There’s a good likelihood that SpiderMan: No Way Home will include various incarnations of the web-slinger from previous iterations, but the original actor who played the web-slinger on television will not be one of them and he is rather upset about it.
Before the triumph of Sam Raimi’s live-action Spider-Man trilogy for Sony, Marvel tried serializing his storylines on television for the first time in the 1970s with Nicholas Hammond in the titular role on the short-lived series The Amazing Spider-Man.
Nicholas Hammond of The Sound of Music was the first actor to bring the character to life, long before Holland, Garfield, or Maguire got their chance to play friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. The Amazing Spider-Man was a CBS Network television series that first aired in 1977 and lasted only two seasons before being canceled, along with the Wonder Woman series headed by Lynda Carter, for fear of CBS becoming recognized as a “superhero network.”
Since the show’s discontinuation, Hammond has previously disclosed that there were ideas for a potential cinematic revival in the 1980s, involving the actors of The Incredible Hulk TV series, but the project never progressed beyond initial negotiations.
In the 1970s television show The Amazing Spider-Man, Nicholas Hammond played Peter Parker/Spider-Man, based on the renowned Marvel Comics character. While The Electric Company, a Children’s Television Workshop series, had the first live-action rendition of Spider-Man in the United States, Hammond’s Spidey was the first with plots.
Recently, The Hollywood Reporter chatted with Hammond about his stint as Peter Parker, and he expressed disappointment that he was not asked to reprise the role for the upcoming Marvel picture.
The acclaimed stage and screen actor, who recently played the unforgettable Sam Wanamaker in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, delighted in how much people enjoy not only his portrayal of the character but Spider-Man in general, speaking from his home in Sydney. And he admits that playing Peter Parker again in a Marvel Cinematic Universe cameo would have been a dream come true. But, at least in No Way Home, it’s not going to happen.
“I think it would have been huge fun. It would have been a kick in the pants to have the old guy there. I was really hoping I would be approached but unfortunately, that didn’t happen,” Hammond says.
With the new MCU flicks, Hammond believes that life imitates art. He claims that Tom Holland’s portrayal is the most accurate representation of what they were attempting to achieve: making him seem like a normal guy, someone who you could forget had these abilities and become engrossed in Peter’s story.
“Tom Holland’s version is the closest to what we were doing; trying to make him very much a real guy, someone who you could actually forget he had these powers and get caught up in Peter’s story. That was what we were going for,” he added.
Despite the fact that The Amazing Spider-Man only lasted 13 episodes on CBS, Hammond appreciates what was attempted. Hammond was first hesitant because the only such show that had ever aired on television was Batman, and he was not interested in becoming a part of anything that had its own value.
As the film nears its December release date, the frenzied conjecture and fan theories surrounding No Way Home have reached near fever pitch. Fans are still adamant that Holland will be the sole Spider-Man on the big screen. If Marvel went to all the bother of bringing back Maguire and Garfield for the picture, it would have been incredible to see the first live-action Spider-Man make a cameo appearance as well.
Fans may also opt to take Hammond’s announcement with a grain of salt and begin speculating that he, too, will appear. The possibilities are surely there, given Marvel’s well-deserved reputation for public misinformation over their releases. Fans won’t accept any news to the contrary until they watch Spider-Man: No Way Home for themselves, so there’s no way of knowing whether Holland will be web-slinging solo throughout the picture.
Sources: The Hollywood Reporter, NewsBreak, Screen Rant, Head Topics, Screen Crush