Many raised eyebrows when film icon Michael Douglas (78) chose to pursue subatomic particles.
– It looks better in the film than it did on set, the Hollywood veteran tells VG.
The actor with two Oscar statuettes on his CV stretches his arms to the side and pretends to hold on to the edge of a table. The 78-year-old illustrates what director Peyton Reed wanted his aging body to do in the superhero film “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.”
– Michael took part in several crazy physical challenges. We tore at him and he thought it was absolutely insane. He loved it, Reed claims to VG.
In the recording, Douglas is hooked to wires and placed in front of a giant green screen, before a powerful wind machine throws him and his co-actors around the room, as if in a tumble dryer. Everything to create the illusion that they are sucked into another dimension.
– They promised not to make me look stupid, but it’s strange to try to have a bigger reaction than you feel is natural. You will have to trust the director. You have no idea how it will turn out in the end. Nothing is there, because it is uploaded digitally afterwards, explains Douglas.
Surprising choice
He has been in the American film industry since the late 60s, and is undeniably one of Hollywood’s biggest stars of all time.
With blockbusters such as “Wall Street”, “Basic Instinct” and “Fatal Attraction” in his repertoire, as well as his marriage to actress-wife Catherine Zeta-Jones, 25 years his junior and a survived cancer diagnosis, Michael Douglas has been a regular name in the newspaper columns in several decades.
When Douglas plunged into Marvel’s heroes-in-a-leotard universe (MCU) back in 2015, it surprised many. At the time, the 78-year-old had close to 50 films on his CV, without ever having cast so much as a flirtatious glance towards the fantasy and superhero genre.
Pianist Liberace and stock speculator Gordon Gekko are a long way from scientist Hank Pym, who uses subatomic particles to shrink himself to insect size.
– “Ant-Man” is not a typical Michael Douglas film. You took the role a few years after you were cured of oral cancer. Did the illness experience change what you were looking for in film roles and what you wanted to do with the rest of your career?
– I wanted to try something new. Something that was not expected of me. Everything I had done previously was mainly contemporary film with adult themes, which children and young people did not see. There is a whole new audience out there. Suddenly lots of people become familiar with you and your work, who didn’t know you before, says Douglas.
A young man’s world
At 78, he is one of the oldest main characters in the MCU.
– What do you bring to the table that younger actors don’t?
– Age and seniority, Douglas replies in a millisecond, before chuckling heartily.
– Superhero films are really a young man’s game, but I give the universe older characters. Maybe I hold the record for oldest character in the Marvel Universe? Samuel L. Jackson is close…
The latter, who plays the spy Nick Fury, is 74 years old. Sir Patrick Stewart, on the other hand, who in 2022 reprized his role as the telepathic professor Charles Xavier in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”, sits on the record with his 82 laps around the sun.
Give the benefit of the doubt
– In “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” you shrink more than ever before. Throughout a long career, you have probably been in situations where you have felt small?
– Good question …
Douglas adjusts his sitting position and puts his hand to his chin. For a couple of seconds he looks thoughtfully into the void.
– Having doubts is part of the process. I’ve had that in many of the films I’ve been in. If you have doubts, you feel small. You feel limited. If you don’t feel insecure, you haven’t pushed yourself enough. It gives confidence. And confidence expands you. It allows you to grow. At the same time, I like to think small.
So, how did Michael’s self-esteem fare when his well-grown body was tossed around in said dryer?
– The effects were fantastic in the film, but it wasn’t like that when we were filming… It’s a perfect example of a moment where I felt really stupid!
