Jose Perez/Splash NewsShailene Woodley had starring roles in two of the year's biggest movies, Divergent and The Fault in Our Stars, but her supporting scenes were actually cut from another blockbuster: The Amazing Spider-Man 2. How did she handle the news that her role as Mary Jane Watson was no longer deemed necessary?
"For a few hours it was literally like, 'Oh, my God, was I awful? Why did they cut me? What are people going to think?'" she tells Vanity Fair. Woodley didn't throw herself a pity party, however. "I woke up the next morning and I was like, 'O.K., it makes total sense,'" she recalls. "I'm a pretty spiritual person, so I can just sit back and trust that everything happens for a reason, even if my ego doesn't like it."
Woodley first addressed her removal from the film in the June 18, 2013 issue of Entertainment Weekly.
"Of course I'm bummed," the up-and-coming star told the magazine at the time. "But I am a firm believer in everything happening for a specific reason." She added, "Based on the proposed plot, I completely understand the need for holding off on introducing [Mary Jane] until the next film."
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 director Marc Webb explained why he had to remove Woodley's scenes in an April 2014 interview with Movies.com. "There was one little scene at the beginning where she is next door and it took place right around the montage where he comes back and there was another little moment between Gwen [Emma Stone] and MJ. But it just tipped over," he said. "The relationship between [Andrew Garfield's Peter and Gwen] is so sacred and so powerful, that it just didn't feel right. And it sucks because Shailene is such a f--king great actress and so cool and magical, but it was just about having this obligation to this romance that I thought was sacred. It was just one of those things."
Is it possible that Woodley might reprise her role in the next Spider-Man movie?
"Well, Divergent is a massive hit," Webb said, "and I think it's going to be tricky for schedules."