Movies - TV
Cillian Murphy Dropped A 15-Year Habit For Peaky Blinders
By WITNEY SEIBOLD
In 2017, while starring as gang leader Tommy Shelby on the TV show “Peaky Blinders,” Cillian Murphy discussed his diet, saying that he started eating meat again after 15 years.
Murphy had become a vegetarian due to the outbreaks of mad cow disease that swept through England in the mid-1990s. The actor was simply untrusting of the meat industry for a time.
When it came time to play Shelby, who was not a vegetarian, Murphy was told by a personal trainer that the character’s appearance would look different from his due to their diets.
The actor realized that, in order to capture a certain verisimilitude about his character, he needed to start eating meat again, and on a trip with his wife, ordered venison steak.
While Murphy did take up meat again for the role, the actor revealed in 2022 that he had returned to a vegetarian diet after filming on “Peaky Blinders” officially ended.