Nicolas Cage says he wanted to play his 1930s superhero detective in Spider-Noir like a "spider pretending to be a person"

Executive producers and Spider-Verse writing duo Phil Lord and Chris Miller say Nicolas Cage had a pretty specific idea as to how he wanted to portray Spider-Noir in the upcoming Prime Video series.

"That trailer is great. They did a wonderful job. He's amazing," Lord told Collider. "He had this great idea, which was, 'I want to play this like a spider pretending to be a person.'" As silly as this might sound on the surface, Cage is one of the best actors of quite possibly all time (and I mean this wholeheartedly)... so we get where he's coming from, and so do Lord and Miller.

"Like, 'After what happened to me, I'm more spider than person, and I have to act like a human in public, and in private I can be my true self,'" Miller explained, giving us a bit of a window into Ben Reilly's mentality throughout the series. "So he sometimes goes to the movies, his character, and practices and studies what the actors are doing so he can use it in his real life."

Cage takes stars as Ben Reill, AKA the Spider, an older, alternate universe version of Spider-Man in 1930's New York City (where fedoras and bowler hats abound). As the jaded, down-on-his-luck private detective finds himself returning to superheroism and going up against classic Rogue Gallery villains like Sandman, Silvermane, Electro, and Cat Hardy (AKA Black Cat).

Spider-Noir premieres on MGM Plus in the US on May 25, before arriving on Prime Video globally on May 27. In the meantime, check out our guide to the other best new TV shows on the way in 2026.