Chris Hemsworth Was "Weirdly Shaken" Meeting Chris Pratt: "He's Just So Charismatic"

Plus, the actor admits Cate Blanchett is an "intimidating" co-star in Thor: Ragnarok

By Zach Johnson Aug 16, 2017 2:15 PMTags
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It's not often that other men intimidate Chris Hemsworth.

But, when dozens of actors united to film Marvel Studios' Avengers: Infinity War, the actor admits he did get a bit nervous meeting one of his co-stars. "The first time I really met Chris Pratt—and went on set with him and the Guardians—I was weirdly shaken," he laughs in an interview with ELLE. "I don't know why. He's just so charismatic. And good at what he does."

Hemsworth was similarly thrown off kilter when he filmed Thor: Ragnarok opposite Cate Blanchett, who stars as Hela, the goddess of death. "She calls you on your s--t straightaway. Which is intimidating. You walk in and you're doing all the usual polite chats, and she's like, 'Chris, what are you doing? Really, that's the story you're gonna tell?' And you're like, 'S--t, I'm not going to get away with anything with this lady," the actor says. "I have to drop the façade."

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Who can blame him for being a bit nervous? "She's Cate Blanchett, for God's sake!" he says. "There's quite a feeling of wanting to impress her. She's like, 'I'm a human being. Act normal.'"

Thankfully, Blanchett has a disarming charm about her. "Before you know it, you're drinking and telling stories and cracking jokes," Hemsworth tells ELLE. "She has a wild sense of humor."

In previous Thor and Avengers movies, Hemsworth says, "I've had to wear extensions in my hair. That's where my powers come from." But in the new blockbuster (in theaters Nov. 3), the titular character loses his long locks. "When I didn't have the wig on, I instantly felt like I could move and speak and react differently," the 34-year-old actor says in Entertainment Weekly's Fall Movie Preview issue. "Once we aesthetically stripped a lot of that away, it allowed the whole thing to take on a different attitude. It felt like a completely different character, and that was hugely liberating and freeing as an actor because I had become a bit bored with myself."

With Hela raising hell, Thor teams up with Loki (Tom Hiddleston), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) to defend the Asgardian people—and the rest of the universe. "You hear Thor in the trailer talking about putting together a team like the old days, and this is sort of the culmination of that statement. Their backs are against the wall and something pretty drastic needs to occur to change the tide at this point," he explains. "It's a classic heroic lineup."