The Wild True Story Of How Tom Holland Beat Out A Dozen Actors (And Backflipped His Way) Into The Spider-Man Suit

It Started With Thousands Of Actors And A Brutal Numbers Game

When Marvel and Sony struck their deal to bring Spider-Man into the MCU, the studios launched a worldwide casting search that pulled in a staggering number of hopefuls. A Homecoming Blu-ray featurette later revealed that 7,500 actors submitted audition tapes before the studios narrowed things down to just 200 for in-person meetings, and Holland himself called the whole thing "a pretty daunting process."

The List Got Brutally Specific: Six Names, One Role

By spring 2015 the search had been whittled down to a final shortlist of six screen-testing finalists straight out of a pool of over 1,500 actors: Tom Holland, Asa Butterfield, Judah Lewis, Matthew Lintz, Charlie Plummer, and Charlie Rowe. Holland and Butterfield quickly emerged as the two clear frontrunners, with insiders reporting Butterfield was even considered the favorite at certain points in the process.

His Audition Tape Was Basically Made By The Future Punisher

While filming the little-seen 2017 film Pilgrimage, Holland bonded with co-star Jon Bernthal, and the two ended up helping each other shoot their Marvel audition tapes -- Holland for Spider-Man, Bernthal for the Punisher. Bernthal has since jokingly taken credit for the tape's big move, recalling he told Holland, "maybe you should run up that wall and do a double backflip and then start the scene," a stunt Holland pulled off for real.

Every Single Self-Tape Included A Sneaky Gymnastics Demo

Holland leaned hard on his background as a West End dancer -- he'd starred as the title role in Billy Elliot the Musical -- to stand out from the pack. He later admitted that during his very first ident tape he did "a somersault into frame and a somersault out of frame" just in case anyone was watching, and made sure every subsequent tape included some kind of acrobatic flourish to prove his physical chops.

The Secret Screen Tests With Robert Downey Jr. (And A Minibar Confession)

The finalists were flown to Atlanta to screen-test directly against Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Evans in front of Kevin Feige, Amy Pascal, and the Russo brothers. Holland later revealed he improvised through his scene after Downey ditched the script entirely, and years afterward admitted Marvel found out he'd "polished off the minibar" the night before that very first test with Downey.

The Backflip That Sealed The Deal -- Then He Found Out On Instagram

During a movement test alongside Chris Evans, Holland was asked point-blank if he could do a backflip, and shot back that he'd been sending Sony backflip videos for five months already. After a grueling five-to-seven-month process, Holland didn't even get a phone call first -- he found out he'd won the role while scrolling Instagram in bed, seeing Marvel's post before Kevin Feige rang to confirm it, and the official announcement went out on June 23, 2015 alongside director Jon Watts.