Toronto Sun
By Kevin Williamson ,QMI Agency
Consider the Vancouver set of Man of Steel, the reboot of the comic-book mythos directed by Zack Snyder (300) and produced by Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight) that stars British actor Henry Cavill.
Google Cavill's name -- or the film's title -- and there's a veritable Fortress of Solitude's worth of photos and video, taken by fans and paparazzi who have stalked the production since it began this summer in Illinois before relocating to B.C.
There's a caped Cavill with the iconic S on his chest. There's Cavill shirtless, rescuing people in front of a giant green screen. There he is looking scruffy and bearded. Or clean-shaven, riding a bike.
(Not that he's alone in being surreptitiously photographed -- recent pictures of Russell Crowe on a smoke break while outfitted as Kryptonian dad Jor-El have also surfaced online.)
Sitting down for a Canadian exclusive interview at a Beverly Hills hotel, Cavill, 28, admits there's "only so much you can do. You try to keep things private...As much as it does stimulate debate about what the plot is, I think it should be kept secret so it's exciting and new for people. Not so that they think, 'Oh, I saw so-and-so scratching their nose.' It removes you from the experience potentially. I quite like keeping the cards close to my chest."
Which is something he's going to have to get used to, since Man of Steel -- also starring Kevin Costner, Diane Lane and Amy Adams -- doesn't open until June 2013, meaning he'll be fielding and deflecting questions for almost two more years.
In the meantime, he's about to be seen in Immortals. Opening Friday, it stars Cavill as Theseus, a stonemason chosen by Zeus to lead humanity against Mickey Rourke's evil King Hyperion.
Remarkably, considering two such high-profile lead roles, Cavill almost quit acting altogether out of frustration.
"There was definitely a moment where I thought this was a waste of my time," he admits.
"You can work your entire life as an actor, trying to develop and build a career. It's a very thankless job and task ...
"I went through a phase where I was getting wonderful feedback for everything I did, but not getting the job because I wasn't a name ... It just wasn't happening. I was getting lots of feedback: 'Oh, loved you, fantastic performance, the director loved you, but sorry, no.' And I started to throw my hands up in the air and thought, 'There's just no winning. It's not going to happen because I'm doing everything right, but I'm not getting the results.' So I was considering going back to school, finishing my last year of school, and then joining the Armed Forces."
Until a screen test changed his mind -- and career. Specifically, he got the chance to audition for James Bond in Casino Royale.
Although he lost the licence to kill to Daniel Craig, "I thought, 'Oh, that's good. Something's happening. I've achieved some level of recognition. Someone has noticed me.' That gave me some reinforcement, then I got (the television series) The Tudors."
And while some young actors might be daunted by the opportunities now coming his way, Cavill says, "It's not intimidating at all. It's a wonderful experience. You get to be around people who have proven to be great at their craft and to learn from them. It's the chance to work with great actors ... I grasp it with both hands."
Suiting up
Henry Cavill didn't don his wardrobe -- he lived it.
"It's like wearing a permanent costume," he says of his physique in Immortals.
"When you put on a costume before work, you look in the mirror or even before you look in the mirror, you feel different. And when you're in that kind of shape -- and it was really was my costume because I barely had a costume -- it certainly does help."
Says Luke Evans, who plays Zeus in the epic, "I saw my body change in seven weeks. It does definitely do something to inform your character in a subliminal way."
Of course, the exhaustive training was also to prepare the actors for the battle sequences. "Like anything, it's not the actual fight that's the hard work, it's the prep that goes into it," says Cavill, who worked with a martial artist. "Part of the training was flexibility ... You have to do the stretching beforehand otherwise you would pull stuff and do damage to muscles."
But as rigorous as the preparation, Evans admits it does make you feel "totally bad-ass ... I mean, bad-ass and hungry, sore and aching, but definitely bad-ass."
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