Why this Hollywood Actor Stays Off Social Media (Mostly)

Sway

As Facebook morphs into Meta and makes a push for immersive 3-D connection (without solving all of its existing problems), Kara Swisher takes a look back at the company’s early days — and the fictionalized telling of them — with the actor Andrew Garfield. He had his breakout role playing the Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin in the 2010 film “The Social Network.” He tells Kara, “I immediately shut my Facebook page down as soon as I read the script.”

A decade later, Garfield’s career has taken off: He’s earned a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination for his latest project, “Tick, Tick … Boom!,” and even played Spider-Man. But unlike many celebrities, Garfield isn’t particularly active online. “If I wanted to have the life of privacy and protection and freedom and wholeness,” he says, “I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to be exposed to all of the faceless, voiceless, nameless people on social media.”

In this conversation, Garfield and Kara talk about his unconventional approach to the internet and the dangers of idolizing Kanye West or Elon Musk. They also speak about Garfield’s portrayal of Jonathan Larson, the composer of “Rent,” in “Tick, Tick … Boom!” And they discuss how the death of a parent has affected the way they each embrace life.

This episode contains strong language.

You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more information for all episodes at nytimes.com/sway, and you can find Kara on Twitter @karaswisher.