Andrew Garfield (born in 1983) is an actor who has appeared in radio, theater, film, and television, including the 2007 movies Lions for Lambs and Boy A, and 2009’s The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Sony Pictures official twitter has just updated with the breaking news that Andrew Garfield will be Peter Parker in the next Spider Man movie. Sony is definitely gambling a lot on this fresh new face in Hollywood. Spider-Man is one Sony’s biggest movie franchises of all time, but it did need a reboot. Can Garfield do it? He has a very strong British accent (hence the US/UK dual citizenship), so we may have to prepare ourselves for a fancy Englishman shooting webs all over NYC. Or maybe the next Spider-Man will be in the UK? Oh boy.
Garfield will probably be more of a catch with the ladies than Tobey Maguire was – he made a modeling debut and appeared in a Vogue December 2009 issue alongside Lily Cole as Hansel in the photographed retelling of Hansel and Gretel. Garfield also appears in the forthcoming British sci-fi thriller Never Let Me Go and is filming The Social Network, alongside actors Justin Timberlake and Jesse Eisenberg.
Spider-Man swings back onto the screen in 3D on July 3, 2012. The new film will begin production in early December directed by Marc Webb from a screenplay by James Vanderbilt. Laura Ziskin and Avi Arad will produce the film from Columbia Pictures and Marvel Studios.
On selecting Garfield, director Marc Webb said, “Though his name may be new to many, those who know this young actor’s work understand his extraordinary talents. He has a rare combination of intelligence, wit, and humanity. Mark my words, you will love Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker.”
Commenting on the announcement, Amy Pascal, co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, and Matt Tolmach, President of Columbia Pictures said, “Spider-Man is a classic superhero — a young man who balances his responsibility to serve humanity and crush evil with the shyness and normalcy of someone struggling to find himself. The role demands an extraordinary actor. You need someone who can magically transform himself from Peter Parker into Spider-Man. An actor who will depict the vulnerability of youth and the strength and confidence of a legendary figure at the same moment. We have found that actor in Andrew Garfield. From the first time we saw him in the upcoming film The Social Network, to his glorious screen test, which floored all of us, we knew that we had found our new Peter Parker.”
