COLLIDER: How are you doing today, sir?
ANDREW GARFIELD: I’m good, baby.
I called you baby.
I’m doing very well.
That was not what I expected to be called, but I’ll take it.
Seriously, congrats on this movie.
Image via Sony Pictures
You and Jessica are fantastic.
Hopefully, you enjoy the questions, because I prepped.
So I want to start with, what TV series would you love to guest star on?
Image via Sony Pictures
GARFIELD:Search Party.
What movie or movies have you seen the most?
A little unorthodox choice.
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GARFIELD:Clean Slate.
Do you do knowClean Slate?
Actually, I’ve seen a lot of movies, and I don’t know if I knowClean Slate.
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GARFIELD: It’s a little-known Dana Carvey movie.
The originalMemento, but it’s a comedy.
I do actually know this movie.
Image via Searchlight Pictures
He’s like a detective with amnesia.
When you’re filming a movie, can you leave the character you’re playing on set?
Or does a piece of it always come home with you every night during the shoot?
Image via Searchlight Pictures
GARFIELD: I can choose.
Justin’s character, Sean Parker, answers the door, and I’m very surprised to see him.
The Social Networkis what I call a masterpiece.
Image via Netflix
He was the perfect sports dad.
And that was that.
So that was a beautiful moment.
I felt very gratified.
Leaving it all in the field.
That was a beautiful day.
In the years since the film, have you talked to Eduardo?
GARFIELD: No, no.
I wonder if I ever will.
I’m very, very open for that conversation.
I would love to have a hang.
Fincher obviously has a very unique way of working on set.
What is his secret?
Because it’s not just about the takes, it’s about him being an amazing director.
So what is it that gets these amazing performances out of everyone?
Suddenly there’s no acting, there’s no performing, it’s just pure.
He can see it.
He’s like, “Okay.
So he just has an instinctive trust, and the best directors I’ve ever worked with have that.
Mel Gibson’s that way.
Scorsese’s that way.
A bunch of other directors I’ve worked with are that way.
It’s an instinctive, “Oh, that was it.
It’s a body, gut kind of intuition.
What was cooler for you, being on an episode ofDoctor Whoor hostingSNL?
GARFIELD: I don’t want to compare things.
I loved doing it.
My father was a bigSNLfan and so I felt much more like that had lived in my imagination.
Did that help you when you were getting ready to come out on stage onSNL?
GARFIELD: No, it’s every time.
It’s every time, every time.
No matter what it is,SNLor theater or a film set.
And am I going to die when the cage opens?”
I think I might die.
Do I risk it?
Because I haven’t died yet, but maybe today’s the day that I die.”
There’s not space back there.
You get brought into this box and then there’s doors open.
I let the energy just leave me, go through me, and used it as best I could.
I’ve never watchedSNL, theSNLthat I did.
I never intend to, because it was just the most pure experience.
I don’t want it to be ruined by watching my work in it.
It was just like…
The experience is the thing.
I think that’s how I, if I ever do it again, that’s the intention.
I just want to be here to help you guys shine.
That’s the awesome part of it.
You have managed to land such incredible roles through your already amazing career.
Is there a role though that you went after that you didn’t get that still stings?
And again, but I don’t regret it.
There’s nothing I regret.
It was absolutely right.
And no, I really have this weird kind of wacky belief that everything is perfect.
Everything happens for a reason.
So, no, I don’t.
No, actually, no.
You got to work with Philip Seymour Hoffman and Mike Nichols on Broadway.
Because that’s insane.
GARFIELD: It was the best.
One of the greatest times of my life creatively, spiritually, life-wise.
I had just finished shooting the first Spider-Man film and I needed it.
I actually needed it for my soul.
But then to do Arthur Miller.
And to do that particular play.
Then you put Phil as Willy Loman and then Mike directing, I mean, it doesn’t….
There’s no way of being able to comprehend the perfection and beauty of that experience.
I’m so grateful for it.
What do you think might surprise people to learn about being part of a big Broadway production like that?
GARFIELD: Your dressing rooms are pretty shitty, for the most part.
I don’t know if there’s anything I can say that would be surprising.
It’s just so soulful.
It just feels so right for me.
There’s a real community feeling.
This is really killing me."?
GARFIELD: A few times.
A bunch of times.
It doesn’t get more profound than that, or more agonizing and suffering than that.
So there were nights where I was like, “Fuck this.
Why am I doing this to myself?”
You obviously made twoSpider-Manmovies with Marc Webb.
Do you miss being in those sort of films?
GARFIELD: I mean, I feel a lot of ways about it.
I’m really glad I did it.
There’s not one part of me that regrets it at all.
I feel so grateful for all the friendships and relationships I built and the experience.
That stuff’s tricky for me.
Where do I want to live?
Do I want to live by a river?
Do I want to live by a lake?
Do I want to live in the woods?
I’m being a bit glib, but also…
So for me, that was a really interesting dynamic and dilemma for me.
So that, that was the kind of remedy for me.
So, it’s a big learning experience, for sure.
Did you ever talk to Drew Goddard about thatSinister Sixmovie?
Was that, how close did that actually get to being made with you?
We just got on like a house on fire.
I loved his vision, he’s so unique and odd and off-kilter and unconventional in his creative choices.
So that was definitely a fun couple of months, but life.
No, I get it.
GARFIELD: It would have been cool.
Maybe one day he’ll get to do it, but it would’ve been cool.
GARFIELD: It’s awesome and you expect nothing less.
That’s who she is as an actor.
I admire her a great deal.
I value that kind of commitment, and I knew that would be the case.
GARFIELD: We would go to church every Sunday, me and Jess.
We would go to Heritage USA, their old stomping ground.
We got toured around and we would do that as a ritual together every Sunday.
It was very, very beautiful and surprising.
That, I think, was definitely unexpected.
GARFIELD: It depends.
WithSilence, I took a year.
WithHacksaw Ridge, it was probably about three months.
With this, I would say probably about two and a half to three months.
With Lin-Manuel’s movie,Tick, Tick…
So that was a year and a half.
That was boiling for a year and a half.
Then the real just firm focus was probably about four months for that.
Anyway, so it’s different every time.
That stuff is really, I just love it.
One of the things that I don’t think people realize is what Jim and Tammy Faye did.
They literally built a media empire, which is…back in the seventies, or early eighties.
This is really hard to do.
I mean, can you sort of talk about what they accomplished before, obviously, their downfall?
GARFIELD: Oh, it’s insane.
Jim was a builder, he built a theme park.
He built, as you say, a media empire.
He built housing for single mothers who had been abused.
He’d built housing for disabled kids.
He had ministries all over the world.
It’s remarkable what he did.
Also for him, his justification was, is that God wants this.
God wants me to create places for Christians.
He wants me to convert as many people as possible.
He wants me to make Christianity fun.
He wants me to show that actual material prosperity is what God wants.
It’s a little easier now than it was back then.
She was a really good person.
It just so happened that, of course… and, she was very camp.
And in the world generally.
GARFIELD: No, not right now, not right now.
No, because we’re shooting until December, so it’s a little bit of a ways off.
I want to jump actually real quick and talk aboutTick, Tick…
Boom!, which is a project I cannot wait to see.
I’m very excited.
I still get sad when I think about Jonathan and dying so young and it still bums me out.
What did it mean to you to play him?
GARFIELD: I mean, to the best of my ability, it was really profound.
He was not afraid of ruffling feathers and upsetting people.
Even though people know about him, there’s just so much they don’t know.
I know Lin is obviously a huge fan of his, Jonathan’s work.
And did you feel that pressure or do we just, so excited to be there?
Because he was always an 11, because I think some way he knew he didn’t have long.
Boom!, it’s his heart.
It was a heart condition.
He had a heart attack.
SoTick, Tick…Boom!is prophetic.
None of us ever will sing our song fully in this life.
We will all die before with an unfinished song.
We hope we leave people behind who’ll keep that song going.
All of the ethos of Bohemia, all of the ethos of Rent.
That’s what he was trying to do.
Wake us up to life and the celebration of life and the sanctity of life.
That was the greatest gift.
Cannot wait to talk to you more in-depth once I have seen the movie.
GARFIELD: You too, dude.
Nice to see you.
