Producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura is no stranger to spectacle. Throughout the ‘90s, Di Bonaventura rose to prominence as the president of worldwide production at Warner Bros., where he helped put The Matrix into production and even had a huge hand in securing the rights to the Harry Potter books. He built up enough momentum to found his own production company in 2002, leading to 2005’s Constantine which was the first release under the official “Di Bonaventura Pictures” brand. Since then, Di Bonaventura has found great success partnering with Paramount Pictures as one of the main producers of the G.I. Joe and Transformers film franchises. However, the famed producer is now playing his hand at a different kind of blockbuster with another studio. Together with Sony, Lorenzo di Bonaventura has just helped bring Madame Web to life.
Following the two Venom films and Morbius, Madame Web is the next chapter in Sony’s Spider-Man Universe. Audiences are introduced to socially awkward EMT Cassandra “Cassie” Web in 2003 Manhattan, New York City. After a near-death experience on the job, psychic abilities are unlocked within Cassie, revealing her destiny as a powerful clairvoyant. She must put her new powers to the test when fate brings her face-to-face with three young women: Julia Cornwall (Sydney Sweeney), Mattie Franklin (Celeste O’Connor), and Anya Corazon (Isabela Merced). The three young girls are being hunted down by Ezekiel Sims (Tahar Rahim), a mysterious foe with spider-like abilities that include a deadly poisonous touch. Sims can also see into the future, and he’s been haunted by visions of his own death at the hands of these three girls as costumed heroes. Little do they know, but they are each Spider-Women in the making.
The key to defeating Ezekiel Sims puts Cassandra Webb on a path that leads to the Amazon rainforest in Peru, where her mother was researching spiders while she was still pregnant with her. When she comes across a secret tribe of Spider warriors known as “Las Arañas,” Cassie puts her ego aside and accepts that mastering her clairvoyance and protecting the girls is merely the beginning of a new journey. Co-writer and director S.J. Clarkson has some history with Marvel, having also directed episodes of Jessica Jones and The Defenders. In fact, as producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura tells us in our exclusive Interview, she’s what drew him to Madame Web in the first place. This is only Di Bonaventura’s second feature with Sony, coming after 2010’s Salt. But could there be more from this corner of the Marvel Universe on the way? Di Bonaventura sure hopes so.
Madame Web is the latest in a string of huge projects for Di Bonaventura, following Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Meg 2: The Trench, and Pet Sematary: Bloodlines, all of which were released last year. This is also the first film Sony is expanding its Spider-Man Universe with this year, with Kraven the Hunter and Venom 3 both coming soon in 2024. In sitting down with Madame Web producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura, we find out he and the filmmakers balanced this project as its own standalone story while featuring appearances from major Spider-Man characters like Ben Parker [Adam Scott] as Cassie’s fellow paramedic and even Mary Parker [Emma Roberts]. Additionally, Di Bonaventura shares his hopes for a Madame Web sequel and his thoughts on why certain comic book adaptations have recently struggled at the box office.
Exclusive Interview with Producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura for Madame Web
Madame Web features some huge connections to Spider-Man’s world, like Ben Parker obviously, but the story itself is very self-contained. Was it tricky not letting the film’s Spider-Man connections distract from the story you were trying to tell?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: We had to make a choice at the beginning. If possible, do we want to step into other parts of the Spider-Man universe? And our conscious decision at the beginning of the project was that we wanted to do a grounded character study. Once we made that decision, it became less hard. What became the dominant thing was asking ourselves, how do we attract the fans who know Madame Web from the comic books and also the non-fans? How do we get them to participate in this journey as emotionally and as personally as possible?
When you’re talking about self-containment, I see that in many different ways. But, principally, we’re trying to contain it to the origin story of this character and therefore, explore emotionally how scarred she is from what happened with her mother and how much that has affected her as an adult. She doesn’t have attachments, she doesn’t do a lot of those things. So, you get to go through this experience with her where you see this pain, and you don’t understand it at first but you do feel it. You see that she doesn’t want to attach to people too much other than Ben Parker. And then you see that gradually fade away as she becomes willing to embrace protecting three young women.
Even though we still get so many superhero films nowadays, very few of them feature a predominantly female cast. Do you think Madame Web is going to resonate with female audiences this way?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: I tend to look at the audience as a whole because I hope men resonate with the movie in the same way as women do. But because there are four female characters here, you know, I hope that women see that emotional struggle of finding your power, even though it’s more literal in this case. We see the beginnings of these other three young women – what are they going to become? So, hopefully, women in particular will see themselves in those characters. But what men should also see, in particular, is that inner journey of finding out, “Who Am I? What am I capable of?” I think we all go through that.
How important did you think it was to have an exciting female filmmaker like S.J. Clarkson at the helm?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: The funny thing is, I have offered S.J. several things in the past and she passed on everything. She actually came to the project before me, so that was one of the big things that drew me in. I knew that S.J. was going to create a movie that had its own integrity, which is very hard to do. There’s a lot of pressure on every film about what the studio wants and, in this case, what the Spider-Man fans want and what else is being made that we’re competing against. So, having a director who has a strong grasp on what they want to accomplish is a tremendous attribute for a film, and for me, as a producer, only makes me want to work with them more.
Some recent comic book films have been struggling at the box office, especially last year. Many people have been claiming that general audiences are getting superhero fatigue because of over-saturation in the market. Speaking as the producer of Madame Web, do you believe this to be true?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: I think two things have been going on, both with Marvel [the MCU] and DC. First of all, I think those kinds of superhero movies have suffered a little bit because they’ve gotten away from what made, for instance, the first Iron Man or Christopher Nolan’s Batman successful to begin with. Those were really character-based movies. And then, when you start getting into these larger films where you’re trying to connect all the worlds together, you’re actually getting away from the emotional journey of the central characters.
So, for me, part of the fatigue is that you have to keep track of everything now. You know, it’s almost like homework. With Madame Web, you don’t have to know anything coming into the movie. You’re going to meet a new character and then go on an emotional journey with them. That leads to my second point, a lot of recent superhero movies have also gone away from the thing that really works about having extraordinary characters, which is getting to know them and then going on a ride together. That makes it more character-based and therefore engaging, it’s not just about the spectacle. Trust me, if you’ve seen some of my movies, I love spectacle. But when spectacle for its own sake begins to wear a film down, I think there’s a lesson to be learned.
Well said, and speaking of extraordinary characters, Madame Web features three young rising stars: Sydney Sweeney, Isabela Merced, and Celeste O’Connor. Do you see a future with these 3 Spider-Women in more spin-off films or a Madame Web sequel?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: What’s great about their characters is that, funny enough, there’s probably more comic book material written about the various Spider-Women than Madame Web herself. They each have their own comic books. So, hopefully, coming out of this first experience with Madame Web, the audience is going to embrace us enough to be able to tell the next story.
You can take those three characters much further along in the next story, and Madame Web still hasn’t mastered all of her skills either. If we got to do a sequel, one of the interesting things we would be able to see is Madame Web trying to master her new powers and often failing. So, we now realize the downside of having these abilities. I think that would make for good, dramatic material where the person is still learning what they’re doing.
Are you wanting to continue producing Sony Marvel films and if so what types of characters would you be looking to the big screen?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: I haven’t honestly thought about that. I’m really into this project right now and I hope that this particular character gets to ride again. I’m sure there are other Sony characters that I would like, but my hands have been full honestly. We’re producing an animated Transformers movie [Transformers One] and a new television series this year alone. And this has all been coming since the tail end of Meg 2. So, I’ve been very busy and I haven’t really thought about that.
Finally, since we covered how other comic book movies have struggled and the franchise potential here, what do you think Madame Web has over the current superhero blockbuster competition?
Lorenzo di Bonaventura: That’s a good question. For starters, you’re seeing multiple origin stories at the same time, and that’s different. What differentiates Madame Web, very much to the advantage of the storytelling, is how grounded it is and how it feels like if this happened to you, it’s in a world that you understand.
In our movie, Cassie Web thinks she’s going insane. The struggle to understand what is happening, I think, is much deeper in this movie than in other comic book films. It’s much more about asking questions like, “Who is this person? What is she going through? And how do you try to get a grip on it?” So, I think in that way, there’s a relatability to that character that’s different from the other DC and Marvel movies.
Release Date: February 14, 2024.
Directed by S.J. Clarkson.
Screenplay by Matt Sazama, Burk Sharpless, Claire Parker, & S. J. Clarkson.
Story by Kerem Sanga, Matt Sazama, & Burk Sharpless.
Produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura.
Based on Marvel Comics.
Main Cast: Dakota Johnson, Sydney Sweeney, Celeste O’Connor, Isabela Merced, Tahar Rahim, Mike Epps, Emma Roberts, Adam Scott, Zosia Mamet, & Kerry Bishé.
Cinematographer: Mauro Fiore.
Composer: Johan Söderqvist.
Production Companies: Columbia Pictures, Marvel Entertainment, & Di Bonaventura Pictures.
Distributor: Sony Pictures Releasing.
Runtime: 116 minutes.
Rated: PG-13.
