Willem Dafoe wasn't going to join Spider-Man: No Way Home for just a cameo appearance
The Spider-Man (2002) actor wanted to get in on the action
Actor Willem Dafoe made his grand return to the screen as the Spider-Man villain the Green Goblin in the newest franchise installment, Spider-Man: No Way Home. Before agreeing to reprise the role though, the 66-year-old wanted to make sure that he would not simply stand on the sidelines— instead, he wished to perform action sequences and maintain an integral role in the film.
“I just was concerned about how contrived it was or whether it was just like a power cameo, a reference,” Dafoe says in an interview with Mulderville. “I really was worried that I wouldn’t have something to do.”
“To do this physical stuff was important to me,” Dafoe continues. “One of the first things I said to Jon [Watts] and Amy [Pascal], basically when they pitched it to me, before there was even a script, was, ‘Listen, I don’t want to just pop in there as a cameo or just fill in in close-ups. I want to do the action because that’s fun for me’.”