Andrew Garfield Reflects on 'Profound Two Weeks' Spent with His Mother Before She Died of Cancer

Bruce Glikas/FilmMagic Andrew Garfield and mother Lynn Garfield

Andrew Garfield is reflecting on losing his mother to cancer when he was filming his upcoming movie, The Eyes of Tammy Faye.

The Amazing Spider-Man actor, 38, opened up to Variety about mom Lynn — whom he described to the outlet as "the purest angel" — and her battle with cancer. Garfield had only recently learned of her diagnosis prior to going to North Carolina to shoot the film and was hesitant to leave, he said, but did so at her encouragement.

"She said, 'I would struggle with you not doing it on account of me.' I told her, 'OK, but promise me when it's time to come home you'll let me know,'" Garfield recalled.

During filming in late 2019, that time came and his costar Jessica Chastain and Searchlight Pictures co-chief David Greenbaum sent him back home to England to be by her side.

Cliff Watts for Variety

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"The good news about me and her is that we left nothing unsaid," Garfield said. "We had all the quality time we could possibly have while she was here. And those last two weeks I got to be with her were probably the most profound two weeks of my life."

He continued, "To be with her and my dad and my brother, all of her friends, my nephews. It was full of grace in the midst of the terrible tragedy."

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Once The Eyes of Tammy Faye wrapped, Garfield said he took time off to "be a human being, not a human doing."

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Later in the interview, he discussed how he honored his mother with another one of his upcoming roles — playing Rent creator Jonathan Larson in the Lin Manuel Miranda-directed movie musical Tick, Tick… Boom!.

"I can feel her smiling at that," Garfield said. "She was someone who was taken arguably too soon, even though we don't get to decide. There are certain things you can't control. What I started to understand through her loss is that we're all leaving with a half-finished song."

"Being a part of this film with Lin [Manuel Miranda] and the rest of the company, I'm able to sing Jon's [Larson] songs and I'm able to hold my mother's unfinished song in the lyrics and the music that Jon wrote," he continued. "His work has become a container for that."

"It becomes a story where we can bring our individual, personal losses and we can share them," Garfield concluded. "And then we can go back to living in that way where we know this is all finite."

The Eyes of Tammy Faye opens in theaters on Sept. 17