Chris Hemsworth Confronts the Notion He's Too Good-Looking to Play a Hacker
In his first big turn since being crowned People's Sexiest Man Alive, the hulking blonde Australian actor Chris Hemsworth has chosen to play … a world-famous hacking genius? The 31-year-old Avenger stars in Michael Mann’s Blackhat as an imprisoned genius furloughed by the government to bring down a global evildoer.
Despite some internet upheaval about Hemsworth’s casting —sample message board comment: “ The notion that ANY skilled hacker is a hot, ripped, athletic jock is laughable” — it’s not that outlandish to think hackers can be handsome. But computer whizzes in Hollywood products tend to be of the nerdier, squirrelier character-actor variety, and for every Angelina Jolie in Hackers, there have been at least a few Seth Greens in The Italian Job.
Hemsworth admitted to Yahoo Movies that he questioned Mann on whether or not he fit the physical profile of a hacker. “He said the demographic is no longer the cliché version that we once imagined,” the actor recalled. “Hacking exists across all sections of our society, from the math [world] to the criminal world to the social world.”
As for another comment that he doesn’t even wear glasses: “I could’ve worn glasses,” Hemsworth says laughing. “But [Mann] said, ‘Oh come on, why would he wear glasses?”
