Tap Shoes, Dance Belt and Spidey Sense: Meet Broadway’s Peter Parker

After an exhaustive search, actor/singer/cutie Reeve Carney (pictured above) has been selected to bring Peter Parker to life in Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark on Broadway. It should be noted that director Julie Taymor had just worked with him in her new film version of The Tempest, so they might as well have skipped the exhaustive search. I auditioned, but was rejected when I couldn’t shoot webs and do jazz hands at the same time. (Try it. It’s harder than it looks.) In addition to finally casting Peter, the show also has new producing partners who swear everything is just great and that Spidey will be swinging onto Broadway sometime in 2010 at the Hilton Theatre.

Reeve (best known for his role in Snow Falling on Cedars and for his indie band Carney) joins cast members Evan Rachel Wood (Mary Jane Watson) and Alan Cumming (Norman Osborn) in the show. Director Julie Taymor brought Disney’s The Lion King to life on Broadway, so she knows a thing or two about seemingly impossible stage adaptations. And, as previously reported, Bono and The Edge are writing the songs.

Now, if they could just get Patti Lupone as Aunt May, I’d be in gay geek heaven.