BODY BUILDING

For films like The Wolverine, Pain & Gain and Batman V Superman, where physical perfection is a must, there’s no avoiding the gym. Heavy weight sessions to bulk up, exhausting cardio to trim down and a diet of grilled chicken or fish, broccoli, egg whites and protein shakes are key to a screen-worthy six-pack. Performance enhancers, we’re told, are “a definite no-no” (unless you’re going method, like Ben Foster in The Program).

“I have never once had to convince Hugh that training was a good idea,” says trainer David Kingsbury, who has beefed up Mr Jackman for the past five years. “We once arrived off a flight at 4am, were in the gym by 5am and on set by 7am, and that is not a freak event. If Hugh’s going to be working until 7pm, it is not unusual for him to be up at 3.30am to train.”

Mark Wahlberg is another focused early bird. To fit in his exhaustive training regimes, he’s in bed at 8pm in order to be up at 2.30am to work out from 3am to 4am. Then it’s off to a basketball court for an hour before returning at 6am for a plate of chicken and veg and heading to work or the school run. If he’s on-set, he’ll do 500 sit-ups during the day and 45 minutes of boxing at 6pm before popping on the PJs.

His Pain & Gain co-star Dwayne Johnson “always executes at 100 per cent” laughs Hollywood trainer and bodybuilder George Farah. “He stays in shape so we really just modified his regime,” he adds. “We added daily cardio, dropped his carbs and cut out the one cheat meal a week that he was eating, and we saw immediate drastic results in his physique.”