Topher Grace
Topher Grace portrayed Eddie Brock/Venom in Spider-Man 3.
Significant roles
- Eric Forman in That '70s Show (1998-2006)
- Seth Abrahms in Traffic (2000)
- Tommy Donegal in Mona Lisa Smile (2003)
- Pete Monash in Win a Date with Ted Hamilton! (2004)
- F. Scott Feinstadt in P.S. (2004)
- Carter in In Good Company (2004)
- Jason in Valentine's Day (2010)
- Edwin in Predators (2010)
- Matt Franklin in Kids in America (2011)
Quotes
- "I was not just a huge fan of the first two films. I told Sam when we got together I thought there were only two films, two franchises, where the sequel's been better than the first one. And it's Aliens and Godfather and the New Testament (laughter). So I was a huge fan of his films. I thought he was a great director beforehand. The comic book I was an even bigger fan of, in the late Eighties. Ironically, it was when Venom, the character I play was being born by the great Todd McFarland who kind of revolutionized comics at that time. So I felt like when he offered me the role, I had this inside track. And I kind of had to sit on my hands and not say yes too quickly, because I hadn't negotiated my deal yet. But I wanted to say, "I'll pay you to do it!" "
- "Well, the evil Doppelganger idea came from Alvin Sargent, the writer, but the script wasn't done when I signed on, so there was kind of like places open for ideas in terms of how that could play out. Something I was nervous about, because I was such a huge fan of the comic book, was that Eddie Brock was much older than me and really muscle bound, and even though I worked out for like six months, I could never get to where he was."
- "Sam kind of put my mind at ease by saying, "Don't worry, we've got a really cool idea for the origin. There's a retelling of the Spider-Man story in a comic book called Ultimate Spider-Man. It's kind of taken from that comic book, a little bit too. It's kind of a case study in that somebody had received kind of very similar powers to Spider-Man but didn't have a great father figure like Uncle Ben telling him, "With great power comes great responsibility." He probably would use it for evil. Even Peter kind of used it for personal gain when he first got the power. So then I thought, this is neat, because I know I'm like Tobey. I've lost roles to him before [laughs] and we work at the same place in the film and we're after the same girl, and something I loved about it was that they gave Eddie the edge at the beginning which is weird. Everything is kind of rolling his way. He's a better photographer, he dresses better, he's got more of a flourish. But then as is so often the case, if someone's got it all going on in the exterior, it's probably hiding a very shallow interior, and although Peter might not have as polished an exterior as Eddie, he has a very solid core, and so it was great because it showed two people who are very similar and who ultimately are totally opposite."
- "Like the first day we did, they actually poured some kind of tar-like substance on me, and I remember the stuff was getting in my eyes and I remember thinking this is going to be a long shoot. They tried lots of different things. There was a kind of goop that they'd smear on the suit to give it the effect of being more liquid. That remained to the end. It was kind of unpleasant. But the good thing about Sam in terms of CGI -- and there is a bunch of CGI, especially the character of Venom -- but the good thing about him is that if it can be done in camera, meaning if there can be no special effects, or if it can be done physically. My personal belief is that that character and the way he looks in the comic books came out of a reaction to like CGI, which at the time was like that water in The Abyss, kind of hard water, or in T2. I admire Sam for that. When I was watching the movie -- the more that he filmed it on the set, the more it feels kind of authentic."
- "I don't want to see those fangs again. They were like really painful. It was weird. It was an hour to put on the suit, but that's actually not very painful. The only thing about the suit is there's no way to go to the bathroom in the suit which Tobey's never told me. You have to be kind of careful with that. I mean just not drinking a lot of liquids in the morning. The make-up is 4 hours, the prosthetic make-up, which really wasn't painful. It just took a lot of patience because you sit there. There's nothing to do. You can't read a newspaper. You have to keep your head straight and they would glue all the vines onto my face. They'd pull me up on wires which was a little bit of a wedgie situation [Laughs] which is not that awful, but the fangs were actually bruising my gums. It's good though. I guess it's kind of a method way to get into being mean."
- "The best thing about what Sam does is he's an actor's director which is easier said than done in a huge budget movie like this. You would never know that you were in this huge blockbuster the way he directs you and I think he got a lot of it out of me. I was actually surprised when I was watching the film that it was so moving at certain points. Most of the time directors can't wait to get to the big action scene but he's just the opposite. Obviously he's really good at those action scenes, but the way he works with his actors, he cares about every little nuance. It was an amazing experience working with someone who can balance those two things. I don't know if I'll ever be that lucky again."
- "I know the movie did well for Sony, but I also know a lot of people weren't happy with it. I think Sam is so talented. I remember one time I was on ninth unit. (Laughs.) Ninth unit? It's like he's running a small country."
- "This summer, there was a movie like that where people are just slamming a big studio movie. I would love to see anyone who's slamming one of those movies try to fit in Sam Raimi's position. He was like the president of a small country — by the way, it had the gross national income of a small country, too. I have huge respect for him. I think, on a whole, he did such a fantastic job."