Brolin takes an evil turn
Josh Brolin stars in two comic book movies this year, Avengers: Infinity War and Deadpool 2. He talks to Laura Harding about getting in shape, bingeing on doughnuts and the reaction from his family
osh Brolin is lifting up his t-shirt to show me his stomach.
This unsolicited flashing of the flesh is an attempt to demonstrate the effects of the doughnut binge he recently went on after he finished filming the highly anticipated Deadpool sequel.
There is a distant hint of a dad bod lurking under the 50-year-old’s black t-shirt but it’s unconvincing. He is still in undeniably great shape.
And that is because Brolin is the unexpected action star of the moment. It will be close to impossible to walk into a cinema this spring and not see him on screen.
He plays the huge purple villain Thanos in the box office behemoth Avengers: Infinity War, as well as Cable in Deadpool 2, not to mention his return as federal agent Matt Graver in the Sicario sequel.
So who could have predicted that Brolin, best known for films like No Country For Old Men, Inherent Vice and Milk, would end up in two huge comic book movies in such quick succession?
“Nobody!” he laughs. “Especially my agent, who is very happy about it right now.
“They were completely different to anything I had done before.
“I have always mixed it up and whatever roles I’ve chosen have been different but I think that these three coming together in one summer is crazy.
“And the fact they are different, even though two of them are tentpole movies, I just think they are fun characters, man.”
But joining two big franchises required a crash course in comic book vernacular.
“I do get all the references in Avengers now. I didn’t see it until
the premiere and I missed a lot because I didn’t realise the things that happened were going to happen so I got uncomfortable in the theatre.
“I didn’t know how people were going to react after the movie was over.
“Then my wife and I went to another theatre, a small theatre, and we saw it again and you pick up a lot of things.”
He looks bashful. “You don’t want to say that you go to see your own film a lot because it sounds horrible but I’m actually excited about seeing it again.”
His father, the actor James Brolin, who is now married to Barbra Streisand, has already caught a showing.
“I talked to him the next day and I said, ‘What did you think?’ and he said, ‘I didn’t get it’, which I thought was pretty good.
“Keeps you humbled man. Keeps you down to the ground. Not under the ground, just right at ground level.”
He was convinced to sign on for Deadpool 2 after an unexpected inspiration - seeing his co-star Ryan Reynolds in the 2009 romantic comedy The Proposal, in which he stars opposite Sandra Bullock.
“It was instrumental in me becoming an actor!” he jokes.
Reynolds, who reprises his role of the Merc With The Mouth for Deadpool 2 is one of his man crushes, it seems. Another is the action star behind Deadpool’s rival, Wolverine.
“I know a lot about Hugh Jackman because I’m a big fan,” he says with a twinkle in his eye.
“I know that he lifts heavy weights in between movies, I watch a lot of those videos.”
But Brolin himself is now no stranger to heavy weights. He got in what looks like the best shape of
his life to played the ripped Cable in Deadpool 2.
“I did put in some work but Hugh Jackman always stays perfect like Ryan.
“I’m a guy that when the movie is over I just go right to the doughnut shop.”
And so that brings us back to the lifting up of the shirt, to show off the effects of those doughnuts.
“It’s not that I can go to the doughnut shop when it’s over, it’s that I can’t help but run to the doughnut shop,” he confesses.
But the time will come when he has to get ripped all over again, when he reprises the role for the XForce movie. And this time, he will be aiming to get even buffer.
“I maintain right now. I don’t really watch what I eat but I maintain and then when we get back into it, there is a whole new plan - we want to go a little bit bigger, it will be fun.
“I’ve never done this kind of body sculpting before, as lame as it is to talk about and as embarrassed as I feel talking about it right now.
“I know it’s good for you, it’s fun doing it but it’s only for a little while.” Deadpool 2 is in cinemas now.
I have always mixed it up... but I think that these three coming together in one summer is crazy!