If Tom Holland and Zendaya get married, the reception will be at Home Depot.
A who’s who of young Hollywood will arrive in tuxes and cut-out gowns to gather in the lumber aisle. The groom will hoist a sliding bevel to toast the bride. Guests will smile through the stench of sawdust. Then Holland will share a key dating moment.
As he told Britain’s UNILAD this month: “I was hanging out at her house and her door was broken. I was like, ‘I’m gonna fix that door for you.’ And now we’re in love.”
You see? You don’t need to wine and dine prospective soul mates. You just need a random orbital sander. And it’s not just doors. Holy Mary and Joseph, Holland is a trained carpenter from a long line of carpenters. As he explained: “Carpentry is something I just really enjoy. I love it. I made my mum’s kitchen table. I made my mum’s office. I built all the cupboards in my bedroom.”
My daughters already think he’s adorable. Wait till they discover his hobbies include building birdhouses for his grandfather.
Forget race, income, creed, religion, gender, sex and the rest of it. After you buy a house, you slowly realize the world is divided into two groups: the handy and the unhandy. I wouldn’t be surprised if Holland secretly broke Zendaya’s door to impress her by fixing it. If her tires are mysteriously slashed and he pops in unannounced with a picnic basket holding Dom Pérignon and a car jack, I rest my case.
This is the way it goes. The handy walk among us with supreme confidence. They are unfazed by leaky faucets. They can install pot lights with their eyes closed. At one point in the interview — after proudly displaying a photo of a new tool closet he made — Holland says he ordered “this thing” that will require six days to build.
Notice how he didn’t specify if “this thing” is a bookcase or nuclear reactor?
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It doesn’t matter. To the handy, everything is “this thing” to be built or fixed. I am skeptical when someone uses the word “privilege.” But handy privilege is real. You get a head start when you are comfortable with both a wood auger and pneumatic drill. The world is your oyster when you can evenly apply a urethane adhesive.
Tom fixed Zendaya’s door and now they are in love. That’s his story. So if he broke her septic tank, presumably they’d now be in Splitsville. I wrote last year about an alleged “Short King Spring” trend, in which women were falling for men who basically came up to their shoulders. Commentators cited Holland and Zendaya. But now we know height plays no role in this love story. Every man is the same size while on hands and knees and laying hardwood. My wife would probably love me even more if I was small enough to fit in her purse but knew how to grout.
And forget BDE, another alleged phenomenon. What Holland has going for him is BCE: Big Carpenter Energy. It’s tied to the evolutionary impulse for shelter. Deep down, Zendaya knows that even if their superstar careers come crashing down and they blow their fortunes on crypto or a misguided taco truck operation, Tom can build a cabin with his bare hands. She will never need a plumber, drywaller or Maytag repairman. He probably made Cupid’s arrows with his own circular saw.
Holland makes me sick to my stomach. I am doomed to live out my days as a member of the unhandy tribe. This old house is falling apart and all I can do is call in power tool mercenaries while paying through the nose. We recently replaced a bathroom fan that sounded like it had been shot with a crossbow — ouuchhh — and the electrician was done in five minutes. The dust bunnies that fell into the toilet could have filled a Kia. He asked why I had never cleaned it. Sir, I did not know the plastic grill thingy simply pulled down from the ceiling on pressurized prongs. I. Did. Not. Know.
It was like watching him do a magic trick.
Hollywood lore says a relatively obscure Harrison Ford landed the role of Han Solo after meeting George Lucas while doing repairs in Francis Ford Coppola’s office. Before “Star Wars,” Ford was dubbed “carpenter to the stars.”
I read this, ironically, in This Old House. The site also pointed out Terrence Howard once renovated a 250-year-old carriage house in Philadelphia. This included erecting a 1,400-foot-long stone wall. As he observed: “Every man should work with his hands.”
He is assuming every man has hands that can do the work. I have tried to work with my hands many times. It’s like trying to do the fandango with an untrained ferret.
He is also assuming the unhandy have tools beyond the free gifts we got with magazine subscriptions. A nice fellow at Home Depot once gave me tips for changing a sink basin. About 30 seconds into his spiel, my hands were sending an SOS to my brain: “Is this guy on crack? We can’t do any of that!”
Tom Holland and Zendaya will have a great life together.
Why? He is blessed with a superpower more powerful than shooting webs out of his wrists or swinging across skyscrapers: Spider-Man is a handyman.