Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy forever made Tobey Maguire synonymous with the crimefighting web-slinger, but if Yellowstone star Wes Bentley was interested, we very well could have had an entirely different Peter Parker. Released in 2002, that first Spidey film came before the comic book movie boom that would wind up conquering Hollywood. Last year’s Spider-Man: No Way Home, which featured Maguire’s Spider-Man alongside those played by Tom Holland and Andrew Maguire, is one of the highest-grossing movies of all time.
Bentley had no way of predicting all of this back when the offer to play Spidey came his way before Maguire had been officially cast. For better or for worse, Bentley was just not interested in the part whatsoever. He points to a decline in quality in the Batman movies, culminating with the widely-panned film Batman & Robin, to suggest that the future of comic book adaptations at that time appeared to be much more grim. That made him too nervous to accept the role, as Bentley recalls in a new interview for Jimmy Kimmel Live!.
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Puzzled, Kimmel asked again if Bentley really didn’t want to play Spider-Man, and the actor went on to add:
Spider-Man Is Now a Widely Coveted Role
The success of Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man drastically changed the perception some actors might have had when it comes to getting cast as the Marvel superhero. When Raimi parted ways with the franchise with Spider-Man 4 getting nixed, the time came to cast another actor for The Amazing Spider-Man. We now know that Andrew Garfield landed the role, and Joe Jonas just recently opened up about how bummed out he was that he didn’t get the part, saying that he was lobbying to make it happen.
“In the moment, you’re destroyed or you’re defeated. But you realize this person was brilliant, “Jonas told Variety, admitting that he later realized it was the right decision. “I remember years ago I was up for Spider-Man and I was so, so excited and it was the year Andrew Garfield got it. Obviously, he was the right one.”
For now, Tom Holland is Spider-Man in the MCU. When the time comes to make another Spider-Man film with the next actor, chances are there will be no shortage of interested actors lined up to audition.
