The cast of Spider-Man: No Way Home is packed with new, old and familiar faces from the web-slinger’s live-action and comic book back catalogues, gathering together a star-studded ensemble even by the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s lofty standards.
Noted Spidey fans Tom Holland Jacob Batalon probably had to pinch themselves more than once when they discovered they’d be sharing the screen with Alfred Molina’s Doctor Octopus, Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin, Jamie Foxx’s Electro and many more besides, all famed actors reprising characters they’d first played when the current crop of stars were children and/or teenagers.
However, Batalon admitted he got one of the biggest surprises of his life during the No Way Home shoot when Molina approached him asking for an autograph, as he revealed to The Hollywood Reporter.
“When I first met Alfred, I think, he told me that his – I believe it was his step-daughter [that] was a big fan of mine. And he asked me to give him like an autographed picture. At first I thought he was kidding, I literally thought he was just trying to pull my leg or something, but he was genuinely asking me for a picture. And I was like, ‘Of course I will.’ And now we’re best friends.”
Such is the level of fame that comes with playing a key part in the MCU’s Spider-Man franchise, even veterans like Molina are now asking for your signature, which must have been mind-blowing for the 25 year-old Batalon. He was only seven years old when Otto Octavius terrorized Tobey Maguire’s Peter Parker in Sam Raimi’s sequel back in the summer of 2004, so to be working with the tentacled menace and becoming his buddy is a turn of events he could have never seen coming.
