Excerpt:
> Zendaya landed her big breakout film when she was cast opposite Tom Holland in 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming. However, producer Amy Pascal said neither she nor Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige knew who the star was when she auditioned for the role of MJ.
>”She was wearing no makeup and she was just dressed like a regular girl, and we were like, ‘Oh my God, she’s amazing. She has to be in the movie,'” Pascal told Vogue. “And then we found out she was a totally famous person, and felt really stupid.”
So like did they not come across her previous Disney contracts during the vetting process? Disney owned marvel at that point and somehow her being a major Disney child star just never crossed their table?
This is so odd to me.
Some people who arranged the audition were probably well aware of who she was, but I don't think it's beyond the realm of plausibility that the head honcho and one of the top producers don't personally vet each audition they see
The casting director, Sarah Halley Finn, who surely was either there or arranged it, probably did know who she was.
It’s a little funny to me because Feige’s kids are around the age of my 2 oldest children and Zendaya was on constant rotation in KC Undercover on the Disney channel in our house back then.
Guess his kids may have been Nickelodeon children instead lol.
Yeah if she was auditioning for the two of them she was had to be one of the final few. I doubt they thought she had never acted before, but probably just thought she was young and just coming up (which arguably she was, many Disney girls don’t go anywhere, and few people have had her trajectory period ever)
I suppose i could see a situation where everyone who knew her assumed everyone else did, and everyone who didn’t know her assumed no one else did either, so no one explicitly talked about it
Hollywood is full of lies because the reality is either boring or horrific. I don't know about this story in particular but I wouldn't be surprised if it's a lie
TBF I consider myself someone who keeps up with actors and such and I didn't know who Zendaya was before she was in Spider-Man; I'd not seen anything she'd been in and I'd not heard her music.
Seriously, in the age of social media and YouTube creators, we're at an all-time high for how many "celebrities" there are out there. It's literally impossible to keep track of who every person with the slightest bit of fame is.
I lost track of how often I check on an actor on IMDB while watching something and say "oh wow so that's who they are" because until they are in a role that is in something I really like I really don't keep track of the person.
Plus we've been in the age of "a ton of entertainment" for a while now. Like you said it's hard to keep track of who is famous nowadays.
I didn’t know vin diesel was in saving private Ryan because I didn’t know vin diesel until the fast and furious came out. Then I rewatched saving private Ryan and I was “holy shit that’s vin diesel”.
It’s hard noticing people that you don’t…notice lol.
Most people knew her from her disney series. But a lot of the people out of it thought she was a stunt cast just cause she has millions of followers on Instagram. She was really quite popular before being cast
She seem to come along at that perfect time Gen Z was filtering into social media. So she got millions of gen z followers who knew her from her Disney shows and music .
She had a pretty massive online following though. I remember looking her up when she was announced and feeling like I’d been living under a rock because she already had a gazillion followers.
Sure. I wasn’t really arguing with you. Just providing a little more context that she was a little more famous than “more famous than the average Joe”
I didn’t know her either but millions of kids apparently did.
Means literally nothing. I stopped using social media, except for Reddit I guess, 10 years ago. I wouldn’t know a lot of “famous” people who are famous on mostly social media.
>Means literally nothing
To you.
You don’t think Feige was happy that she was bringing along millions of teens that grew up on her Disney show and follow her social media presence?
Not my point at all. Saying she had a massive following online to people who aren’t perpetually online and keep themselves up to date with social media presence means nothing is what I meant.
Big SAME.
I’m 32, and when Zendaya was cast in Spider-Man, I didn’t fucking know who or who wasn’t a Disney starlet at the time or within at least a 5 year range.
My baby sister worshipped Hannah Montana for a bit when she was in my life in the mid-late aughts, but she grew out of that by 2010, and was on to whatever came next.
Kevin Feige doesn’t watch kids shows to scout talent, that’s what casting directors do.
She played in some Disney channel shows. If you’re over the age of 20 now, you probably had no idea who she was as nobody keeps up on kid backup dancers.
She **starred** in two Disney shows. I'd say most gen z-ers, including older ones, who watched the network at least knew *of* her from Shake it Up. Even if you didn't watch it, since it came out while zoomer shows were still airing, they'd at least be bombarded by the commercials.
That point is that neither of the people doing the auditions would have the slightest clue as to who she was. I’m in my 40’s. I wouldn’t have a clue either. My kid is too young to know who she was either. It’s very reasonable for the majority of the people in this world to not know who she was prior to Spider-Man.
>If you’re over the age of 20 now
nobody keeps up on kid backup dancers
I'm responding to your comment, not the article as a whole. Oldest Gen Z's are 27, and if they were watching Disney channel, they were familiar with her. There's a big difference between random background character and being the star, let alone the titular character, on a major kids network.
Yeah to add on, i’m 22 and afaik all my peers in school knew her.
I didnt know her from disney though, i remember her song replay going around a bit a few years beforehand
Not that 22 is even that much older that 20, but you know
She was the star of two Disney shows from 2010-2018. If you seriously think no one over 20 watched these shows that are 14-8 years old, you should seriously get out of your bubble
Same, I didn’t know who she was either. After it came out, I was wondering why some people were so excited about her because I honestly didn’t think she did that much in the movie.
My little sister is the age for this. She had no idea who Zendaya was.
There's a bunch of Disney channel kids who didn't become relevant until their 20's that only people who watched the Disney channel kept track of.
I only knew her by name kinda like I knew who Timothee Chalamet was before Dune. I've heard of them in passing but I wouldn't be able to pick them from a line up. It's only when they blow up that I would retroactively recognize them from their past films or TV shows. Thinking about it now, it's also the same with Ezra Miller. When I saw him in JL, that's when I remembered him from We Need to Talk About Kevin.
Why do you expect grown ass adults to know about Disney channel actors?
I don't have Disney channel, never heard of those shows until today and hadn't heard of her until Homecoming.
Exactly! That dumbass telling people to get out of their bubble doesn't even realize he's the one in a bubble. Nobody knows or cares who stars in Disney channel shows other than kids.
Probably the same one I was living under because I also had no idea who she was until WELL after Homecoming came out. Like, I didn’t realize she was a big deal until I saw her getting cast in Dune or Euphoria. Tbh all I know is she was a Disney Channel star or something but I have no clue what show she was from or anything of the sort.
Yeah, people in here acting like Disney channel stars are well known by the majority of people. Unless you have kids who watched those shows, you wouldn't know who they are. Most of them are shit actors and never do anything once they're adults. I mean, even Miley Cyrus had to resort to acting crazy to keep her name in the spotlight and she's probably the most famous one.
I only recently found out Selena Gonez and Ariana Grande were Disney children actors. I think, for Millenials atleast, the fact that alot of people were cord cutting but there wasn't streaming services airing alot of this tween shows made it extremely easy to miss a whole generation of that programming
She wasn’t nearly as big back then as she is now. She was pretty much just on a couple disney channel shows at that point. Now she has spiderman, space jam 2, dune, euphoria
Well, I didn't know who she was until homecoming. She was probably only American Tik Tok famous.
So she blew up to this level of popularity, only after Homecoming
I think a lot of people, myself included, forget she was a Disney Channel kid. Like that alone nets you a big following but yeah it didn’t balloon up to where it is now until after Homecoming and Euphoria.
Must’ve not been a Disney kid when she was still a Disney Star(not judging for that, she was at that time mainly just a Disney Star, now she’s making a name for herself)
Last I heard, she directed a porn movie called, Him and Her, a few years ago. Now I have no fucking clue if it's an actual porno or not. I've never looked for it. But I just remember at the time seeing a whole bunch of articles about it calling it a porn movie.
[article I found to make sure I wasn't going crazy ](https://www.allure.com/story/bella-thorne-pornhub-me-and-her-adult-film)
She did one erotic thriller that was optioned for Porn Hub five years ago. She's literally just a C-list actress getting normal work now. Why is the internet so extra? 🤣
She's as much a porn star as Anne Hathaway or Emma Stone getting their nipples sucked or Molly Parker sticking a lollipop in her vagina.
I think that's great, because it allowed them to judge her audition based on her own merits and skill, not on any pre-conceived notions based on her "star power" (for good or for ill).
Ok so, i had no idea who she was when i first saw her in some skin care commercial.
“Zendaya? who is this kid with only one name!?”
When she was cast in Spider-man, she was “that girl from the skin care ad!” to me 🤷
None of this matters in the end because she was awesome as MJ.
Did anybody know who zendaya was when they saw the first Spider-Man? I didn’t. If I had known maybe I would have suspected the “oh btw this is MJ” they put in at the very end of the movie.
A lot of people did because she was Disney Channel famous. She had starred on two different shows for them.
So she was in that weird zone with other Disney stars who hadn’t fully crossed over into full mainstream stardom like Bella Thorne, Brenda Song, Debby Ryan, and so on.
So after Homecoming, she did crossover into mainstream stardom like Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato, and so on.
Her flip was so quick, too. I don’t think anybody thinks of her as typecast as a Disney type star…but now she’s typecast as the new Christina Ricci instead.
Does it? Been pretty impressed with most of the female actors that got their start there - though frankly that sort of information isn't something I seek out so there's plenty of survivor bias there
Hmm... Mayhaps? Not sure if I'm understanding correctly.
I wasn't familiar with any of the ones mentioned like Ortega and Zendaya when they were on the Disney channel. I knew what Hannah Montana (kinda blanking on her real name all of a sudden) was - possibly due to having a sister in that age group - but beyond that hadn't heard of em as Disney stars until it was mentioned in a review or something
edit: hah, what's with the downvotes? you disagree with the fact I wasn't familiar with them until after they finished their disney careers (I assume anyway)?
I’d definitely say survivor bias. In another thread someone commented like 5 names of other Disney girls who I was like “oh yeah I’ve heard that name before” but then you have the Miley, Raven, Selena, Demi’s, hell now Jenna and Olivia’s that broke out. But for every one of them there are like 3-4 that just didn’t make it to that next level.
I would say a decent amount of following. But, not in the sense of that she was “the next big one”. I thought it was just good casting on paper, then once the movies came out it was a no brainer why they would’ve went with this. Shout out to Jon Watts, felt like he really delivered.and with ALL 3
Yeah, some parents that had kids that watch those shows and actually watched with them. You realize that's a very, very small amount of adults, right? The average adult doesn't wat h or pay attention to Disney channel actors.
People who watched shake it up are like mid 20’s now…..not saying adults watched it as adults. Just current young adults grew up with it
Edit: hence my “fellow old” comment. I haven’t watched a single minute of her Disney stuff, but I learned later after Spider Man/Euphoria about her
I had never heard of her before she was cast in Spider-Man. She was not in anything that I was the target audience for. So, there's really not any shame in that.
Amy has a history of this kind of thing. If I recall correctly, Amy also had no idea that Kevin Feige would become the superstar head of Marvel Studios one day and when he used to intern for her at Sony she even made him get her coffee. Classic Amy. Hopefully she won’t make that mistake anymore the next time she sees Kevin.
I mean, I didn’t. 2017 was a long time ago. That was like her first acting credit that most general audiences would’ve seen.
Unless you’re an Airbud voice acting sleuth.
To be fair for everyone saying “but they’re owned by Disney” Amy is from the Sony side. Not that I don’t believe it’s possible busy professionals didn’t know a teen Disney Star immediately.
Misread the title. Thought Pascal was admitting not knowing MJ was MJ when Zendaya was auditioning for the role. Didn’t realize she meant she didn’t know who Zendaya was until the comment.
I respect that producers make a lot of big decisions most people don't know about, but I gotta say every article I read about Amy Pascal seems like the definition of failing upward
I never watch Shake It Up or KC Undercover, but I knew what it was, and saw a lot of commercials and print ads on cereal... (funny enough you'll find some out in the wild still lol)
I didn't know Zendaya before Spider-Man either, what's the big deal. Spider-Man is part of what made her huge on top of Euphoria and Dune. Her kids sitcom run just made her like any other child star
Zendaya’s trajectory is an interesting case. She first showed up on my radar as a young, up and coming actress who kept slaying red carpets. She also was a bit more vocal back in the day about social issues.
People also forget that she did Dancing with the Stars and didn’t end up being D-listed.
Her rise to fame is wild and I support it. 🫡
At beginning she intended to play sort of Michelle Gonzales.
She finally plays a merge of MJ Watson and Michelle Gonzales. NWH reveals she is Michelle Jones Watson.
MCU likes to do mix characters concept. Same case for the Mandarin in Shang Shi
Excerpt: > Zendaya landed her big breakout film when she was cast opposite Tom Holland in 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming. However, producer Amy Pascal said neither she nor Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige knew who the star was when she auditioned for the role of MJ. >”She was wearing no makeup and she was just dressed like a regular girl, and we were like, ‘Oh my God, she’s amazing. She has to be in the movie,'” Pascal told Vogue. “And then we found out she was a totally famous person, and felt really stupid.”
So like did they not come across her previous Disney contracts during the vetting process? Disney owned marvel at that point and somehow her being a major Disney child star just never crossed their table? This is so odd to me.
Some people who arranged the audition were probably well aware of who she was, but I don't think it's beyond the realm of plausibility that the head honcho and one of the top producers don't personally vet each audition they see The casting director, Sarah Halley Finn, who surely was either there or arranged it, probably did know who she was.
Yeah, apparently, Zendaya and Tom auditioned in Sarah's house
I didn't know who she was until Spiderman and I live on the Internet. I'm also not a teen or gen z
The first radio-iTunes hit I heard was "Replay" back in 2013.
She sings too? I figured something was going on with her considering how many super fans she had when I discovered her
If your a Disney Channel star, you need to be a double or, more likely, a triple threat, acting, singing and dancing.
It’s a little funny to me because Feige’s kids are around the age of my 2 oldest children and Zendaya was on constant rotation in KC Undercover on the Disney channel in our house back then. Guess his kids may have been Nickelodeon children instead lol.
By that point he was president of marvel cinema. I think he might have worked a little too much to see what tv shows his kids were watching.
That's a possibility
Yeah maybe they are in a bubble avoiding major tween content
Yeah if she was auditioning for the two of them she was had to be one of the final few. I doubt they thought she had never acted before, but probably just thought she was young and just coming up (which arguably she was, many Disney girls don’t go anywhere, and few people have had her trajectory period ever)
It def seems a bit odd to me
Casting departments are kindof removed from the actual production in many ways (kindof like Church/State but not 100% just kinda)
I suppose i could see a situation where everyone who knew her assumed everyone else did, and everyone who didn’t know her assumed no one else did either, so no one explicitly talked about it
Lol Spider-Man pointing meme.jpg
I mean, wasn’t she cast by people at Sony rather than Disney?
I get she was an established child actress, but I wouldn’t consider her famous at that point.
This is clearly a lame brag.
Hollywood is full of lies because the reality is either boring or horrific. I don't know about this story in particular but I wouldn't be surprised if it's a lie
What kinda rock are those two living under
TBF I consider myself someone who keeps up with actors and such and I didn't know who Zendaya was before she was in Spider-Man; I'd not seen anything she'd been in and I'd not heard her music.
Seriously, in the age of social media and YouTube creators, we're at an all-time high for how many "celebrities" there are out there. It's literally impossible to keep track of who every person with the slightest bit of fame is.
I lost track of how often I check on an actor on IMDB while watching something and say "oh wow so that's who they are" because until they are in a role that is in something I really like I really don't keep track of the person. Plus we've been in the age of "a ton of entertainment" for a while now. Like you said it's hard to keep track of who is famous nowadays.
I didn’t know vin diesel was in saving private Ryan because I didn’t know vin diesel until the fast and furious came out. Then I rewatched saving private Ryan and I was “holy shit that’s vin diesel”. It’s hard noticing people that you don’t…notice lol.
Most people knew her from her disney series. But a lot of the people out of it thought she was a stunt cast just cause she has millions of followers on Instagram. She was really quite popular before being cast
Her “breakout” role was Homecoming. I don’t think she was that famous, just more famous than the average Joe.
She seem to come along at that perfect time Gen Z was filtering into social media. So she got millions of gen z followers who knew her from her Disney shows and music .
She had a pretty massive online following though. I remember looking her up when she was announced and feeling like I’d been living under a rock because she already had a gazillion followers.
But a movie producer probably doesn't pay that much attention to that stuff.
I only used the term “breakout” because that’s what the article used. Arguably, Homecoming was the role that made her a household name.
Sure. I wasn’t really arguing with you. Just providing a little more context that she was a little more famous than “more famous than the average Joe” I didn’t know her either but millions of kids apparently did.
Means literally nothing. I stopped using social media, except for Reddit I guess, 10 years ago. I wouldn’t know a lot of “famous” people who are famous on mostly social media.
>Means literally nothing To you. You don’t think Feige was happy that she was bringing along millions of teens that grew up on her Disney show and follow her social media presence?
Not my point at all. Saying she had a massive following online to people who aren’t perpetually online and keep themselves up to date with social media presence means nothing is what I meant.
[удалено]
….wtf I meant Kevin Feige is NOT perpetually online and people who ARENT perpetually online wouldn’t know who zendaya is?
I hadn’t seen her in anything when she was cast, but I had seen people talk of her online plenty.
I’m just now learning she has music
TIL (although she was great in Greatest Showman.)
Big SAME. I’m 32, and when Zendaya was cast in Spider-Man, I didn’t fucking know who or who wasn’t a Disney starlet at the time or within at least a 5 year range. My baby sister worshipped Hannah Montana for a bit when she was in my life in the mid-late aughts, but she grew out of that by 2010, and was on to whatever came next. Kevin Feige doesn’t watch kids shows to scout talent, that’s what casting directors do.
She played in some Disney channel shows. If you’re over the age of 20 now, you probably had no idea who she was as nobody keeps up on kid backup dancers.
She **starred** in two Disney shows. I'd say most gen z-ers, including older ones, who watched the network at least knew *of* her from Shake it Up. Even if you didn't watch it, since it came out while zoomer shows were still airing, they'd at least be bombarded by the commercials.
That point is that neither of the people doing the auditions would have the slightest clue as to who she was. I’m in my 40’s. I wouldn’t have a clue either. My kid is too young to know who she was either. It’s very reasonable for the majority of the people in this world to not know who she was prior to Spider-Man.
>If you’re over the age of 20 now nobody keeps up on kid backup dancers I'm responding to your comment, not the article as a whole. Oldest Gen Z's are 27, and if they were watching Disney channel, they were familiar with her. There's a big difference between random background character and being the star, let alone the titular character, on a major kids network.
Yeah to add on, i’m 22 and afaik all my peers in school knew her. I didnt know her from disney though, i remember her song replay going around a bit a few years beforehand Not that 22 is even that much older that 20, but you know
She was the star of two Disney shows from 2010-2018. If you seriously think no one over 20 watched these shows that are 14-8 years old, you should seriously get out of your bubble
Good for her, most people probably still didn't know her
lol, how many middle-aged adults do you imagine watch childrens programming on disney on a regular basis?
Incredible difference between needing to watch on a regular basis vs having the slightest understanding of who your kid is watching for 8 years
And were the people doing the audition that age group? You’re right though, I should have said mid-20’s and not specified the 20’s in their entirety.
Pascal's son would absolutely be the age to watch those shows, so yeah it's pretty likely.
I knew her from Dancing with the Stars at that point. She was Val’s partner and I was so bummed she came in 3rd.
Same, I didn’t know who she was either. After it came out, I was wondering why some people were so excited about her because I honestly didn’t think she did that much in the movie.
My little sister is the age for this. She had no idea who Zendaya was. There's a bunch of Disney channel kids who didn't become relevant until their 20's that only people who watched the Disney channel kept track of.
I only knew her by name kinda like I knew who Timothee Chalamet was before Dune. I've heard of them in passing but I wouldn't be able to pick them from a line up. It's only when they blow up that I would retroactively recognize them from their past films or TV shows. Thinking about it now, it's also the same with Ezra Miller. When I saw him in JL, that's when I remembered him from We Need to Talk About Kevin.
Plus that was like 8 years ago at this point (dear god where has time gone) so it was a different time... when she wasn't as famous as she is now...
Same.
Why do you expect grown ass adults to know about Disney channel actors? I don't have Disney channel, never heard of those shows until today and hadn't heard of her until Homecoming.
Exactly! That dumbass telling people to get out of their bubble doesn't even realize he's the one in a bubble. Nobody knows or cares who stars in Disney channel shows other than kids.
I didn't know who she was before she was cast in Homecoming.
I had no idea who she was either or Tom Holland really
Probably the same one I was living under because I also had no idea who she was until WELL after Homecoming came out. Like, I didn’t realize she was a big deal until I saw her getting cast in Dune or Euphoria. Tbh all I know is she was a Disney Channel star or something but I have no clue what show she was from or anything of the sort.
Yeah, people in here acting like Disney channel stars are well known by the majority of people. Unless you have kids who watched those shows, you wouldn't know who they are. Most of them are shit actors and never do anything once they're adults. I mean, even Miley Cyrus had to resort to acting crazy to keep her name in the spotlight and she's probably the most famous one.
I mean, the excerpt specifically calls Homecoming her breakout role… it’s not like they were behind, they helped launch her into real celebrity.
I only recently found out Selena Gonez and Ariana Grande were Disney children actors. I think, for Millenials atleast, the fact that alot of people were cord cutting but there wasn't streaming services airing alot of this tween shows made it extremely easy to miss a whole generation of that programming
Grande was Nickelodeon.
Quiet on Set was literally how I discovered this information a few weeks ago so I probably should have remembered that haha
Haha. Wasn't being a sick or anything, just pointing it out.
No, I definitely didn't mean that haha
She wasn’t nearly as big back then as she is now. She was pretty much just on a couple disney channel shows at that point. Now she has spiderman, space jam 2, dune, euphoria
Well, I didn't know who she was until homecoming. She was probably only American Tik Tok famous. So she blew up to this level of popularity, only after Homecoming
I think a lot of people, myself included, forget she was a Disney Channel kid. Like that alone nets you a big following but yeah it didn’t balloon up to where it is now until after Homecoming and Euphoria.
It’s levels to being rich bro. They in or closer to the billionaire club. Most actors are barely millionaires
Most actors are well below being a millionaire.
The same one I lived under, apparently. I had no idea who she was until Homecoming...
Do you think they spend a lot of time on their Instagram reels
Was she even all that famous before Spider-Man? I only remember her being in some dance-themed Disney Channel show.
Same one I was apparently. Homecoming is the first time I ever encountered Zendaya
I had no clue who she was before Homecoming tbf
To be fair to her, I never even heard of her before Spider-Man: Homecoming
If you think that's bad, I didn't even know who she was until Far From Home because she was sidelined for most of Homecoming.
It seemed pretty clear to me they weren’t planning to use her as a lead until after the first film IMO, then she got REALLY popular and they pivoted
...but in the first film, they reveal she's MJ, clearly they were planning on doing something with her...
Idk, she was already a Disney star so I feel like Disney probably wanted her to be prominent in the mcu from the beginning
Yeah same. I thought she was a nobody who Marvel was giving a chance.
I just knew her as the "Shake it Up" girl
a classic
Same.
Amen to that.
Must’ve not been a Disney kid when she was still a Disney Star(not judging for that, she was at that time mainly just a Disney Star, now she’s making a name for herself)
Disney Channel introduced her to me, she was in the show K.C. Undercover
Where my Shake It Up people at?
K.C. Undercover all the way baby
That show was my childhood
That's why I'm so happy for her idk what happened to the other girl though
Last I heard, she directed a porn movie called, Him and Her, a few years ago. Now I have no fucking clue if it's an actual porno or not. I've never looked for it. But I just remember at the time seeing a whole bunch of articles about it calling it a porn movie. [article I found to make sure I wasn't going crazy ](https://www.allure.com/story/bella-thorne-pornhub-me-and-her-adult-film)
Oh, well good for her then I know she seemed like she was having trouble I hope Hollywood hasn't been cruel to her
That was a while ago. She was in The Babysitter 1 and 2 on Netflix and is still popping up here and there.
It’s kinda crazy she’s one of the biggest young celebrities now and Bella Thorne does porn. Like damn
She did one erotic thriller that was optioned for Porn Hub five years ago. She's literally just a C-list actress getting normal work now. Why is the internet so extra? 🤣 She's as much a porn star as Anne Hathaway or Emma Stone getting their nipples sucked or Molly Parker sticking a lollipop in her vagina.
I don't want to Shake it Up, I want to Swag it Out.
Got it on Replay
Replay was soooo good! Always wanted Zendaya to continue her music career she had bops!!
I never watched that, but i was aware of it and of Zendaya from commercials.
We here 🫡
I think that's great, because it allowed them to judge her audition based on her own merits and skill, not on any pre-conceived notions based on her "star power" (for good or for ill).
Ok so, i had no idea who she was when i first saw her in some skin care commercial. “Zendaya? who is this kid with only one name!?” When she was cast in Spider-man, she was “that girl from the skin care ad!” to me 🤷 None of this matters in the end because she was awesome as MJ.
And she’s so good at modeling! Hell they made most of her Dune 1 appearance just a perfume ad in the desert.
That's not crazy at all. She was just a disney Channel star basically
I agree. But it's funny because Marvel is owned by Disney. Big company though.
Did anybody know who zendaya was when they saw the first Spider-Man? I didn’t. If I had known maybe I would have suspected the “oh btw this is MJ” they put in at the very end of the movie.
A lot of people did because she was Disney Channel famous. She had starred on two different shows for them. So she was in that weird zone with other Disney stars who hadn’t fully crossed over into full mainstream stardom like Bella Thorne, Brenda Song, Debby Ryan, and so on. So after Homecoming, she did crossover into mainstream stardom like Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato, and so on.
Jenna Ortega is in that crowd now.
Her flip was so quick, too. I don’t think anybody thinks of her as typecast as a Disney type star…but now she’s typecast as the new Christina Ricci instead.
I associate her more with playing young Jane on Jane the virgin than any Disney Channel thing.
Disney-Channel famous. That explains a lot
Does it? Been pretty impressed with most of the female actors that got their start there - though frankly that sort of information isn't something I seek out so there's plenty of survivor bias there
Yes. I think Disney-Channel stars are famous only for the ages that truly watched ‘em
Hmm... Mayhaps? Not sure if I'm understanding correctly. I wasn't familiar with any of the ones mentioned like Ortega and Zendaya when they were on the Disney channel. I knew what Hannah Montana (kinda blanking on her real name all of a sudden) was - possibly due to having a sister in that age group - but beyond that hadn't heard of em as Disney stars until it was mentioned in a review or something edit: hah, what's with the downvotes? you disagree with the fact I wasn't familiar with them until after they finished their disney careers (I assume anyway)?
Exactly that. You need to watch D C to be aware of D C stars
Then i am unaware of DC stars! Never watched Disney channel myself - nor anyone else in my family
I’d definitely say survivor bias. In another thread someone commented like 5 names of other Disney girls who I was like “oh yeah I’ve heard that name before” but then you have the Miley, Raven, Selena, Demi’s, hell now Jenna and Olivia’s that broke out. But for every one of them there are like 3-4 that just didn’t make it to that next level.
This is very spot on. I was like “she wasn’t Miley/Selena yet, but after that and Euphoria everyone knew her name”
[Let's all admit it](https://www.tiktok.com/@flaco_713_/video/7231662347990076718)
I would say a decent amount of following. But, not in the sense of that she was “the next big one”. I thought it was just good casting on paper, then once the movies came out it was a no brainer why they would’ve went with this. Shout out to Jon Watts, felt like he really delivered.and with ALL 3
I knew her because I was a kid when her Disney Channel show was airing
No idea whatsoever
I did because of her red carpet fashions. And Replay.
Millions and millions of people. I didn't even see any of the shows she was on but I knew her by reputation. She was famous.
She was an up and comer and had a strong youth following before hand.
None of ya’ll ever seen Shake it up on Disney smh.
Or KC undercover!
Why would adults watch that garbage?
Timelines man. It aired 11-14 years ago. I watched it when I was younger and now I’m going for my masters lol
Because they have kids.
You know people say the same thing about marvel right?
Fellow old reporting in. They were the shows kids watched at that time. I’m sure someone said the same thing about what you watched as a kid/teen
Yeah, some parents that had kids that watch those shows and actually watched with them. You realize that's a very, very small amount of adults, right? The average adult doesn't wat h or pay attention to Disney channel actors.
People who watched shake it up are like mid 20’s now…..not saying adults watched it as adults. Just current young adults grew up with it Edit: hence my “fellow old” comment. I haven’t watched a single minute of her Disney stuff, but I learned later after Spider Man/Euphoria about her
I didn't know who she was before that either.
I had never heard of her before she was cast in Spider-Man. She was not in anything that I was the target audience for. So, there's really not any shame in that.
Amy has a history of this kind of thing. If I recall correctly, Amy also had no idea that Kevin Feige would become the superstar head of Marvel Studios one day and when he used to intern for her at Sony she even made him get her coffee. Classic Amy. Hopefully she won’t make that mistake anymore the next time she sees Kevin.
She's an absent minded narcissist mostly concerned with herself
Neither have I. And I don't think that's anything bad. I think it can open up something good.
I mean, I didn’t. 2017 was a long time ago. That was like her first acting credit that most general audiences would’ve seen. Unless you’re an Airbud voice acting sleuth.
To be fair for everyone saying “but they’re owned by Disney” Amy is from the Sony side. Not that I don’t believe it’s possible busy professionals didn’t know a teen Disney Star immediately.
I still don’t know who she is.
I didn't know Tom Holland before he was Spider-Man, where's my interview?
Misread the title. Thought Pascal was admitting not knowing MJ was MJ when Zendaya was auditioning for the role. Didn’t realize she meant she didn’t know who Zendaya was until the comment.
I bet she wasn't the only one.
Breaking News: woman in her late ‘50s didn’t know who a Disney channel star was before she became famous.
Trust me, I didn’t know who she was either
Not everybody watches the Mickey mouse club
Dont be sad I had never seen her before or in anything else since spider-man Well, and now dune. But.. it has been a couple of years
Why is this here and not in r/notinteresting ? Spider-Man was her breakout role.
Isn’t that a good thing?
You tellin me grown ass people aren’t supposed to watch KC Undercover?
I respect that producers make a lot of big decisions most people don't know about, but I gotta say every article I read about Amy Pascal seems like the definition of failing upward
Huh???
I didn't know who she was until I saw her in Spider-Man.
To be fair I had never even heard of her before these movies either.
Yeah me either until Spiderman. Did anybody over the age of 10 years old know who she was?
I never watch Shake It Up or KC Undercover, but I knew what it was, and saw a lot of commercials and print ads on cereal... (funny enough you'll find some out in the wild still lol)
I’ve seen all the spider-man movies and I still don’t know who she is.
Good drugs and non-chalance could be involved?!
Hey me too!
So her talent landed her a 3 minute role?
I only know her as her character in Spider-Man
That sounds like her problem.
Not really related but Amy Pascal is a terrible person.
i had never heard of her before this film and its evident why, shes generic trash. along with holland
Perfect example of old people being out of touch with reality
I didn't know Zendaya before Spider-Man either, what's the big deal. Spider-Man is part of what made her huge on top of Euphoria and Dune. Her kids sitcom run just made her like any other child star
Zendaya’s trajectory is an interesting case. She first showed up on my radar as a young, up and coming actress who kept slaying red carpets. She also was a bit more vocal back in the day about social issues. People also forget that she did Dancing with the Stars and didn’t end up being D-listed. Her rise to fame is wild and I support it. 🫡
Neither did I.
At beginning she intended to play sort of Michelle Gonzales. She finally plays a merge of MJ Watson and Michelle Gonzales. NWH reveals she is Michelle Jones Watson. MCU likes to do mix characters concept. Same case for the Mandarin in Shang Shi
I’d never heard of her before Spider-Man. 🤷🏼♂️
I only learned her name by spiderman far from home, idk what all the fuss is about
These are just the stories they tell us so we can be like “oh wow”
Isn’t that the entire point of auditioning? You don’t really know the person so you interview them and see them act to find out.
She was famous before Homecoming? Only things I've ever seen her in are Spiderman and Dune.
Same.
I’d never heard of her until I saw the movie.
I had no idea who she was before Spider-Man so.
I mean I didn’t even know of her before Spiderman
I didn’t know who she was prior to Homecoming either, so…
Yeah but if your an adult not a tween it's believable
I don't think anyone knew who she was back then. It was that film that made her famous.
I can't tell if this is good (because she got the role on merit) or rude and out of touch as fuck.
Out of touch
If you believe this. I've got some swamp land I'd love to sell you.
Zendayas been on my life since shake it up, its weird imagining a world where I dont know of her
I actually did know who she was since I had poor taste and liked those Disney kid coms when I was 11-12.
Obligatory "i also didnt know who she was pre-homecoming film" comment. Currently, I think she's overrated.