Willem Dafoe recalls moment he learned he has a distinctive face: 'Nobody looks like that motherf---er'

No one else looks like Willem Dafoe.

It did not occur to Willem Dafoe that he has a very distinctive face until one particularly unsettling subway ride with his son.

The actor, 68, recalled the moment while reflecting on his role as the Green Goblin in Sam Raimi's 2002 Spider-Man, in a preview from this weekend's episode of Sunday TODAY With Willie Geist. "I was on the subway years ago when New York was still pretty rough," Dafoe said. "I was taking my kid from downtown to the Bronx Zoo."

"Some guys got on the train and they're sitting there and they're looking at me, and they're looking kinda rough," the actor recalled. "And I think, 'Oh God, even with my son here, these guys are gonna rob me for money or something. Something bad is going to happen.' They were looking at me, then they were looking at each other."

Finally, Dafoe heard one say, "Yeah, it’s got to be him. Nobody looks like that motherf---er." The actor said, "That's when I knew."

Dafoe's distinctive face currently graces Yorgos Lanthimos’ black comedy fantasy Poor Things (in theaters now), centered on Emma Stone's Bella Baxter, a young woman who is resurrected after her death by an eccentric scientist played by Dafoe. His character's face is marked by deep scarring due to experiments his late father conducted on him as a child.

The film's hair and makeup designer Nadia Stacey told EW that she played around a lot with Dafoe's "patchwork quilt of a man" when it came to constructing his facial features — but, of course, when you cast an actor as distinctive as Dafoe, "you don't want to cover him completely." But the actor reveled in the transformation, telling EW it helped him tap into his unorthodox character.

"It's always good to work with a mask," he said. "It's always good to work with something where you can leave yourself behind and become something else . . . That’s always a pleasure, when you have these tangible, physical things to work with."

Tune into Dafoe's full interview on Sunday TODAY this Sunday.

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