There have been so many twists and turns executed throughout The Crowded Room, a riveting dramatic series starring Tom Holland that’s available to anyone with an Apple TV+ subscription. Even if you tuned in to the initial episodes of the series, which is based on the 1981 nonfiction book The Minds of Billy Milligan, it’s unlikely that you could have predicted some of the narrative shifts that happen in The Crowded Room. Don’t worry. I’m not going to spoil the show’s secrets. They are best for you to discover while you are charging through the episodes. But we did get a chance to speak with Holland about bringing the character of Danny Sullivan to life, and the biggest challenge he faced in the process.
The finale for The Crowded Room will arrive on July 28. And while Tom Holland is largely recognized for his portrayal of Peter Parker in the Spider-Man movies (which you can now watch on streaming… well, most of them). But when he branches outside of the superhero genre, Holland enjoys challenging himself in complicated dramatic roles. When he teamed with Joe and Anthony Russo on the drug-addict crime thriller Cherry, Holland was all but unrecognizable, and his immersion earned him solid reviews from critics. Now with The Crowded Room, Holland is exploring facets of a new character that include gender fluidity and dissociative identity disorder. And he’s relishing the opportunity.
Tom Holland spoke with us about The Crowded Room and his character, saying:
He’s a character with highs and lows that are on the complete end of the spectrum. So the complicated part was actually not the kicking and screaming, or the crying in the corner. It was the middle ground. It was Danny just on a good day was what I found really hard to bring to life. I wanted him to feel likeable, empathetic, vulnerable, and somewhat small. I just wanted there to be this sense that Danny is a really, really small kid. So playing Danny on his average day was the toughest thing to tap into.
You learn very early on that Danny (Holland) is involved in a crime, and that he has cohorts that might have egged him along, but for various reasons. Those reasons unfold over the course of the series, and make room for characters such as Sasha Lane’s Ariana – who hides a lot of secrets – and Emmy Rossum’s Candy, Danny’s mother. The crime is the tip of the iceberg in terms of the elements you learn about Danny, and that has allowed Holland to go to so many places that he doesn’t get in the Marvel and Sony superhero universe. Not yet, at least.
Holland has expressed some apprehension about returning to Spider-Man 4, given the success that they enjoyed with Spider-Man: No Way Home. In his opinion, if they can’t top that third movie, then maybe it’s time to pass the baton off to the next inevitable Peter Parker. He’s still going to be part of that MCU text thread, which makes him cooler than the rest of us. And he’ll no doubt find plenty of work in dramatic fare should he want to.
Tune in to the series finale of The Crowded Room on July 28, and then hold out hope for an MCU Spider-Man 4 in the near future.
