Nicolas Cage has revealed that watching the hit AMC drama Breaking Bad during the Covid-19 pandemic fundamentally altered his perspective on television, ultimately convincing him to take on the lead role in the Marvel series Spider-Noir. The Oscar-winning actor, who had long avoided television for fear of producing work that felt 'homogenised' or 'like everybody else,' said the experience opened his eyes to the narrative possibilities of long-form storytelling.
From Film to Television: A Shift in Perspective
In an interview with Variety, Cage explained how his son introduced him to Breaking Bad during lockdown. 'I began to see that the actors in that show were afforded the luxury of time to tell their story,' he said. 'I saw Bryan Cranston staring at a suitcase for what seemed like minutes. I couldn’t take my eyes off him, and all he was doing was staring at a suitcase, and it occurred to me that you cannot do that in movies: You don’t have the time.'
Cage, who stars as ageing private investigator and superhero Ben Reilly in the eight-episode live-action series Spider-Noir, noted that the prospect of an extended narrative was a major draw. 'I thought, maybe with an eight-hour narrative I can start planting seeds for a character that can bloom into something that I don’t have the luxury of time to do in a movie,' he said. 'That was the main attraction.'
Spider-Noir: A Unique Take on the Marvel Universe
Spider-Noir, produced by Amazon MGM Studios, is based on the Marvel comic Spider-Man Noir. The series is set in 1930s New York and features Cage as a version of the character he previously voiced in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The show stars Lamorne Morris, Brendan Gleeson, and Abraham Popoola, and is available in two formats: a black-and-white cut reminiscent of classic noir films and a colour version inspired by the stylised comic-book aesthetic of films like Dick Tracy.
Cage drew heavily from classic Hollywood noir and German expressionist cinema to shape his performance. 'I wanted to try to create an essence of some of my favourite old-world actors because I wanted to embody that style,' he told Variety, naming Humphrey Bogart, James Cagney, and Edward G. Robinson as key inspirations. 'I wanted all of that to coalesce so when you watch the black-and-white format of Spider-Noir, you really feel like you’re being transported to another time.'
Movement Inspired by Silent Horror
Cage also revealed that his character's movements were inspired by Max Schreck’s performance in F.W. Murnau’s 1922 silent horror film Nosferatu. 'That, to me, is indicative of German expressionism, the choreography,' he said. 'It seemed to me that a move like that would be arachnid, so I worked with my body to create that feeling of an animality in the character.' He added, 'One of the most interesting things I find with spiders is that they have no muscles – their appendages are like straws, and they shoot fluid to move – and so that informed this idea of the movements.'
The actor's shifting accent throughout the series drew immediate attention from viewers, but director Oren Uziel explained it was deliberate and character-driven. 'He becomes The Spider and he becomes more spider than man, and has to learn how to be human. So this is him educating himself. That's him going to the gym, almost,' Uziel told Slash Film. 'So, it was really fun, and it explains why often he is doing Bogart, or doing Cagney, or doing Peter Lorre.'
Uziel noted that a scene of Reilly watching the 1936 crime drama Great Guy starring James Cagney was carefully crafted. 'We scanned so many movies and then looked for the right clips that would be fun for him to mimic,' he said.
All episodes of Spider-Noir are now available for streaming on Prime Video UK, in both black-and-white and colour versions.
