Jonathan Majors Ate A Ton Of Elk To Get Into Character
Jonathan Majors ate 6,000 calories of elk and chicken a day to bulk up for a role as a professional bodybuilder.
Jonathan Majors is on a career hot streak right now, with leading roles in Magazine Dreams, Creed III, and a host of upcoming Marvel movies which will feature his performance as the franchise’s latest big bad, Kang the Conqueror. Given that each of these performances requires Majors’ body to be in peak physical condition, he outlined a few interesting techniques he utilized to get into shape in a recent interview with Variety. During a recent press junket for Magazine Dreams, Jonathan Majors explained “I’m playing Killian Maddox… Playing him you don’t fuck around. What ended up happening is I would train two hours, two times a day for the movie and a third time after wrap. Meanwhile, you eat six times a day. Lots of chicken. Lots of elk. That’s just for me. I like it.”
This news comes just days after Jonathan Majors revealed some inspiration for his Kang the Conqueror performance, which he modeled to be the antithesis of Robert Downey Jr.’s “hero of heroes” Iron Man. Majors has clearly put in the work to play an effective antagonist alongside both Marvel’s Avengers team as well as Michael B. Jordan’s Adonis Johnson/Creed. Given the nature of his upcoming stint as Kang, a villain who traverses space and time throughout the multiverse to conquer worlds, we’re hoping Majors didn’t go full method a la Jared Leto, and kept his villainous performance on the screen.
Many actors have transformed their bodies to play a role, including Christian Bale who famously went from a bodybuilder physique to emaciated and sickly and back again during his time as Bruce Wayne in The Dark Knight film series. Marvel stars have especially discussed going to great lengths to tone their bodies for the hyper action the superhero lifestyle demands, with even legends of comedic acting such as Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Paul Rudd taking to the extra ab crunches. With Jonathan Majors playing three back-to-back heavyweights, it makes sense that he would take to such a strict regimen.
Majors went on to specify that his diet and exercise routine consisted of consuming over 6,000 calories per day for four months, in order to maintain his hulking frame of 6 feet and 202 pounds. When asked if he was relieved to finally abandon his excessive training, Jonathan Majors expressed that he actually enjoys the routine in moderation. The Lovecraft Country star explained that he enjoys being physical, hiking, running, and working out in the gym, but has scaled his workout down to once a day instead of the requisite three gym sessions he had been pulling for the roles.
So it appears that Jonathan Majors will be joining the ranks of fellow Marvel stars such as Kumail Nanjiani and Chris Pratt, as actors who became highly fit and muscular for their roles and stuck with the healthy lifestyle in the long term. Pratt famously portrayed the chubby Andy Dwyer on NBC’s Parks and Recreation for years before shaping up to lead Guardians of The Galaxy, while Nanjiani ditched the pudgy couch potato lifestyle to become one of Marvel’s Eternals, two superhero teams we may see face off against Majors in 2025’s Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and 2026’s Avengers: Secret Wars.
Magazine Dreams premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this month, with reviews praising Jonathan Majors’ performance. There is no announced date yet for when the film will reach streaming services or theaters across the country, but sources indicate that could change very soon after the festival circuit. You can see the next arrival of Majors’ Kang the Conqueror in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, which premieres in theaters February 17.
