Christian Bale Entertained Thor: Love & Thunder's Young Cast With Gorr's Black Goop
Spoilers for "Thor: Love and Thunder" ahead.
You know the old Hollywood saying: never work with dogs or children. However, Christian Bale, who plays the villain Gorr the God Butcher in "Thor: Love and Thunder" seems to have had a great time with the kids of New Asgard in the film, who loved him right back.
That's a little odd considering the character of Gorr is pretty terrifying. Stark white makeup all over his face, glowing yellow eyes, and a whole lot of black goo staining his teeth and leaking out of his mouth. He may have frightened the gods in the film, but according to an interview with Marvel.com, the kids found the entire thing hilarious. If that's true, I'd love to hear what they would have thought about the never-filmed dance to Kate Bush, that Bale mentioned had been in the works at one point.
Bale, who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for "The Fighter," assumed that the kids probably didn't even know who he was. He said they thought, "he's just some old fart. I don't know that they've got any clue about anything I've ever done, I was just the weirdo with the strange makeup."
Dribbling goo is good for giggles
One of the things that led to the laughter at Gorr was the fact that Bale attempted to stay in character during his scenes. That didn't seem to impress the kids, but it pleased Bale that it worked out that way. He explained:
"I loved those scenes. We don't see it that much in the film, but I always had bile in my mouth, which I would still dribble in front of them. They were always asking me to do that, going 'Smile,' going, 'Dribble,' going 'ahhhhh!' They loved it, and everyone wanted to take turns with the sword. It was really wonderful, and the kids were great and bloody good little actors and all these fantastic outfits."
While we could maybe debate the wisdom of letting the kids play with sword props, I have to agree that they were great. The big fight scene where Thor imbues them with the power of Zeus' thunderbolt (for a limited time only, of course) is adorable. Not only is it fun to see these kids fight back against the man who has taken them, but having one of them armed with a stuffy that has lasers shooting out of its eyes is going to be recreated by kids all over the world for a long time.
New Asgard's children are our future
The young actors served another delightful purpose for Bale's co-star Tessa Thompson who plays Valkyrie. She ends the film by starting fight training with the kids, and told the site that it helped remind her that they're play-acting for a living. She said:
"Most of the time, when you're doing the fight scenes, you're fighting nobody, [because of the CGI]. You're just walking around, just fighting the air, which it just feels like you're a kid, essentially. To invite kids into this experience really reminds you of not just who these movies are made for, in some ways, but also how to make these movies, because kids naturally know how to play...These movies require a childlike nature in terms of performance. There's so much of the imagination. It's basically like playing as a kid. You're running around."
That sounds like a blast! Give me a prop sword, a tennis ball on a stick for an eyeline, and a green sheet for a background, and I'd probably turn into a kid as well.
"Thor: Love and Thunder" also stars Natalie Portman, and is in theaters now.