Chris Hemsworth’s Alzheimer’s Disease Risk Was His ‘Biggest Fear’—How It Affects His Acting Career
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A new outlook. An episode of the National Geographic TV show Limitless saw that the chances of Chris Hemsworth having Alzheimer’s Disease is at higher risk. Is he retiring from acting because of this?
Hemsworth‘s rose to prominence in 2011 when he starred as Thor Odinson in the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Thor. He went on to reprise his role as Thor in eight more Marvel Cinematic Universe movies: 2012’s The Avengers, 2013’s Thor Dark World, 2015’s Avengers: Age of Ultron, 2016’s Doctor Strange, 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok, 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War, 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, and 2022’s Thor: Love and Thunder. In an interview with Vanity Fair in 2022, Hemsworth opened up about how his career mirrored Thor’s journey in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “I just love playing the character. I love the journey I have been on with him. Not only as Thor, but just my life. The two have been side by side for 10, 11 years now and have both crossed over into each other’s world from time to time,” he said.
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He’s also taken the iconic roles of Kevin Beckman in Ghostbusters, Agent H in Men In Black: International and Eric The Huntsmen in Snow White and the Huntsmen. He’s set to star in Extraction 2 which will premiere on Netflix on June 26, 2023.
So how does Chris Hemsworth feel about Alzheimer’s Disease and is he retiring early? Read down below to see what he said.
Has Chris Hemsworth stopped acting because of Alzheimer’s Disease?
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Has Chris Hemsworth stopped acting? No, Chris Hemsworth hasn’t stopped acting and doesn’t plan to in the near future. Though, the Thor: Love and Thunder star reportedly has a slower schedule than usual according to Page Six insiders.
Hemsworth has a couple of projects in the works including revisiting his “Thor” character in an upcoming Avengers sequel, and an untitled Hulk Hogan biopic. But after those projects, says a source, “he doesn’t plan to take on many roles because of [learning about his high risk for] Alzheimer’s.”
He talked about how he discovered his “biggest fear” in episode 5 of Limitless. He found out that his genetic makeup includes two copies of the gene APOE4, one from his mother, and the other from his father, which studies have linked to an increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease.
He talked to Vanity Fair about how it changed the course of his life and how he wanted to portray it in the TV show. My concern was I just didn’t want to manipulate it and overdramatize it, and make it into some sort of hokey grab at empathy, or whatever, for entertainment,” Hemsworth told the magazine. “It’s not like I’ve been handed my resignation.”
Hemsworth also touched about how he viewed it in regards to the timeline of his life. “Most of us, we like to avoid speaking about death in the hope that we’ll somehow avoid it. We all have this belief that we’ll figure it out. Then to all of a sudden be told some big indicators are actually pointing to this as the route which is going to happen, the reality of it sinks in. Your own mortality.”
He continued, “I worked with the death doula and people who worked in palliative care and end-of-life care and then spoke to a number of people who were at the end of their days or coming upon them—even younger people that were diagnosed with cancer and didn’t have long to live. For me, the positive of it was like, ‘Right, if I didn’t know this [Alzheimer’s] information, I wouldn’t have made the changes I made’ I just wasn’t aware of any of it, so now I feel thankful that I have in my arsenal the sort of tools to best prepare myself and prevent things happening in that way.”
The importance of awareness of the disease helped Hemsworth make his decisions regarding his career. “If you look at Alzheimer’s prevention, the benefit of preventative steps is that it affects the rest of your life. When you have preposition to cardiovascular heart disease, cancer, anything—it’s all about sleep management, stress management, nutrition, movement, fitness. It’s all kind of the same tools that need to be applied in a consistent way.”
He plans to focus on his family and be more thoughtful in his process of choosing which films to star in. “Now, if something’s going to pull me away from my family and my kids, it’s got to be a positive, constructive, collaborative experience. I shot with George Miller on the new prequel to Fury Road, part of the Mad Max saga, and I said to my agent said, “That’s where I want to spend my work hours; with someone who is kind and collaborative and interesting.
He continued talking about the pacing of his life. “I felt like I’d been in a sprint for 10 years, and all these moments that were dream scenarios would fly by. Moments that I should have been stepping back and going, ‘Wow, this is incredible,’ I was inundated with other kinds of requests and asks and being pulled in different directions. [I was] not really kind of enjoying what was right in front of me.”
Hemsworth has three children with Elsa Pataky, daughter India Rose, born in 2010, and twins Sasha and Tristan, born in 2014. His kids were a large factor in making him more picky with roles”Doing an episode on death and facing your own mortality made me go, “Oh God, I’m not ready to go yet.” I want to sit and be in this space with a greater sense of stillness and gratitude. And then you start talking about kids and family and going, “Oh my God, they’re getting older, they’re growing up and I keep slapping another movie on top of another movie.” Before you know it, they’re 18 and they’ve moved out of house, and I missed the window. It really triggered something in me to want to take some time off. And since we finished the show, I’ve been completing the things I was already contracted to do. Now when I finish this tour this week, I’m going home and I’m going to have a good chunk of time off and just simplify. Be with the kids, be with my wife.
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