Thor 4’s Brett Goldstein Reveals How Quickly He Became The MCU’s Hercules

Brett Goldstein has revealed how little time he had to transform himself into Hercules for his post-credits cameo in Marvel Studios’ Thor: Love and Thunder.

Thor: Love and Thunder introduced a whole host of new gods to the MCU and chief amongst them was Russell Crowe’s Zeus. The King of Olympus proved far less noble than Chris Hemsworth’s Thor had been hoping, with the two briefly pitted against each other.

The film’s post-credits scene saw a wounded Zeus calling upon his son, Hercules, to kill Thor. The scene introduced Ted Lasso star Brett Goldstein as Hercules, a role he had very little time to prepare for.

In a recent interview, Brett Goldstein revealed Marvel only contacted him to offer him the role of Hercules two weeks before the scene would be filmed.

Given Hercules appears for one brief shot with no dialogue, after the credits have rolled, it’s not surprising that Goldstein was cast late in the day. However, this quick turnaround left the actor with no time to embark on a typical MCU training regime to get himself in Olympian shape.

Talking to The Playlist about his appearance in Thor: Love and Thunder, Brett Goldstein revealed:

“I didn’t know what it was for. I was told that some Marvel people would like to have a Zoom with you, and I met with them, and it was just so surreal because…it was literally out of the blue one night, and I was very busy, and it was like, ‘Can you make time for a Zoom?’ ‘Yes, sure.’ And they go on Zoom, and they just told me what you see in the film, which is the sort of opened with, ‘So Russell Crowe is Zeus,’ and I’m like, ‘Yeah, OK, go on.’ And blah, blah, blah. And then they turn around, and they reveal, ‘It’s Hercules; it’s you.’ And I went, ‘What?’ Just like, ‘Are you serious? Are you f***ing with me? Is this a wind-up?’ So yeah, it was as surprising to me as I think it has been to other people.”

The actor went on to reveal that director Taika Waititi then told him he only had two weeks to shape up for the role of Hercules:

“Yeah, when I spoke to Taika, I said, ‘You know I’m basically like a skinny comedian?’ I said, ‘When is this filming?’ It was like in two weeks, and I was like, ‘I mean, I’ll do my best, but two weeks feels…’ I said, ‘He doesn’t have to be as big as Thor, does he?’ And look, on the day, I mean, I’m doing 400 pushups that day. I was fit to explode. I did the best I could on that day, yeah.”

The actor is apparently committed to giving the role of Hercules his all in any future MCU appearances, joking “I’m going to eat 30 chickens a day from now on.” It is not yet known when or if Brett Goldstein will return as Hercules, but it looks likely the son of Zeus could be coming back for a showdown with Thor.

Here is the synopsis for Thor: Love and Thunder:

The film finds Thor (Chris Hemsworth) on a journey unlike anything he’s ever faced – a quest for inner peace. But his retirement is interrupted by a galactic killer known as Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale), who seeks the extinction of the gods. To combat the threat, Thor enlists the help of King Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), Korg (Taika Waititi) and ex-girlfriend Jane Foster (Natalie Portman), who – to Thor’s surprise – inexplicably wields his magical hammer, Mjolnir, as the Mighty Thor. Together, they embark upon a harrowing cosmic adventure to uncover the mystery of the God Butcher’s vengeance and stop him before it’s too late.

Directed by Taika Waititi and produced by Kevin Feige and Brad Winderbaum, the Thor solo film stars Chris Hemsworth, Christian Bale, Tessa Thompson, Jaimie Alexander, Taika Waititi, Russell Crowe, Natalie Portman, Chris Pratt, Dave Bautista, Karen Gillan, Pom Klementieff, Vin Diesel and Bradley Cooper.

Thor: Love and Thunder is now playing in theaters. Stay tuned for all the latest news on the future of the MCU, and https://www.youtube.com/user/heroichollywood”>subscribe to Heroic Hollywood’s YouTube channel for more original video content.

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