Tom Holland Responds to "The Crowded Room" Being "So Horribly Reviewed"

Updated on June 27, 2023 at 12:20 PM

Tom Holland, Amanda Seyfried, and Emmy Rossum join forces in their Apple TV+ drama, "The Crowded Room," which premiered on June 9. The show stars Holland as a teen struggling with the fallout of a violent crime. Unfortunately, it's been critically panned by reviewers and the Spider-Man star is aware of it — not that he's letting it get to him.

During a June 23 interview with Unilad, Holland revealed that being a die-hard fan of England's Tottenham Hotspur soccer team (which has never won the Premier League) has made him extremely resilient. "I think being a Tottenham fan is somewhat like being in 'The Crowded Room.' It has taught me resilience," he said. "Tottenham has never won anything and supporting them is incredibly difficult. It's no secret my show has been so horribly reviewed, but I'm here today to promote the show and I'm still here. I'm very resilient. It's a good quality."

Apple TV+ unveiled the first trailer for "The Crowded Room" on May 10 and in it, Holland's character Danny Sullivan is arrested for his involvement in a shooting in New York City in 1979. Seyfried then enters as Rya Goodwin, the cop sent to investigate the shooting who uncovers details about his past that make her see the crime in a new way. The miniseries was created by writer and producer Akiva Goldsman, known for his work on "A Beautiful Mind," and Holland serves alongside Goldsman as an executive producer.

Holland opened up about his role in a May 9 interview with Entertainment Weekly, telling the outlet that it's been "so informative to my own life."He said he was actually taking a break from acting when his agent called him about the project. "'It sounds like your dreams are coming true,'" he remembered his agent saying.

"It's a show that will take you on twists and turns — you'll never know where you are or what's going on — and then it will all come to a miraculous conclusion toward the end," Holland explained of the series. "It's a story about heartbreak. It's a story about love. It's a story about betrayal. And, most of all, it's a story about a young kid's determination to survive."

Ahead, here's everything to know about "The Crowded Room."

"The Crowded Room" Trailer

Apple TV+ released the full trailer for "The Crowded Room" on May 10.

"The Crowded Room" Cast

"The Crowded Room" stars Holland as Danny Sullivan, a man arrested in 1979 after a New York shooting, and Seyfried as interrogator Rya Goodwin. The cast also includes Emmy Rossum, Sasha Lane, Will Chase, Lior Raz, Laila Robins, Henry Eikenberry, Jason Isaacs, Christopher Abbott, and Zachary Golinger. Seyfried's real-life husband, Thomas Sadoski, also appears in the series.

36-year-old Rossum plays Holland's 27-year-old mother in the show, and while their age difference might seem jarring, Rossum previously explained why she feels it actually makes sense in a June 2 interview with Entertainment Tonight.

"It makes sense when I read the script," Rossum said. "Candy's a super young mom, she's almost a child in her own right when she becomes pregnant at age 16. You watch as I age from 25 to 35, which is actually younger than I am now." Rossum went on to say that she "fell in love with the relationship between mother and son and the closeness and everything that they're grieving in later episodes." She added, "I was so taken with the series and really just loved all my scenes, especially with young Danny (Golinger). Our relationship was so beautiful and so I knew everything that we had that I had lost in the scenes with Tom. [It] was really fun."

"The Crowded Room" Plot

"The Crowded Room" is reportedly inspired by the true story of Billy Milligan, who was arrested for raping three women in Ohio in 1975, per Collider. Milligan was later diagnosed with multiple personality disorder, and became the first person to be acquitted on the basis of that disorder.

The show is a loose adaption of Daniel Keyes's 1981 novel "The Minds of Billy Milligan," which is based on the case, though the Apple TV+ series alters most of the details, changing Milligan's name to Danny Sullivan and changing his crime to a shooting. It follows Sullivan's interrogation, interspersing that with flashbacks to his upbringing.

"The Crowded Room" Release Date

Three episodes of "The Crowded Room" premiered on Apple TV+ on June 9, and new episodes air weekly through July 28.