Will Poulter, actor of Guardians of the Galaxy, has urged people against replicating the intensive training programmes employed by movie stars to bulk up.
The 30-year-old British actor plays Adam Warlock in the third installment of the superhero saga.
Warlock is a formidable artificial entity meant to kill the Guardians, and he is a new nemesis for the team, which comprises Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, and Dave Bautista.
Will was questioned by presenter Alex Jones how much pressure was put on him to hit the gym and ‘look Marvel ready’ when he appeared on The One Show on Tuesday night.
‘It is interesting because I can’t have too many complaints in the sense that what would have ordinarily been a really heavy lift, for want of a less punny phrase, was made pretty easy on me by Marvel and the team of trainers I had,’ he explained.
‘I had a wonderful group of people taking me through the process in a way that was natural and safe, and kind of critically, didn’t erode at my mental and physical health long term.’
Will added that this task was for a ‘very specific purpose’.
‘It was me giving trying to play a superhero my best shot,’ he continued.
He added: ‘It was not necessarily a process I would recommend to anyone in their day to day life, but the only thing I would recommend would be to go about it in a safe and natural way and taking stock of your mental health through the process, because it is tough and it can be a strain.’
Also explaining how it was to get the call up to say he had secured the role, Will said it was ‘bizarre’, but a job he felt ‘very, very grateful for’.
‘I was a fan from the outside looking in. I think the scale and the scope of the movie kind of scared me initially, so as excited as I was to get that call, I was also pretty apprehensive,’ he said.
Any trepidation, he claimed, ‘soon melted away’ when he arrived on set and met the’special’ cast and staff, who he said made him feel comfortable.
Commenting on his role in the movie, Will had previously said he was ‘very, very lucky’ to be ‘welcomed into the Marvel family’.
Stan Lee invented Warlock for an early issue of the Fantastic Four comic in 1967, and he first appeared in Marvel Comics in 1967.
The One Show airs weekdays from 7pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
