The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Leading actor in demand despite ‘get-fit’ injury
Brian Cox badly injured knee after wife encouraged him to get in shape
Award-winning actor Brian Cox has revealed he tore his knee cartilage doing squats after his wife told him to get in shape.
The Succession star hired a personal trainer following encouragement from his actress wife Nicole Ansari.
However he was left in agony after one of his first training sessions when squat exercises damaged the meniscus cartilage in his knee.
The 74-year-old thespian said he was unable to walk properly months after the mishap and was undergoing physiotherapy in a bid to repair the injury.
Dundee-born Cox said: “I have done my leg in. I have damaged my meniscus on my knee so I’m a little slow at the moment, I can’t get around in the way I used to.
“The injury came after my wife decided that I should get fit and I kind of agreed with her.
“Then what happened was I did some squats with this very good trainer and that was the end of January.
“I had physiotherapy but it’s never worked. Hopefully it will be sorted out.”
He joked: “I’m like an old horse, they should just take me out and shoot me.”
Despite the injury and being confined in lockdown at his home in New York, Cox said he had never been busier after being inundated with offers of work.
Speaking on The Deep Cut podcast, he added: “Because I was trapped in one spot people just say ‘Can you do this, can you do that?’
“I have been inundated with Zoom calls. I have already made a Zoom movie, I’m doing a Zoom poetry reading and I have done lots of appeals for masks for Scotland.
“It’s been endless. I have a much quieter time doing Succession than I have in this secluded Covid-19.”
Cox has said playing ageing media mogul Logan Roy in the HBO drama series Succession had been the highlight of his 60-year career.
The part won him a Golden Globe award for best actor earlier this year and earlier this week he was nominated for an Emmy award.
The actor, who suffers from diabetes, said he is hoping to shoot the third series of the show later this year but would have to take precautions due to the pandemic.
He said: “I don’t know when we will get it made.
“We have to look into all the aspects of social distancing, testing on a regular basis, all of that we have to do. Especially me, I’m diabetic so I have to be really careful.”