Josh Brolin: I'm really glad I didn't play Batman

As of press time, the movie "Avengers 4" has earned nearly 4 billion yuan at the box office in China, and fans around the world went to theaters to attend his "funeral" - yes, it was the strongest villain in history, "Thanos". This "Purple Potato Man" who can destroy half of the universe with a snap of his fingers and requires all Marvel superheroes to gather together to resist, although everyone knows that his image is created through special effects makeup and post-production, Thanos' facial expressions, voices and motion capture are all completed by actors, and his actor is 51-year-old Josh Brolin.

The playboy from an acting family - once said "being an actor is pathetic"

Josh Brolin was born into an acting family. His father and grandfather were Hollywood actors. His father is James Brolin, a Hollywood veteran in the 1960s and 1970s. His stepmother is the legendary star Barbra Streisand, and his mother is a wildlife conservationist. However, for Brolin, who grew up on a farm in Templeton, California, acting was not his childhood dream. He once said in an interview that "being an actor is sad. All I want in my life is applause and recognition from others." He himself does not want to fall into such a sad situation.

Brolin was a nerdy boy with braces in his school days. It was not until high school that he suddenly became interested in acting because of an improvisational performance experience class. With the support of his family, Brolin moved to Los Angeles to live with his father and entered the entertainment industry as he wished. At the age of 17, he starred in the summer blockbuster "The Goonies".

However, Brolin starred in a lot of mediocre films, even took on a lot of bad movies, played a minor role, and worked as a theater actor, but he never became well-known. Under the protection of his parents, Brolin seemed to have no ambition. At that time, acting was more like a tool for him to make a living. After 20 years of debut, this late bloomer is almost unknown in Hollywood.

In 2004, he played a small supporting role in the movie "Into the Blue". The director mocked him: "Who is Brolin? "The Goonies"? That was 20 years ago!" This sentence finally stimulated Brolin, and he began to seriously select scripts and study drama.

In 2008, the Coen brothers directed the 80th Academy Award-winning film "No Country for Old Men", which can be said to be Brolin's first work that he could show off. In the film, he played a poor Vietnam veteran who accidentally got a suitcase containing $2 million and embarked on the road of escape. However, the killer played by Javier Bardem was too powerful and brilliant, and Brolin's role as a small character did not have much room to play. Fortunately, "American Gangster", "W.B. Bush", "In the Valley of Elah" and "Milk" released in the same year gradually established Brolin's reputation as a "good actor" in the circle.

Almost 50 years old, he accepted devilish training - he would rather beg for food than take a role that "doesn't suit his taste"

Brolin has not received formal acting education, but his acting talent seems to be innate. For him, the most important year in his acting career was his appearance in Men in Black 3 in 2012. The globally popular Men in Black series made Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, the "J&K Black Super Agent Combination" with different auras and sparks, famous all over the world. When Agent J traveled through time and space back to the past to perform missions with the young K, the crew found Brolin, who looks very similar to Tommy Lee Jones, to play the younger version of him.

After this blockbuster, the world finally got to know Josh Brolin, and Hollywood producers and directors saw his acting skills. In 2013, Brolin partnered with "Scarlet Witch" Elizabeth Olsen to star in the American version of "Oldboy". In order to fit the role, he gained 15 pounds in just four days, and forced himself to eat three hamburgers before going to bed every night. Then he lost most of the fat in a week.

One day in 2014, Brolin received a call from the Marvel director team, who selected two roles for him: one is Cable in Deadpool 2, who has telepathy and the ability to control thoughts, can emit lasers from his left eye, and has a mechanical left arm; the other is Thanos, the ultimate villain in the Marvel Universe. So since the first Guardians of the Galaxy, Josh Brolin has become the spokesperson for Thanos. In order to meet the director's requirements, Brolin, who is already 46 years old, started to work out crazily, and trained his triceps to be as thick as the average person's waist.

With the help of Marvel, Brolin has successfully become a top star in Hollywood. In recent years, he has starred in "Inherent Vice", "Sicario" series, and "Dune" which is expected to be released in 2020.

However, regarding Brolin's pickiness about roles, Paul Haggis, the director of "In the Valley of Elah", has something to say: "There are some commercial blockbusters that are very attractive at first glance, and others are eager to pounce on them, but he just turns them down casually! Even if he is so poor that he has to beg for food, just because he can't find resonance with the role, he will say no!"

Young and frivolous, scandal-ridden: "19 of my friends died from heroin"

Brolin is a typical spoiled kid who was born and raised in the glitz and glamor of Hollywood, surrounded by a group of friends who were also rich but ignored by their parents. He became a heavy smoker at the age of 13, and alcoholism was commonplace. Fortunately, Brolin did not fall into it. "I have 19 friends who died from heroin. I also tried it, but I never became addicted or in danger of my life."

At the age of 45, Brolin decided to quit drinking and smoking. After starting to build muscle for the role, he fell in love with fitness and lived a healthy life. "I just felt that it was enough. 45 is a very special age limit."

Brolin has had three marriages so far, the first two of which were actors. His first wife, Alice Adair, gave birth to a son and a daughter. Brolin's second wife, Diane Lane, played Superman's adoptive mother Martha Kent in "Batman v Superman" and "Justice League". The two got married in 2004 and divorced in 2013.

Brolin's current wife, Katherine Boyd, is a former model. She was Thanos' assistant and is 20 years younger than him. In 2016, the two held their wedding in Mexico. In real life, Thanos is a wife-showing maniac and often shows off his affection on social platforms. The two sweetly sing and pick their ears on the bed, and take videos together at parties. In front of his wife, Brolin always turns into an acting master and an emoticon. Last November, after the release of "Avengers 3", Thanos had just killed half of the population of the universe, and the 50-year-old Brolin welcomed his little daughter. He also posted a photo of his little daughter's "evil smile" in her sleep on the social networking site, and was jokingly called by fans: "The second generation of Thanos? Will she be named Gamora?"

What you don't know about Josh Brolin:

1. When they were young, Brolin and Depp entered the final stage of casting for the American TV series "21 Jump Street" together. At that time, Depp wanted the role very much. When he received a call from his agent, Depp jumped up excitedly and rushed out the door. When the two met again, Depp had already become a big star, and Brolin was just a small supporting role who came to the crew to play a guest role.

2. Brolin's biological mother died in a car accident on his 27th birthday. His father, James Brolin, married Barbara Streisand in 1998. Brolin has a good relationship with his stepmother.

3. Last year, when their youngest daughter was born, Brolin's current wife, Katherine Boyd, gave her stepmother-in-law, Barbara Streisand, a bracelet with "Grandma" written on it, which made Streisand burst into tears. Brolin joked, "The 76-year-old Streisand is like a typical Jewish grandmother, and she is very much looking forward to having a grandchild."

4. Brolin's only Oscar nomination was for "Milk", in which he played the assassin Dan White and was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor at the 81st Academy Awards.

5. Brolin claimed that he has always been paid according to the minimum salary standard of the Screen Actors Guild. For example, when he was filming "No Country for Old Men" in 2008, his salary was only $100,000. After deducting the agent's fees and paying taxes, he was left with about $36,000.

6. Brolin, who has a hot temper, once publicly quarreled with director Cameron because he was busy playing Cable in Deadpool 2 and refused to act in the upcoming Avatar 2, which made Cameron very unhappy. Brolin responded: "If I don't want to act, I won't act. There's nothing to say!"

7. When casting for DC Universe's Batman, director Zack Snyder considered Brolin, but ultimately chose Ben Affleck. However, the film received mediocre reviews after its release, and Brolin happily responded, "I'm really glad I didn't play Batman."

8. Unexpectedly, right? The actor who played "Thanos" in the first "Avengers" released in 2012 was not Josh Brolin, but Damien Poitier.