In person, it’s easy to see Chris Hemsworth growing up amongst the crocodiles and buffalo of the Australian Outback. He’s a big presence (even without the Asgardian armour), and looks as if he could easily go Paul Hogan on a croc should the situation require it. He laughs loudly and often, and despite it being the morning after a post-premiere do for his new movie that he was reportedly amongst the last to leave, is all easy, generous manner and wide grin.
As well as talking to Hemsworth about his new film, Snow White and the Huntsman, we chatted to the Avenger about his upcoming Marvel sequels, his love of Game of Thrones, and how he’s taking to his new-found geek stardom…
Between The Cabin in the Woods, The Avengers and now Snow White and the Huntsman, you’ve more or less dominated the first half of 2012 for Den of Geek. Do you feel comfortable in your new position as a geek hero?
[Laughs] It’s nice, I like the solid fan-base. It’s like your football team. They’ll be brutally honest with you about things which can hurt at times, but they’ll turn up each Sunday and watch the game.
What have they been brutally honest about?
More probably when they weren’t fans. When I got cast in Thor and I made the mistake of jumping online and reading comments, and they were all about ‘How can this guy play Thor?’ and ‘There’s no way, he’s not big enough’, ‘He’s not this…’, ‘He’s useless’ and the usual stuff and it’s like, okay, cool. I sort of welcome the challenge [laughs].
They’re happy now I think.
I really felt like at ComicCon a couple of years ago when we first showed the six-minute teaser of Thor was like [breathes out slowly] a big sigh of relief because they cheered and screamed and made us play it again and it was just such a big response and up until that point you didn’t know what was going to happen, you know, were they going to burn the building down? [laughs].
I hear you’re a Game of Thrones fan…
Yeah. Huge fan. I shouldn’t even say this because I know it’ll end up as… But I keep saying how much I want to be in that show, you know? I just love it. I love that world.
Who would you play?
Who would I play? I’d want to play the next… someone… I wouldn’t want to go back and redo anyone’s part.
You wouldn’t fancy taking on Sean Bean’s role in a movie version?
No way, he’s too bloody good. Literally, I’m just so impressed by that cast, I mean come on… these people! Outside of Sean Bean I hadn’t really heard of most of them or seen them and it’s just like every one of them is knocking it out of the park, you know?
Lots of great British actors
Yeah, there’s so much talent here.
So are you excited for Thor 2 because of (Game of Thrones director) Alan Taylor helming?
Oh yeah. What I think Thor and the Asgardian world could be injected with and benefit from is that organic, lived-in mythical world that is in Game of Thrones. It’s such a beautiful balance of fantasy, but it’s still real, you still believe it existed somehow. If it’s too clean and ethereal it’s a bit hard to relate to I think.
More locations is what Alan has talked about doing. I was just watching the fourth or fifth episode of the new Game of Thrones series and I don’t know where it is, but those snow-capped mountains and waterfalls… It’s like, where are these places? I want to go there.
When did you know that The Avengers 2 was happening?
I haven’t even had an official yes that it’s going ahead, I’ve read the same Hollywood thing everyone else did. With Avengers, literally the day it opened they were like ‘We’re doing another one’, when a couple of weeks before they’d said ‘We won’t be doing it for a few years, then as soon as it came out it was like ‘Yes we will!”
All this has presumably left you a bit busy to film a cameo in Star Trek 2?
I would have if they’d asked me. I swear. I kept being asked and I was like, yeah, maybe I’ll get a phone call from J.J but it didn’t come [laughs].
Not even for a dream sequence or something?
Yeah, or a flashback again [laughs] It could be sort of like Obi Wan Kenobi-like, after he dies and the ghost comes back and gives him advice or something. But I’d look older than when I died [laughs] it was five years ago when I shot that one so it would be like, ‘He died, but he’s aged, that’s weird…’
We bet they could sort that out in post.
Yeah, they’d fix that!
Chris Hemsworth, thank you very much.
Snow White & The Huntsman is in cinemas from 30th May.
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