Zendaya and Tom Holland addressed constant chatter about their height difference and the absurd notion that kissing must be ‘difficult’ for the pair on Friday.
The romantic couple and Spider-Man co-stars appeared on SiriusXM Town Hall where they had a discussion about ‘ridiculous’ stereotypes for tall women and short men.
Holland, who is 5ft8in, and Zendaya, who is 5ft10in, spoke in-depth about the gendered construct of height in real life and as it relates to the movie, maintaining above all that it shouldn’t be a ‘thing.’
Unbothered: The romantic couple and Spider-Man co-stars had a discussion about ‘ridiculous’ stereotypes for tall women and short men and incessant talk of their height difference on Friday at SiriusXM Town Hall; pictured above
The on and offscreen couple were joined by their co-star Jacob Batalon as they sat down with host Jessica Shaw at the New York based studio.
‘Zendaya. I wanted to ask. And actually, and Tom, I wanted to ask you guys because in the first, in, in Far from Home when MJ and Peter kiss and Zendaya, you’re taller than Tom and it became this, this thing,’ Shaw said as the pair laughed.
Holland, 25, humorously interjected: ‘Not that much taller. Let’s just, let’s put this out there. Maybe like an inch or two at best.
‘It’s not like, people say likeโ “how did you guys kiss? It must have been soo difficult”,’ he recalled which drew a laugh from Zendaya.
Tom Holland and Zendaya fight off stereotypes for tall women
Getting into it: ‘I wanted to ask you guys because in the first, in, in Far from Home when MJ and Peter kiss and Zendaya, you’re taller than Tom and it became this, this thing,’ host Jessica Shaw said as the pair laughed alongside co-star Jacob Batalon
Heightened awareness: Tom spoke about how absurd it was that people have asked ‘how did you guys kiss?’ – a remark made about their height difference
Messed up thinking: Zendaya agreed that it was a ‘screwed up’ mentality to think it was odd that she was taller than Tom and cited that her mom is ‘taller than her dad’ as well
Shaw clarified that she thinks the gendered view of height in society is both ‘misogynistic’ and ‘problematic’ and asked them to weigh in on the ‘assumption’ that men should be taller than women.
Zendaya, 25, agreed that it was a ‘screwed up’ mentality. ‘Yeah, this is normal too,’ the 5ft10in beauty said of her being taller than Tom, which he agreed with: ‘Yeah it’s a stupid assumption.’
‘My mom is taller than my dad. My mom is taller than everyone,’ the Euphoria star went on to say, while Holland called the whole subject ‘ridiculous.’
Zendaya says she has been learning English slang from Tom Holland
Speaking up: The British actor interjected that in reality he was ‘maybe like an inch or two’ shorter than Zendaya ‘at best’
Oblivious: ‘I didnโt know that people cared until life, you know, but before that I had, no, I have no construct of it,’ she said as she called being taller than Tom ‘normal too’
More thoughts: ‘It’s like not a weird thing for women to be tall,’ Batalon (left) said weighing in, with Tom adding: ‘No, not at all. It’s ridiculous.’
‘It’s like not a weird thing for women to be tall,’ Batalon said weighing in, with Tom adding: ‘No, not at all. It’s ridiculous.’
Holland โ who stands at 5’8 โ went on to say that when they were doing screen tests for Spider-Man every girl reading as MJ was taller than him.
‘I remember when we were doing the Spider Man screen tests, I mean โ you’d have to ask Jon Watts this question โ but every girl that we tested for both roles was taller than me,’ Holland recalled.
‘And I wonder whether Jon, that was a decision that Jon had made. There was, there was no one that tested that was shorter than I was. To be fair – I am quite short. But, uh, but yeah, so maybe that was a decision Jon Watts made and something he was aware of and wanted to break the stereotype. I think it’s great.’
Confident: Zendaya called the pair’s on-screen kiss in Far From Home a ‘sweet moment’ and said that she hates ‘having to cheat it [her body] and pretend,’ she’s shorter
Casting process: Holland went on to say that when they were doing screen tests for Spider-Man every girl reading as MJ was taller than him which led him to believe it was an intentional choice on the part of director Jon Watts
Zendaya called the pair’s on-screen kiss in Far From Home a ‘sweet moment’ and said that she hates ‘having to cheat it [her body] and pretend,’ she’s shorter. ‘Why not just let it be what it is.’
‘I honestly never thought of it as a thing,’ she continued to say. ‘Because my parents were always that way.
‘So I, I didn’t know that people cared until life, you know, but before that I had, no, I have no construct of it.’
Zendaya and Tom sealed their rumored romance with a kiss back in July, but neither have publicly spoken about their relationship.
Facts: The Euphoria star stands at 5’10 while Holland is 5’8 in reality