’” says Watts. “The idea that the suit could be Stark tech really just opened up the door to a lot of possibilities. Some of the new tech has never appeared in comics before – including capabilities that Tony Stark puts in that he thinks would be helpful to Peter in the future, but isn’t quite ready for yet… and it’s up to Spider-Man to prove otherwise.”
CREATING THE VULTURE
The Vulture is one of the classic Spider-Man villains, first appearing in The Amazing Spider-Man #2.
“In the comics, the Vulture was traditionally drawn in a very cartoony suit that features almost real birdlike wings,” notes Carroll. “We took a step back and looked at other flying characters to see how we could differentiate The Vulture and make him feel scarier and more dangerous.”
For one example, they didn’t have to look too far. “Falcon is another flying character in the MCU, but the Vulture’s rig isn’t some small backpack that he straps on and wings pop out of it. The wingspan on the Vulture suit is 36 feet. It’s more like a vehicle, an aircraft that he straps himself into, rather than a jetpack or a set of wings that he just pulls on.”
For Michael Keaton, seeing the Vulture’s full costume was very exciting for the Academy Award® nominee. “It’s intense and really cool looking,” he says. “One of the things that knocked me out about being the Vulture was the amazing artistry from the people who built the vulture suit. It was extraordinary down to the tiny little nuts and bolts, literally. They told me one time how many nuts and bolts it took to build it and it was mind blowing and I was just knocked out by how talented those people are.”
Like many of the new Marvel Cinematic Universe characters, as well as the Spider-Man suit, the concept and look of the Vulture again started with drawings from Marvel’s Head of Visual Development Ryan Meinerding, who produced the template from which costume designer Louise Frogley would design the costume and practical suit.
“Marvel is always very involved with the look of the characters,” says Frogley. “To that end they have amazing concept/visualization artists. We worked very closely with Ryan to achieve the look for The Vulture. The Vulture costume was really a question of proportion on the actor, and once Michael was cast, the rest flowed. We used original World War II fabric for the pants; they had a slight sheen that lit well, especially at night. We also made a straggly fur collar for the jacket to hint at the feathers on a real vulture and, once again, to respect Steve Ditko’s original Vulture.”
ABOUT THE STUNTS
As part of his pitch to get the role, Tom Holland sent Marvel tapes of himself performing gymnastic stunts and parkour – which gave Holland a unique combination of acting and athletic skill.
Holland says that these are skills he honed while playing in the musical “Billy Elliot” on the West End. “I think probably one of the main reasons why I’m here today is because of my work on ‘Billy Elliot,’” says Tom Holland. “The training I was given on that show was just so good. They trained me in everything that I know really in gymnastics. There wasn’t a day on this movie where I didn’t use some sort of athletic ability.”
When Holland proved what he could handle, the stunts team began to put the actor in a position bring those skills to the fore. “It’s nice to have that ability to work with the stunt guys and say, ‘I think it would be cooler if I jump down from there and the wire then pick me up later on,’” he says. “The fact that the stunt coordinator and team trusted me to make suggestions and then to perform later was a real privilege. I really think we’ve benefitted on the movie by having me in the suit to do the stunts and pull the suit off so you can see that I did it. I couldn’t have asked for a better people to work with and [stunt coordinator] George Cottle and his stunt team are so loving and supportive and have your back at every turn.”
For Holland, the collaborative nature of the set was in full effect during a sequence in which Spider-Man jumps off the roof onto the golf course. “In the script, it was supposed to be a swing into the golf course, which we’ve seen it countless times,” he says. “George Cottle and I thought it would be more interesting to see him jump down in a different way, so when we first started shooting, we went through all the previous movies and took pictures of every Spidey pose that he lands in. Then Holland Diaz, my stunt double, and I worked through finding ten new poses so that we could mix it up and bring new things – and fortunately, Jon loved them.”
Even as the filmmakers sought to deliver the film’s exciting action sequences, it was important to remember the character and tone of the film. “Whenever something really badass happens, we will then remind the audience that Peter Parker is not a badass character,” says Holland. “I’ll do something cool and then immediately after that I’ll walk into something or do something really stupid. Even when we are doing the final battle scene on the beach, the thing he’s thinking about is going to do his homework. There are loads of different ways for us to make sure that while these fight scenes are incredibly cool, action-packed, and scary, they’re also a lot of fun.”
Keaton says he was impressed by what Holland was able to bring to his role. “Tom has a ton of energy and he’s really physically formidable. It’s impressive how he started and how he had to learn to dance for ‘Billy Elliot.’ But from a flat out acting standpoint, he’s a pro and 100% committed.”
ABOUT THE CAST
Tom Holland (Peter Parker / Spider-Man) is quickly emerging as Hollywood’s most exciting and versatile young actors. He recently debuted in his role as Spider-Man in Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War.
Audiences can currently see Holland starring in James Gray’s The Lost City of Z opposite Charlie Hunnam, Rob Pattinson and Sienna Miller. Holland also appears in Alfonso Gomez Rejon’s period drama, The Current War, alongside Benedict Cumberbatch, which will be released December 22, 2017.
Holland made his screen debut opposite Ewan McGregor and Naomi Watts in Juan Antonio Bayona’s captivating film The Impossible. Other film credits include, the 2015 Warner Bros. drama In the Heart of the Sea, Edge of Winter alongside Joel Kinnaman, How I Live Now, and Locke.
In 2008, he made his stage debut at the Victoria Palace Theatre in London in which he played ‘Billy’ in Billy Elliot the Musical.
Holland was honored with the 2017 BAFTA Rising Star Award. In addition, he was named Breakthrough Actor of the Year by the National Board of Review and received a Critics Choice Nomination for Best Young Actor /Actress for his role in “The Impossible.”
Holland currently resides in London.
As the star of the 2015 Academy Award® Best Picture winner Birdman: Or (The Unexpected Virtue of Innocence), MICHAEL KEATON (Adrian Toomes / Vulture) garnered critical and public acclaim for his role as Riggan, a one-time celebrated, now washed-up actor battling to regain his ego and career by mounting a Broadway play. For his work in Birdman, Keaton was nominated for an Academy Award® and won the Golden Globe, Independent Spirit, and National Board of Review Awards for Best Actor, as well as many other nominations and honors including a SAG Ensemble Cast win.
Keaton first achieved national attention with the hit comedy Night Shift, followed by starring roles in such popular films as Mr. Mom, Johnny Dangerously and Dream Team.
In 1998, Keaton earned the Best Actor Award from the National Society of Film Critics for Clean and Sober and for Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice. He re-teamed with Burton to play the title role in the blockbusters Batman and Batman Returns.
Keaton also starred in HBO’s highly-regarded true-life drama Live From Baghdad, for which he received a Golden Globe nomination for his role as intrepid CNN reporter Robert Weiner. He also starred in the Universal thriller White Noise and in Game Six, which premiered at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival.
Keaton starred in the Academy Award® Best Picture winner Spotlight, the compelling true story of how the Boston Globe uncovered a massive scandal within the Catholic Church. In 2016, starred in The Founder, in which he portrayed Ray Kroc, the founder of McDonald’s.
Keaton will next be seen in September starring in American Assassin for Lionsgate and CBS Films. Keaton is a member of American Rivers.
JON FAVREAU (Happy Hogan) began his career in the industry as an actor in the inspiring sports film Rudy. He went on to establish himself as a writer with the acclaimed hipster comedy Swingers. Since then, he has continued to challenge himself with a variety of eclectic projects.
Last year, Favreau directed and produced Disney’s live-action adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s epic adventure The Jungle Book. The film has received universal acclaim and was one of the highest grossing films of 2016. Favreau is currently working with Disney once again to direct a live-action reimagining of the animated classic The Lion King.
Favreau also works in the world of Virtual Reality. His latest project is Gnomes & Goblins, an interactive Virtual Reality experience set in the world of an enchanted forest.
An integral part of the formation and expansion of the Marvel Universe, Favreau directed the blockbuster hits Iron Man and Iron Man 2, which grossed a combined $1.3 billion at the worldwide box office. He also served as executive producer on Iron Man 3, Marvel’s The Avengers, and Avengers: Age of Ultron, which grossed a combined $4.1 billion worldwide, becoming three of the top ten highest grossing films of all time.
In 2014, Favreau wrote, directed, produced, and starred in the indie hit Chef, which also starred Sofia Vergara, Scarlett Johansson and Robert Downey Jr. In 2011, Favreau directed and produced Cowboys and Aliens, starring Harrison Ford and Daniel Craig. Prior to directing the first two installments of the Iron Man, franchise, Favreau directed Zathura: A Space Adventure, a children’s film starring Tim Robbins, for Radar Pictures and Sony Pictures Entertainment. In 2003, he directed the acclaimed holiday smash hit Elf, starring Will Ferrell, for New Line Cinema. Favreau made his feature-film directorial debut with Made, a script he wrote and starred in opposite Vince Vaughn and Sean Combs for Artisan Entertainment.
In front of the camera, Favreau has appeared in The Wolf of Wall Street, Identity Thief and People Like Us. His other film credits include Couples Retreat, I Love You Man, Four Christmases, The Break-Up, Wimbledon, Something’s Gotta Give, Daredevil, Love and Sex, The Replacements, Very Bad Things and Deep Impact. He also portrayed legendary heavyweight champion Rocky Marciano in the MGM biopic Rocky Marciano.
Favreau’s television credits include a recurring role on “Friends” and a special appearance on HBO’s “The Sopranos,” playing himself. Favreau also added the title of show runner to his multi-hyphenate list of credits as the creator, producer and host of the critically acclaimed and Emmy®-nominated IFC series “Dinner for Five.” He also executive produced the TV series “Revolution.” Presently, Favreau is an executive producer on the TV series “The Shannara Chronicles,” which was recently renewed for a second season.
Favreau was recently inducted into the Variety Home Entertainment and Digital Hall of Fame for his contributions to cutting edge innovation in content creation.
ZENDAYA (Michelle) began her rise to stardom in acting on the hit Disney Channel show “Shake It Up,” and, more recently, "K.C. Undercover," in which she currently stars as K.C. Cooper, a high school math whiz and martial arts expert who is living a double life as an international undercover spy.
The talented actress, singer and dancer received multiple NAACP Image Awards nominations for Outstanding Performance in a Youth/Children's Program (Series or Special) for her starring role in "Shake It Up.” Zendaya also captured the hearts of audiences - kids and families alike - when she danced her way to the finals in season sixteen of ABC's "Dancing with the Stars," and with her starring role in the hit Disney Channel Original Movie "Zapped."
In the music world, Zendaya released her self-titled debut album on Hollywood Records in 2013. It yielded the Platinum single "Replay" and earned the singer a NAACP Image Awards Nomination for Outstanding New Artist and the 2014 BMI Social Star Award. Additionally, the video for the single garnered over 77 million views.
Prior to her solo debut, Zendaya released numerous hit singles and videos in conjunction with "Shake It Up," including "Swag It Out" and "Something to Dance For." Zendaya and her "Shake It Up" co-star Bella Thorne also recorded hit singles "Contagious Love," "Fashion Is My Kryptonite," and "Watch Me," which hit Billboard's Hot 100 singles chart and received over 97 million online views.
In 2013, she authored the book Between U and Me: How to Rock Your Tween Years with Style and Confidence (Disney Publishing Worldwide).
Zendaya, which means "to give thanks" in Shona (a Bantu language native to the Shona people of Zimbabwe), was born September 1, 1996, in Oakland, California. She grew up with the nearby California Shakespeare Theater in Orinda where her mother worked as the house manager. In addition to training at the theater's student conservatory program, she performed in numerous stage productions and helped her mom seat patrons and sell raffle tickets to benefit the theater.
While attending the Oakland School for the Arts, she starred as a young Ti Moune in "Once on This Island" at the Berkley Playhouse and the breakout role of the male character Joe in "Caroline, or Change" at Palo Alto's TheaterWorks. She also studied her craft at the CalShakes Conservatory program and at the American Conservatory Theater. Her other stage credits include "Richard III," "Twelfth Night," and "As You Like It," among others.
The young star is also passionate about giving back and is currently an ambassador for Convoy of Hope, an organization dedicated to providing help and hope to those who are impoverished, hungry and hurting. She celebrated her 18th birthday by supporting Convoy of Hope’s feed ONE initiative to help feed at least 150 hungry children in Haiti, Tanzania and the Philippines. She also worked with UNICEF, serving as its 2014 Trick-or-Treat spokesperson to help inspire kids to raise funds for the organization’s lifesaving programs. Additionally, she worked with Make-A-Wish Foundation and Keep a Child Alive, and served as an ambassador for the Children's Miracle Network.
Zendaya resides in Los Angeles, California, with her family and dog, a Giant Schnauzer named Midnight.
DONALD GLOVER (Aaron Davis) is an award-winning actor, producer, director, comedian, writer, and Grammy-nominated artist.
Glover was most recently seen in FX’s critically acclaimed and award winning comedy series “Atlanta,” which he created and starred in. The first season ranks as the highest-rated comedy series in FX Networks history and has been renewed for a second season.
Coming off the success of “Atlanta,” Glover has set an overall deal with FX Productions, where he will develop new projects for FX Networks’ outlets.
In film, Glover is currently in production on the new untitled Han Solo Star Wars anthology film, in which he stars as Lando. The film will be released by Disney, Summer 2018. He was also recently cast as Simba in Disney's remake of The Lion King. This adaptation of the 1994 classic will be directed by Jon Favreau.
Last year, he appeared in Ridley Scott’s The Martian opposite Matt Damon and Jessica Chastain and in Magic Mike XXL, alongside Channing Tatum, Joe Manganiello, Matt Bomer and Amber Heard.
Past films include David Gelb’s The Lazarus Effect opposite Olivia Wilde and Mark Duplass; Miguel Arteta’s Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day; Maggie Carey’s The To Do List opposite Aubrey Plaza and Bill Hader, and James Bobin’s The Muppets. On television, Glover starred for five seasons as Troy on NBC’s critically acclaimed series “Community,” created by Dan Harmon. He has also made guest appearances on Judd Apatow’s HBO series “Girls” and on the cult favorite Adult Swim animated series “Adventure Time.”
Glover began his comedy career under the mentorship of Tina Fey, writing for the Emmy award-winning NBC series 30 Rock.
As a musician, Glover is known for his success under the stage name Childish Gambino. He released his first album, “Camp,” in 2011. His second album, “Because the Internet,” was nominated for two Grammy Awards. His third album, “Awaken My Love!,” released in December 2016, debuted #1 on the R&B Albums Chart and is his highest-charting album.
Tyne Daly (Anne Marie Hoag) is an accomplished American stage and screen actress and is best known for her work on the acclaimed television series “Cagney & Lacey” as title character Detective Mary Beth Lacey alongside Sharon Gless as Detective Christine Cagney. The two won the series a record six Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Leading Actress in a row, which remains unmatched to this day. Daly’s performance earned her four of the six Emmy Awards. Daly is also well known on television for her role as social worker Maxine Gray, who was the mother to the show’s title character on the CBS drama “Judging Amy” (1999-2005). More recently, Daly can be seen alongside Sally Field in the feature film Hello, My Name is Doris.
Daly has been in Broadway stage productions since 1967, including hits like “Gypsy,” (1989) for which she won the 1990 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, “The Seagull” (1992), as well as “Rabbit Hole” (2006), where she played the mother of the protagonist, played by Cynthia Nixon. Over the past several years, Daly has continued to appear in on and off Broadway plays. In 2012, she reprised her role as Maria Callas in the West End Production of “Master Class”.
Daly was born into a creative family in Madison, Wisconsin, and grew up in Westchester County, New York. Her father is actor James Daly and her younger brother is actor Timothy Daly. She started her career in New York by performing in summer stock with her family. Daly attended Brandeis University and The American Musical and Dramatic Academy.
MARISA TOMEI (Aunt May) continues to bridge the gap between rich, dramatic performances and smart, comedic turns. Tomei won an Academy Award® for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Mona Lisa Vito in My Cousin Vinny. Tomei subsequently earned Academy Award® nominations for her performances in In the Bedroom and The Wrestler.
Tomei currently stars in Lincoln Center Theater’s “How to Transcend a Happy Marriage.” This new play written by Sarah Ruhl and directed by Rebecca Taichman explores the boundaries of monogamy and the limits of friendship.
Tomei introduced her portrayal of Aunt May in Captain America: Civil War. She will next be seen in Behold My Heart opposite Charlie Plummer and Timothy Olyphant. She recently appeared as a recurring character in the second season of Fox’s critically acclaimed drama series “Empire,” for which she received a Critics Choice Award nomination. She plays Mimi Whiteman, a venture capitalist and Forbes list billionaire who becomes involved in the Lyon family drama. She also appeared in the Oscar®-winning film The Big Short alongside Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt for director Adam McKay.
Tomei appeared in Ira Sachs’ independent film Love is Strange, which premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and screened at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. Love is Strange was nominated for four Independent Spirit Awards including Best Feature and Best Screenplay. The film was also nominated for a Gotham Award for Best Film, a Satellite Award for Best Motion Picture” and “Best Original Screenplay,” a Dorian Award for “LGBTQ Film of the Year” and Unsung Film of the Year, and Sebastiane Award for Best Film during the San Sebastian International Film Festival. Love is Strange won the WFCC Award for Best Male Images in a Movie at the 2014 Women Film Critics Circle Awards.
On the silver screen, Tomei has tackled a diverse range of roles, including Kate Taffety in Crazy, Stupid, Love, Ida Horowicz in Ides of March, Maggie McPherson in The Lincoln Lawyer, and Alice Simmons in Parental Guidance. Other notable film credits include Trainwreck, Cyrus, Sidney Lumet's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, What Women Want, Happy Accidents, Anger Management, Slums of Beverly Hills, Welcome to Sarajevo, Unhook the Stars, Four Rooms, and The Paper, Chaplin, and Loitering With Intent, which Tomei also produced.
A veteran of the theater, she last starred as the widow Serafina in director Trip Cullman’s staging of “The Rose Tattoo” at the Williamstown Theater Festival in Massachusetts. In 2014, she starred as Pony Jones in Will Eno’s The Realistic Joneses at the Lyceum Theatre in 2014. Tomei and the cast won the 2014 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Ensemble Performance. Tomei previously starred in the Broadway production of Caryl Churchill's “Top Girls,” earning a Drama Desk Award nomination for her work. Her other theater credits include MCC Theater’s “Beirut,” “Oh! The Humanity and Other Good Intentions,” “Salome,” “Marie,” “Design for Living,” “We Won't Pay! We Won't Pay!,” “Waiting for Lefty,” “Rocket to the Moon,” “Demonology,” “Dark Rapture,” “Slavs!,” “The Comedy of Errors,” “The Summer Winds,” “What the Butler Saw,” and “Daughters.” Tomei is a founding member of the Naked Angels Theater Company in New York City.
ROBERT DOWNEY JR. (Tony Stark / Iron Man) is a two-time Academy Award® nominee who earned his most recent Oscar® nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his work in Ben Stiller’s comedy hit Tropic Thunder. His performance as Kirk Lazarus, a white Australian actor playing a black American character, also brought him Golden Globe, BAFTA, and Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Award nominations. Downey was honored with his first Oscar® nomination in the category of Best Actor for his portrayal of Charlie Chaplin in Richard Attenborough’s acclaimed biopic Chaplin, for which he also won BAFTA and London Film Critics’ Awards and received a Golden Globe Award nomination.
In early 2010, Downey won a Golden Globe Award for his performance in the title role of the 2009 hit Sherlock Holmes, under the direction of Guy Ritchie. In December 2011, Downey teamed up with Ritchie and co-star Jude Law to return to the role of the legendary detective in the sequel Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.
In summer 2008, Downey received praise from critics and audiences for his performance in the title role of the blockbuster hit Iron Man, under the direction of Jon Favreau. Bringing the Marvel Comics superhero to the big screen, Iron Man earned more than $585 million worldwide, making it one of the year’s biggest hits. Downey reprised his role in the successful sequel, which was released in May 2010. He returned to the role in Joss Whedon’s The Avengers, released in May 2012, which was the highest grossing film during its theatrical run and remains the 5th highest grossing film of all time, grossing over $1.5 billion at the worldwide box office. Downey also appeared in the third installment to the franchise Iron Man 3, directed by Shane Black, which was the 3rd highest grossing film that year, as well as in the 2015 summer blockbuster The Avengers: Age of Ultron, and was most recently seen the worldwide success Captain America: Civil War, which became the highest-grossing film of 2016.
Additionally, he will star in Universal Pictures’ The Voyage of Doctor Dolittle, which he will also produce under the Team Downey banner, the production company that he created with his wife, Susan.
In addition to his prolific work in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Downey was also seen in the culinary-inspired film Chef directed by Jon Favreau, which won the Audience Award at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival. That year, Downey also starred in and executive produced The Judge, featuring Robert Duvall and Billy Bob Thornton, under the Team Downey banner.
Downey’s other recent films include Due Date, alongside Zach Galifianakis for director Todd Phillips; The Soloist, opposite Jamie Foxx for director Joe Wright; Zodiac, alongside Jake Gyllenhaal for director David Fincher; A Scanner Darkly, with Keanu Reeves for director Richard Linklater; Fur: An Imaginary Portrait Of Diane Arbus, opposite Nicole Kidman for director Steven Shainberg; and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, alongside Val Kilmer for director Shane Black. He also shared a SAG Award nomination as a member of the ensemble cast of George Clooney’s true-life drama Good Night, And Good Luck., and a Special Jury Prize won by the ensemble cast of A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, presented at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival.
Downey’s long list of film credits also includes: Gothika, The Singing Detective, Wonder Boys, U.S. Marshals, One Night Stand, Home For The Holidays, Richard Iii, Natural Born Killers, The Gingerbread Man, Short Cuts, Heart And Souls, Soapdish, Air America, Chances Are, True Believer, Less Than Zero, Weird Science, Firstborn, and Pound, in which he made his debut under the direction of Robert Downey Sr.
On the small screen, Downey made his primetime debut in 2001 when he joined the cast of the series “Ally McBeal.” For his work on the show, he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television and a Screen Actors Guild Award® for Outstanding Actor in a Comedy Series. In addition, Downey was nominated for an Emmy Award for “Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series.”
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
JON WATTS (Director / Co-Writer) made his directorial debut in 2014 with the independent film Clown, which he also co-wrote, starring Peter Stomare and Laura Allen. He followed the film by writing and directing the critically acclaimed independent film Cop Car for Focus Features. The film starred Kevin Bacon and followed a small-town sheriff who sets out to find the two kids who have taken his car on a joyride.
Born in Fountain, Colorado in 1981, Watts studied at the Department of Film at New York University. After graduating in 2005, Watts begin to work in music videos, commercials and as a staff member on the web version of the satirical news agency The Onion News Network after working on a series of short films and the television movie "Eugene!" (2012).
KEVIN FEIGE (Producer) has been the driving creative force behind several billion dollar franchises and an unprecedented number of blockbuster feature films, all connected to create the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In his current role as producer and president of Marvel Studios, Feige is a hands-on producer and oversees Marvel Studios’ feature film productions, all of which have opened No. 1 at the box office and grossed over $10 billion worldwide collectively. Feige is currently producing the highly anticipated films Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Captain Marvel and Avengers: Infinity War.
Most recently, Feige produced Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which opened to over $146 million at the box office and has taken in more than $800 million worldwide. Last year, Feige launched another franchise with Doctor Strange, which continued the streak of No. 1 openings, and launched Captain America: Civil War, the highest grossing film of the year worldwide. In 2015, he launched another successful franchise with Ant-Man, starring Paul Rudd, and earlier in the year he produced Avengers: Age of Ultron, which currently ranks as the fifth largest opening of all time. In 2014, Feige produced Guardians of the Galaxy, starring Chris Pratt, and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which broke the opening record for an April release.
In 2013, Feige produced the megahits Thor: The Dark World and Iron Man 3. In 2012, Feige produced the critically acclaimed Marvel’s The Avengers, which set an all-time domestic three-day weekend box-office record. The film went on to become Disney’s highest-grossing global and domestic release at the time.
In 2011, Feige produced and successfully launched two Marvel film franchises, Captain America: The First Avenger, directed by Joe Johnston and starring Chris Evans, and Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh and starring Chris Hemsworth. In 2010, Feige produced Iron Man 2, directed by Jon Favreau and starring Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow.
In summer 2008, Feige produced the first fully developed and financed films from the new Marvel Studios, including the blockbusters Iron Man, directed by Jon Favreau, and The Incredible Hulk, directed by Louis Leterrier.
Feige joined Marvel in 2000 and served as executive producer on the second and third Spider-Man films, which took in combined worldwide box-office receipts of well over $1.5 billion. Feige also co-produced X2: X-Men United, the second instalment of the popular X-Men franchise, and executive produced X-Men 3: The Last Stand, among many other Marvel branded films.
A graduate from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts, Feige first worked for Lauren Shuler Donner and Richard Donner at their Warner Bros.–based production company, which released the action-adventure Volcano and the hit romantic comedy You’ve Got Mail. Feige earned his first producer credit on X-Men, a film that is credited with revitalizing the comic book genre.
AMY PASCAL (Producer) started Pascal Pictures, which is based at Sony Pictures Entertainment. It has a number of high-profile film projects in varied stages of development. Most recently the banner produced the hit comedy Ghostbusters starring Melissa McCarthy, Kristin Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Leslie Jones. Other films in development at Pascal Pictures include a film adaptation of the thriller novel Maestra by S.L. Knight; a film adaptation of David Lagercrantz’s The Girl in the Spider’s Web, which is the sequel to Stieg Larsson’s successful The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy; a film adaptation of Molly Bloom’s underground poker memoir Molly’s Game, which Aaron Sorkin will write and make his feature directorial debut; and a film adaptation of game designer Zoe Quinn’s memoir Crash Override: How To Save The Internet From Itself. Pascal Pictures will also be producing for television, and its first projects include “Darktown,” which they bought with Sony Pictures Television, and a series about 1960s and 1970s Los Angeles, based on Eve Babitz’s memoirs, that they will produce with TriStar Television.
Pascal joined Columbia Pictures in 1988, while Dawn Steel was president. Except for a brief stint when she started Turner Pictures for Ted Turner, Sony Pictures has been Pascal’s home for the past 27 years.
Pascal was Chairman of SPE’s Motion Picture Group for 20 years. During Pascal’s tenure, she and her team were responsible for some of the most profitable and beloved movies of recent years, including: American Hustle; Captain Phillips; the Spider-Man™ franchise; the James Bond films Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace and Skyfall; Moneyball; The Social Network; 21 Jump Street; Zero Dark Thirty; District 9; The DaVinci Code and Angels & Demons; Hitch; The Pursuit of Happyness; Big Daddy; Superbad; Stuart Little; Click; Charlie’s Angels; Something’s Gotta Give; 50 First Dates; Salt; Girl, Interrupted; The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo; Panic Room; Julie & Julia; 2012; S.W.A.T.; Ghost Rider; The Grudge; Eat Pray Love; Michael Jackson’s This Is It; Big Fish; Zombieland; Easy A; Cloudy with a Chance of Meatball; A Knight’s Tale; Ali; Lords of Dogtown; The Interview; Pineapple Express; Step Brothers; Single White Female; The Ides of March; Cruel Intentions; 28 days; Adaptation; Fury; the Men in Black franchise; The Karate Kid; Memoirs of a Geisha; The Equalizer; and Bad Boys II.
During Pascal’s early years at Columbia, she oversaw such memorable motion pictures as Groundhog Day, Awakenings, A League of Their Own, Little Women, Sense and Sensibility and To Die For.
In 1994, Pascal joined Turner Pictures as President of Production. During her two years at Turner, the company was responsible for projects including: Michael; Wings of Desire; Any Given Sunday; You’ve Got Mail; and Fallen.
Pascal began her career working for legendary BBC producer Tony Garnett at Kestral Films, where they produced Earth Girls Are Easy.
In 2013, Pascal was elected to the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
She also serves on the Honorary Committee of the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Los Angeles and in 2008 was awarded the Humanitarian Award from the Simon Wiesenthal Center.
Pascal grew up in Los Angeles where she still lives with her husband and son.
JONATHAN GOLDSTEIN (Co-Writer / Screen Story) is a writer and director whose credits include the hit ensemble Horrible Bosses, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 the reboot of Vacation.
After graduating from Harvard law School in 1995 and practicing for two years at a large New York law firm, Goldstein ran screaming from his office, moved to LA and became a comedy writer. Over the next 12 years, he wrote and produced numerous network television comedies, including “The PJ’s” starring Eddie Murphy, “The Geena Davis Show,” “Good Morning Miami,” “Four Kings,” and “The New Adventures of Old Christine.” In 2007, in collaboration with his feature writing partner, John Francis Daley, Goldstein sold his first film script, The $40,000 Man, to New Line Cinema. That script landed on the Hollywood “Black List,” and launched the team’s screenwriting career.
In 2015, Goldstein and Daley made their directorial debut with the summer feature Vacation, which they also wrote. The film grossed over $104 million worldwide. In 2011, the pair wrote the hilarious comedy Horrible Bosses, which earned over $200 million at the worldwide box office and quickly became the highest grossing dark comedy of all time. Also among their feature writing credits are The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, starring Steve Carell and Jim Carrey, and the 2013 hit animated film Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, which earned over $200 million globally and opened at number one in its first weekend at the box office.
Up next, Goldstein and Daley co-wrote and directed the New Line comedy thriller Game Night starring Jason Bateman, Rachel McAdams, Kyle Chandler and Jesse Plemons. Game Night is set for release on Valentine’s Day 2018.
Goldstein lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the novelist Adena Halpern, and their son.
JOHN FRANCIS DALEY (Co-Writer / Screen Story) came to national attention as an actor when he was cast in the lead role of Sam Weir in the critically acclaimed Judd Apatow-produced television series “Freaks and Geeks” alongside Seth Rogen, James Franco and Jason Segel.
Following “Freaks and Geeks,” Daley starred on several television series, such as “The Geena Davis Show,” “The Kennedys,” “Regular Joe” and the Fox comedy “Kitchen Confidential” with Bradley Cooper. He can also be seen in the feature films A View from the Top, 77 and Waiting, alongside Ryan Reynolds.
For the past seven years, Daley has starred on the hit Fox series “Bones” as Dr. Lance Sweets. He most recently starred on the big screen alongside Anna Kendrick in the comedy fantasy Rapture-Palooza.
In 2007, Daley and his feature writing partner, Jonathan Goldstein, sold their first screenplay, The $40,000 Man, to New Line Cinema. The duo then made their debut as screenwriters with the hit ensemble comedy Horrible Bosses, which grossed over $200 million worldwide and became the highest grossing dark comedy of all time. They followed the success of Horrible Bosses with the 2011 comedy short Audio Tour, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone and the 2013 animated family comedy Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2. In 2015 Daley and Goldstein made their directorial debut with the summer feature Vacation, which they also wrote. The film grossed over $104 million worldwide.
Up next, Goldstein and Daley co-wrote and directed the New Line comedy thriller Game Night starring Jason Bateman and Rachel McAdams. They will make their producing debut on the upcoming action comedy All Day and a Night for Relativity studios.
Additionally, Daley plays keyboard, sings and writes music.
Christopher Ford (Co-Writer), an NYU film school grad, has written multiple features such as Robot & Frank, starring an all-star cast including Frank Langella and Susan Sarandon; Clown and Cop Car, both directed by Jon Watts; and the upcoming Clovehitch, starring Dylan McDermott. He also has a graphic novel series called Stickman Odyssey.
CHRIS McKENNA (Co-Writer), with feature writing partner Erik Sommers, most recently worked on the hit film The LEGO Batman Movie, as well as the upcoming releases Jumanji and Ant-Man and The Wasp. McKenna previously served as executive producer and co-showrunner of the critically acclaimed TV series “Community,” for which he earned nominations for both an Emmy Award© for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series and a Hugo Award for the episode “Remedial Chaos Theory.” He also shared a nomination for a Writers Guild of America Award for his work on “The Mindy Project.” McKenna began writing for TV on the long-running FOX animated series “American Dad.”
ERIK SOMMERS (Co-Writer) is a writer/producer who has written for a number of popular television series, including NBC’s “Community,” ABC’s “Happy Endings,” and FOX’s “American Dad,” for which he shared a 2012 Primetime Emmy nomination and voiced several characters. With writing partner Chris McKenna, his feature film credits include The LEGO Batman Movie as well as the upcoming Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle and Ant Man and The Wasp.
LOUIS D’ESPOSITO (Executive Producer) is co-president of Marvel Studios. He served as executive producer on the blockbuster hits Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, Marvel’s The Avengers, Captain America: the Winter Soldier, Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Ant-Man, Captain American: Civil War, Doctor Strange, and Guardians of The Galaxy: Vol. 2, as well as working with Marvel Studios’ president Kevin Feige on the future Marvel slate that includes Thor: Ragnorok, Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther, Ant-Man and the Wasp, and Captain Marvel.
As co-president of the studio and executive producer on all Marvel films, D’Esposito balances running the studio with overseeing each film from its development stage to distribution.
In addition to executive producing Marvel Studios’ films, D’Esposito directed the Marvel One-Shot film Item 47, which made its debut to fans at the 2012 Comic-Con International in San Diego and was featured again at the LA Shorts Fest in September 2012. The project was released as an added feature on the Marvel’s The Avengers Blu-ray disc. With the success of Item 47, Esposito directed the second Marvel One-Shot, Agent Carter, starring Hayley Atwell, which premiered at 2013 Comic-Con to critical praise from the press and fans. The project is also an added feature on the Iron Man 3 Blu-ray disc.
D’Esposito began his tenure at Marvel Studios in 2006. Prior to Marvel, D’Esposito’s executive producing credits included the 2006 hit film The Pursuit of Happyness, starring Will Smith, Zathura: A Space Adventure, and the 2003 hit S.W.A.T., starring Samuel L. Jackson and Colin Farrell.
VICTORIA ALONSO (Executive Producer), executive vice president of Physical Production for Marvel Studios, recently worked on James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and is currently executive producing Taika Waititi’s Thor: Ragnarok for Marvel Studios; she is also in production on Marvel Studios’ Black Panther and Avengers: Infinity War.
In her executive role, she also oversees post-production and visual effects for the studio slate. She executive produced Scott Derrickson’s Doctor Strange, Peyton Reed’s Ant-Man, Joss Whedon’s Avengers: Age of Ultron, James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Joe and Anthony Russo’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Alan Taylor’s Thor: The Dark World, Shane Black’s Iron Man 3, Joss Whedon’s The Avengers, Kenneth Branagh’s Thor, and Joe Johnston’s Captain America: The First Avenger.
Alonso’s career began at the nascency of the visual effects industry, when she served as a commercial visual effects producer. From there, she VFX-produced numerous feature films, working with such directors as Ridley Scott (Kingdom of Heaven), Tim Burton (Big Fish) and Andrew Adamson (Shrek), to name a few.
JEREMY LATCHAM (Executive Producer) is the senior vice president of production and development at Marvel Studios. Latcham served as an executive producer on the 2012 blockbuster hit Marvel’s The Avengers, which shattered box-office records, becoming Disney’s highest-grossing domestic release of all time.
Latcham also served as executive producer on Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, which was the top grossing domestic film of 2014 with 332 million. Latcham also served as the associate producer on the 2008 critically acclaimed blockbuster Iron Man and as the co-producer on the hit 2010 follow-up Iron Man 2.
A graduate of Northwestern University, Latcham began his career at Miramax and Dimension Films and also worked at the Endeavor Agency. In 2004, he joined Marvel Studios where he has also held the titles of vice president, director of development and creative executive. In 2011, Latcham was featured as one of Hollywood’s New Leaders by Variety.
PATRICIA WHITCHER (Executive Producer) recently served as executive producer on Godzilla and Marvel’s The Avengers, which set the all-time, domestic three-day weekend box-office record at $207.4 million. The film went on to gross over $1.5 billion.
She also served as executive producer on Thor, directed by Kenneth Branagh and starring Chris Hemsworth, and Tom Hiddleston, The film debuted in first place and grossed over $445 million worldwide at the box office.
Before entering the Marvel universe, Whitcher was an executive producer on The Soloist, the real-life drama filmed on L.A.’s skid row and onstage at Walt Disney Concert Hall in 2008. Adapted from newspaper articles written by Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez, the film starred Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx.
In 2006, Whitcher was executive producer of the film adaptation of the Broadway musical Dreamgirls, starring Jamie Foxx, Beyoncé Knowles, Eddie Murphy and Jennifer Hudson. Directed by Bill Condon, Dreamgirls won two Academy Awards® (for Hudson and for sound mixing) and earned eight nominations. Memoirs of a Geisha, which Whitcher executive-produced in 2005 for director Rob Marshall, was another big Oscar® contender with six nominations and three wins (art direction, cinematography and costume design).
Whitcher previously executive-produced Steven Spielberg’s dramatic comedy The Terminal, starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones. Her producing credits also include Brad Silberling’s Moonlight Mile, starring Dustin Hoffman and Susan Sarandon; Where the Heart Is, starring Natalie Portman and Ashley Judd; and P.J. Hogan’s smash hit My Best Friend’s Wedding, starring Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz. Additional producing credits include How to Make an American Quilt, High School High and A Dangerous Woman.
Before producing, Whitcher served as a unit production manager on True Lies, The Meteor Man, The Lawnmower Man, Iron Maze and Darkman. A lifelong Los Angeles resident, she is the mother of two children and a graduate of Loyola Marymount University.
STAN LEE (Executive Producer) is the founder of POW! Entertainment and has served as its chairman and chief creative officer since inception. Known to millions as the man whose superheroes propelled Marvel to its preeminent position in the comic book industry, Stan Lee’s co-creations include Spider-Man, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men, The Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Daredevil, Silver Surfer and Dr. Strange.
Now the chairman emeritus of Marvel Media, Lee first became publisher of Marvel Comics in 1972. He is recognized as the creative force that brought Marvel to the forefront of the comic publishing industry. In 1977 he introduced Spider-Man as a syndicated newspaper strip that became the most successful of all syndicated adventure strips and now appears in more than 500 newspapers worldwide—making it the longest running of all superhero strips.
From June 2001 until the formal creation of POW! in November 2001, Lee worked to form POW! and to create intellectual property for POW! and start the development of various POW! projects.
AVI ARAD (Executive Producer) was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Marvel Studios, the film and television division of Marvel Entertainment, and Chief Creative Officer of Marvel Entertainment. In June of 2006, Arad branched off to form his own production company — Arad Productions, Inc. Arad has been a driving force behind bringing many of Marvel’s most famous comic book characters to the screen, with a track record that has been nothing short of spectacular, including a string of No. 1 box office openings.
As a producer or executive producer, his credits include Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (Columbia Pictures); X-Men, X2: X-Men United; and X-Men: The Last Stand (Twentieth Century Fox); The Hulk (Universal Pictures); Daredevil (New Regency); The Punisher (Lionsgate); Blade, Blade II and Blade: Trinity (New Line Cinema); Elektra (Twentieth Century Fox); The Fantastic Four and its sequel Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (Twentieth Century Fox); Bratz: The Movie (Lionsgate); Ghost Rider and Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (Columbia Pictures); Iron Man (Paramount Pictures); and The Incredible Hulk (Universal).
Arad’s current feature film slate includes Venom (Columbia Pictures), an animated Spider-Man feature (Sony Pictures Animation), Uncharted (Columbia Pictures), Metal Gear Solid (Columbia Pictures), Naruto (Lionsgate), Borderlands (Lionsgate), and many more.
Arad has also been producing animation for over 20 years on such series such as “X-Men,” “Fantastic Four,” “Silver Surfer,” “Iron Man,” “Spider-Man,” “Conan the Adventurer,” “King Arthur & The Knights of Justice,” “Bots Master,” and on direct-to-video animated features such as Avengers, Iron Man and many others.
Additionally, Arad created “Mutant X” and produced sixty-six hours of the live-action TV series for Tribune Entertainment. He also produced thirteen hours of BLADE, the live-action TV series for Spike TV. Currently Arad is producing the Netflix Original Series “Tarzan and Jane,” “Super Monsters,” and others.
Born in Cyprus and raised in Israel, Arad came to the United States during his college years and enrolled at Hofstra University to study industrial management. He earned a bachelor of business administration from the University in 1972. A long- established expert in youth entertainment, Arad is one of the world’s top toy designers. He has been involved in the creation and development of over two hundred successful products, including action figures, play sets, dolls, toy vehicles, electronic products, educational software and video games. In fact, virtually every major toy and youth entertainment manufacturer, including Toy Biz, Hasbro, Mattel, MGA, Nintendo, Tiger, Ideal, Galoob, Tyco, Sega and THQ, has been selling his products for more than 30 years.
In addition to his toy, animation, and film projects, today, Arad served as the Executive Advisor of NAMCO BANDAI Holdings and as a Chairperson of Production I.G’s American affiliate – Production I.G., LLC.
Matt Tolmach (Executive Producer) is currently producing the highly anticipated feature film reimagining Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, directed by Jake Kasdan and starring Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, and Kevin Hart, which is currently in post-production for Sony Pictures and set for a Christmas release. Tolmach is executive producing the Hulu series “Future Man” with Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. He previously produced The Amazing Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man 2, directed by Marc Webb, as well as Alex Gibney’s The Armstrong Lie. He and Frank Marshall are executive producing the documentary “What Haunts Us,” directed by Paige Tolmach. As President of Columbia Pictures for many years, Tolmach oversaw some of the studio’s most acclaimed and successful films, including Moneyball, The Pursuit of Happyness, Superbad, Pineapple Express, Zombieland, Step Brothers, The Da Vinci Code, 2012, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man, Talladega Nights, The Panic Room, The Grudge, and many others.
SALVATORE TOTINO (Director of Photography) most recently worked with director Ron Howard on Inferno, In the Heart of the Sea, The Dilemma, Angels & Demons, Frost/Nixon and DaVinci Code and previously teamed with the director on Cinderella Man. His other recent credits include Concussion, Everest and People Like Us,
Totino first served as cinematographer on Oliver Stone’s Any Given Sunday, then went on to shoot Changing Lanes, starring Ben Affleck and Samuel L. Jackson. His first collaboration with Howard was the director’s suspenseful Western The Missing, starring Cate Blanchett and Tommy Lee Jones.
A CLIO Award winner, Totino has shot more than 300 commercials and music videos, working with such artists as Tina Turner, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, R.E.M., Radiohead and many others. A native of Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, and the son of Italian immigrants, Totino was interested in photography at an early age. He began his career as a production assistant on commercials and worked his way through the ranks of camera departments on television and film projects before becoming a director of photography.
Among his credits during this period was the New York portion of Jim Jarmusch’s Night on Earth, on which he served as a focus puller.
OLIVER SCHOLL (Production Designer) is a German-born production designer and artist. An avid reader of science-fiction and non-fiction, Scholl’s interest in the merging of art, technology and story began in his teens and continues to inform his work today. At the age of 15, Scholl’s first of many illustrations were published in the German science fiction series, Perry Rhodan. He studied industrial design while continuing illustration for advertising and publishing. Early development work for film director Roland Emmerich's Stargate led to Scholl’s transition into the motion picture industry and his relocation to Los Angeles in 1991.
Scholl most recently served as production designer on Nikolaj Arcel’s The Dark Tower starring Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey. He also recently designed the films Suicide Squad, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., and Edge of Tomorrow.
Scholl’s other credits as a production designer are Doug Liman’s Jumper, The Time Machine, Godzilla, Independence Day, and Moon 44.
LOUISE FROGLEY (Costume Designer) is currently designing the costumes for Marvel’s Ant-Man and the Wasp. Her most recent credits include Free State of Jones, The Finest Hours, Unbroken, The Monuments Men, and Iron Man 3, as well as Robert Zeimekis’ Oscar® nominated film Flight starring Denzel Washington. She has also collaborated with Steven Soderbergh five times, on the films Contagion, Ocean’s Thirteen, The Good German, The Limey, and Traffic. She earned Costume Designers Guild Award nominations for Excellence in Costume Design for a Contemporary Film for her work on both Oceans’ Thirteen and Traffic.
Frogley was also honored by her peers with guild award nominations for her work on Good Night, and Good Luck, directed by and starring George Clooney, and for Stephen Gaghan’s Syriana, also starring Clooney. She also teamed with Clooney on the comedy The Men Who Stare at Goats, the period romantic comedy Leatherheads, The Ides of March,” and The Monuments Men.
Her other recent credits include the Marc Forster’s James Bond adventure Quantum of Solace, starring Daniel Craig; the romantic drama The Last Song, Robert Redford’s period drama The Conspirator; and the pilot for the acclaimed CBS series “The Good Wife.”
Frogley began her career in London and Paris as a costume designer and set decorator. Her first movie assignment was as assistant costume designer on director Hugh Hudson’s Academy Award®-winning drama Chariots of Fire. She has since designed costumes for more than 30 features, including Neil Jordan’s Mona Lisa; Ron Shelton’s Bull Durham; Executive Decision; U.S. Marshals; Spy Game and Man on Fire for director Tony Scott; Francis Lawrence’s Constantine; and Stephen Gaghan’s directorial debut, Abandon.
DAN LEBENTAL, ACE (Editor) has been editing in Hollywood since 1990, the year he edited his first feature. That film was followed closely by the Hughes brothers’ Dead Presidents. He also collaborated with the brothers on From Hell.
After more than 25 years in the industry, Lebental has cut more than 30 feature films (both indies and tent-pole studio features) in a wide variety of genres as well as television dramas, documentaries and shorts. His enthusiasm for good stories is matched only by his total dedication to the craft of cutting, his world-class technical expertise
Lebental’s studio portfolio includes Marvel Studios’ blockbusters Iron Man and Iron Man 2, starring Robert Downey, Jr., which both opened No. 1 at the U.S. box office and have grossed more than $1 billion combined. He also edited the blockbusters Thor: The Dark World and Ant- Man as well as the Marvels short All Hail the King.
Lebental has a longtime collaboration with director Jon Favreau, including such films as New Line Cinema’s Elf, Columbia Pictures’ Zathura: A Space Adventure, and Universal Pictures’ Cowboys & Aliens. Lebental met Favreau as an actor, while he was cutting Peter Berg’s Very Bad Things. In addition to editing the majority of Favreau’s movies, Lebental also edited the first season of Favreau’s television show, “Dinner for Five,” and edited the pilot episodes of Favreau’s “In case of Emergency and Revolution.”
Throughout his career as an editor, Lebental has also maintained and developed a close professional relationship with actor/producer Vince Vaughn, for whom he cut Universal Pictures’ The Break-Up, Wild West Comedy Show: 30 Days & 30 Nights—Hollywood to the Heartland, Couples Retreat, and Term Life.
DEBBIE BERMAN (Editor) most recently served as editor on the films The Jesuit starring Tommy Flanagan and Ron Perlman and The Final Girls starring Malin Akerman and Alexander Ludwig.
Berman’s other editing credits include Black November, The Untitled, Touchback, The Zero Sum, Within and Space Chimps.
MICHAEL GIACCHINO (Composer) has credits that feature some of the most popular and acclaimed film projects in recent history, including Rogue One, Doctor Strange, Zootopia, Inside Out, Jurassic World, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, The Incredibles, Ratatouille and Mission: Impossible–Ghost Protocol. Giacchino’s 2009 score for the Pixar hit Up earned him an Oscar®, a Golden Globe®, the BAFTA, the Broadcast Film Critics’ Choice Award and two GRAMMY® Awards.
Giacchino’s next project is War for the Planet of the Apes; his music may also be heard in Colin Trevorrow’s The Book of Henry. He is also working on the upcoming sequels to Jurassic World and The Incredibles, and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
Giacchino began his filmmaking career at the age of 10 in his backyard in Edgewater Park, New Jersey, and eventually went on to study filmmaking at the School of Visual Arts in NYC. After college, he landed a marketing job at Disney and began studies in music composition, first at Juilliard and then at UCLA. From marketing, he became a producer in the fledgling Disney Interactive Division, where he had the opportunity to write music for video games.
After moving to a producing job at the newly formed DreamWorks Interactive Division, he was asked to score the temp track for the video game adaptation of The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Subsequently, Steven Spielberg hired him as the composer and it became the first PlayStation game to have a live orchestral score. Giacchino continued writing for video games and became well known for his “Medal of Honor” scores.
Giacchino’s work in video games sparked the interest of J.J. Abrams, and thus began their long-standing relationship that would lead to scores for the hit television series “Alias” and “Lost,” and the feature films Mission Impossible: III, Star Trek, Super 8 and Star Trek Into Darkness.
Additional projects include collaborations with Disney Imagineering on music for Space Mountain, Star Tours (with John Williams) and the Ratatouille ride in Disneyland Paris. Giacchino also was the musical director of the 81st Annual Academy Awards®. His music can be heard in concert halls internationally with Star Trek, Star Trek Into Darkness and Ratatouille films being performed live-to-picture with a full orchestra.
Star Trek Beyond, directed by Justin Lin, marks his first third in a franchise and was released last summer.
Giacchino serves as the Governor of the Music Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and sits on the advisory board of Education Through Music Los Angeles.
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