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Ryan Reynolds is an actor, writer, and director, so it’s no surprise he likes to be hands-on while he’s making movies. Unfortunately, he can’t always do everything he wants, especially when it involves getting physical.
The Deadpool star recently opened up to Variety about his process as an actor, admitting that the “physicality” in some of his films is something he “really like(s).” But, as he gets older, Reynolds feels like he has to keep things in perspective and pull back a little bit.
“I think it’s important to do as much of [the stunt work] yourself as you can, but I’ll step aside when there’s something that’s just too gnarly and there’s a trained professional ready to go,” he said.
“You’re not allowed to eat Advil like cereal,” the actor went on to joke. “Things start to hurt. After I turned 35, being thrown onto cement wasn’t hilarious anymore. It had been upgraded to hell.”
The Canadian actor is now 45, which means he’s been feeling the burn of those extra stunts for about a decade now.
Before Deadpool, Reynolds starred in 2015’s Self/less, which gave him an opportunity to show off his fighting skills. But even then, he was already aware of how aging had taken a toll.
“I’m right at that age where I’ll do as many takes as they want, but I’m lying on the ground after each one thinking, ‘Oh, God. Just get up and get up fast,” he told PEOPLE at the time. “Don’t let them see you [in pain].’”
Still, he insisted that he “love(s) doing the fight stuff,” explaining, “So much of it is character-based, so you want to be a part of that and put your fingerprints on that and do it as much as possible.”
But after breaking two vertebrae while filming the 2012 action-thriller Safe House, the father of three admitted: “I certainly don’t jump in and do anything that’s really dangerous.”
