Nicolas Cage might be leading his own live-action Spider-Noir show very soon, but he almost played a very different Spider-Man character.
Speaking to People, Cage shared that he almost played Green Goblin, the villainous role that eventually went to Willem Dafoe. Despite speaking to director Sam Raimi about the part, Cage instead chose Spike Jonze's Adaptation. "For me, that was the right choice at the time," he said.
Green Goblin, AKA Norman Osborne, is the villain of the first of Raimi's Spider-Man movies. While the role would absolutely have suited Cage's iconic flair for the dramatic, it is very hard to imagine anyone but Dafoe in the role: especially since Dafoe's take on the character has been immortalized in so many memes.
"I've played plenty of villains. I like both," Cage added. "I think they're both important parts of cinema. I would not want to get trapped into doing one thing."
Cage's Spider-Noir arrives very soon, and it sees Cage reprise his role as private investigator Ben Reilly, which he first played in the animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The show will be released in both black and white and color.
"I'm all about the black and white. I designed my performance for black and white, and I'm glad I saw it that way," Cage previously shared.
"It was actually one of my ideas to shoot it in color, because I am aware of teenagers, and I'm aware they don't have that much experience with black and white. So the dream is that they watch it in color, then they check it out in black and white and learn something and they go, 'Hey, I wanna see some of these movie references,' and then they just open a treasure trove of wealth of great American cinema."
Spider-Noir arrives on Prime Video this May 27. While you wait, check out our guide to the most exciting upcoming TV shows for everything else that's on the way.
