Tom Holland Primer: Where Have You Spied the New Spider-Man Before?

Tom Holland in ‘The Impossible’

Tom Holland will soon be web-slinging into a theater near you. The 19-year-old British actor has been confirmed as the new big-screen Spider-Man, taking over a role played previously by Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. Thanks to a deal between Marvel, Sony, and Disney, Holland will appear in both next year’s Captain America: Civil War and a standalone Spider-Man movie to be released by Sony in 2017. That just leaves one question: Who is this soon-to-be masked young man? The charismatic teen doesn’t have a long résumé, but his film and stage work have garnered their share of raves. Here’s a quick primer on the rising star.

Holland got his first big break at the age of 12, when he was cast in the West End production of Billy Elliot the Musical in London. An enthusiastic young Holland talks about playing the demanding title role in the video below.

Thanks to Billy Elliot, Holland captured the attention of director J.A. Bayona, who was casting his harrowing drama The Impossible. Holland made his feature film debut as Lucas in the acclaimed 2012 film, about a tourist family in Thailand separated in the aftermath of the Indian Ocean tsunami. In the clip below, Lucas urges his mother (Naomi Watts) to get to safety, while she tries to help a fellow victim.

In 2013’s How I Live Now, Holland played the shy, bespectacled Isaac, one of a group of British kids whose lives are transformed by a terrorist attack. The film’s turning point is seen in the clip below.

And even before being cast as Spidey, Holland was keeping busy. In addition to appearing as Gregory Crowell on the BBC mini-series Wolf Hall, he co-stars in three upcoming films: the survival thriller Backcountry, the medieval adventure film Pilgrimage, and Ron Howard’s historical shipwreck drama In the Heart of the Sea which hits theaters December 11. Keep an eye out for Holland as the cabin boy in the trailer below.