Marisa Tomei Wanted Aunt May’s Sexuality To Be Fluid

In a recent interview with Geeks of Color Spider-Man’s Marisa Tomei talked about a campaign that she launched within Marvel Studios to make her character in the franchise have a girlfriend. If you haven’t yet seen the movie, sorry for the spoiler. Although, we’re not sure that fans of the web-slinger were coming into this movie expecting to see a major shift in aunt May’s sexuality. That being said, if it was up to Tomei, she would’ve gone full progressive with the character. She even revealed that she had an idea for whom her on-screen partner could be. Tomei’s overall reasoning was pretty straightforward. Uncle Ben was out of the picture to begin with, (if this is a spoiler for you are you even a fan?) so in essence, her character was free to explore!

Was Tomei’s Idea Considered By Sony and Disney?

The once ultra-traditional and conservative Disney company has certainly made major strides to appeal to progressive audiences. We’ll try and tip-toe around the spoilers here, but in making Aunt May’s sexuality fluid the studio would’ve had to alter the story quite a bit. Aunt May’s love life essentially does dictate a major plot point in the story. According to Tomei, there was some consideration in the studio when she made her request. In a recent interview, she mentioned,

“There was a moment, where I felt that May — maybe she should just be with a woman because Ben is gone,” she then added, “we were kind of talking about it … [but] no one went for it at the time”

Did Marisa Tomei Reveal Her Personal Preferences In Making The Suggestion?

According to Marisa Tomei herself, the proposal for aunt May to have more fluid sexuality than she does in other film adaptations, and the comics wasn’t a vague suggestion. Actually, the, “My Cousin Vinny” star had things pretty planned out. She even suggested who should be her on-screen partner. While also mentioning that they didn’t have to make a big fuss about aunt May’s coming out party. It was enough for her if the studio just decided to reference the fact that she was “exploring” new avenues. Tomei said that she proposed Sony producer Amy Pascal be her on-screen love interest. Tomei said in the interview,

“I actually really wanted Amy Pascal from Sony to be my girlfriend!” Tomei continued saying “I was like, ‘No one even has to know, Amy. I’ll just be in a scene, and you’ll be over there. And I’ll just be like, “Hey!” It’ll just be a subtle thing.’”

Fans Are Split Down The Middle After This Reveal

As is usually the case when something like this comes up the fan base seems to be split down the middle on Marisa Tomei’s proposal. With certain die-hard fans lamenting that actors and studios always want to diverge from the source material that is the comic books. Other folks on social media praised the idea. At the end of the day, it’s essentially all for naught. Since the studio shot down Marisa Tomei’s idea.