Nicolas Cage Can’t Resist Playing Heroes and Villains — Here’s Why

Villain or hero? After a career of playing both sinners and saviors, Nicolas Cage reveals which side he loves most—and why he keeps returning to it.

Nicolas Cage has never been a one-lane guy, and he is not about to start now. At the New York premiere of his new series Spider- Noir, the Oscar winner laid out why he keeps bouncing between heroes and creeps — and, in a very on-brand move, he also nudged the show toward a pretty bold format choice that could win over younger viewers.

Cage on playing saints and sinners

Asked point-blank about which side he prefers, Cage basically said: why pick?

"Villain? I‌ve played plenty of villains. I like both. I think they‌re both important parts of cinema. I would not want to get trapped into doing one thing."

That was to PEOPLE at the Regal Times Square premiere in NYC. And he is not wrong about the range: recent turns swing from a genuinely unnerving killer in Longlegs to a flamboyant Dracula in Renfield, with pricklier, more complicated stuff like Adaptation earning him an Oscar nomination along the way. The throughline is basically: keep moving so the industry cannot box you in.

A Spider-Man what-if, and a Spider-Man now

Fun bit of alt-timeline trivia: years ago, Cage was in talks to play Green Goblin in Sam Raimi‌s 2002 Spider-Man. He chose Adaptation instead; Willem Dafoe put on the Goblin gear opposite Tobey Maguire, and the rest is history. Cut to now: Cage is back orbiting the Spider-world, this time starring in Spider-Noir as Ben Reilly. Yes, Ben Reilly — an unexpected angle if you keep close tabs on Spidey lore, so I am curious how the show frames that.

Early buzz out of screenings calls the series a moody, macabre riff that nods to the animated Spider-Verse energy while staking out its own identity. Cage reportedly digs into his take on Ben, and Li Jun Li and Jack Huston are getting singled out. It is apparently a little experimental — in a good way — both in how it tells the story and how it looks.

Why Spider-Noir is in both black-and-white and color

Here is the curveball Cage helped toss. Spider-Noir was originally headed out strictly in black-and-white. Cage pushed to have a color version too. His reasoning, shared at the world premiere on May 13: younger audiences are not exactly steeped in black-and-white, so give them a color cut with a slightly colorized vibe to pull them in — then, ideally, they try the black-and-white version and start connecting the dots to the classic film references. Whether you agree or not, that is a rare case of a star using clout to open the door to two distinct viewing experiences instead of just one.

What to know

• Nicolas Cage says he enjoys playing both heroes and villains and does not want to get typecast; he told PEOPLE that at the Spider-Noir premiere at Regal Times Square in NYC.
• Receipts on the range: chilling antagonist in Longlegs, Dracula in Renfield, and an Oscar-nominated tightrope in Adaptation.
• Spider past and present: he once circled Green Goblin for Sam Raimi‌s 2002 Spider-Man but chose Adaptation; Willem Dafoe went Goblin opposite Tobey Maguire. Now, Cage stars in Spider-Noir as Ben Reilly.
• Format twist: Spider-Noir will be available in both black-and-white and color. It was initially just black-and-white; Cage advocated for offering both to help bring in younger viewers.
• Release plan: premieres May 25, 2026 on MGM+, with streaming two days later on May 27.
• Early reactions call it stylish, a bit experimental, and praise Li Jun Li and Jack Huston alongside Cage.

Two cuts, one show, and Cage doing the thing he does best: walking the line between genre play and character study. Are you more into his rogues or his reluctant heroes?