Russell Crowe has reeled off a list of serious injuries he has picked up from his years as an action man, revealing he has no cartilage in his toes and "a disintegrating hip".
The Oscar-winning Gladiator star no longer does his own stunts on movie sets because he fears hewon't be able to bounce back as quickly from an injury now he's 52.
"The older I get the less that's just physically possible," he tells WENN.
"I remember when I was a young fella doing all of my stunts and the occasional older actor would go, 'Why are you doing it? Why don't you let the stunt guys do it?'
Surely he picked up a few injuries of the set of Gladiator.
"Now that I'm an older guy, I'm like, that was a piece of kindness and wisdom that had just missed me at the time, because you do start stacking this up. I've got this embarrassing thing where I've got one scar on my body that is from something other than a film set; every other scar is about being on a film set."
And, listing his aches, pains and broken bones, the movie star adds, "I've got no cartilage in my toes anymore; that's from doing a whole bunch of lateral stops. I've got grade-four tears in both Achilles tendons. I've got shin splints. I've got bone marrow ademas under both knees. I've got one disintegrating hip.
Russell Crowe as Robin Hood (2010)
"I've got a rib in my upper thoracic that pops off my spine, which is a very pleasant morning if that ever happens! I've had two operations on my left shoulder.
"This stuff comes from committing to the job and giving myself over to the job."
Crowe admits he sat down with Shane Black, the director of his new action comedy The Nice Guys, and made it clear he wasn't up for a series of stunts - after putting on more than 27 kilograms for his role as bumbling detective Jackson Healy.
"I said, 'There's two things at play here; one is, because I'm getting older, I want to make sure that I get through everything that I'm responsible for. The other thing is, I'm carrying a lot of extra weight, so if we start grinding on stuff and doing it over and over again I'm gonna hurt myself ...
Russell Crowe and Ryan gosling in 'The Nice guys' (2016)
"I did kind of limit him a little bit but all that basically meant is he got the choreography and everything he wanted to do with the camera down really well. And so when I'm doing it, he's getting everything he needs. It's good to pull the grind back from 20 takes to three!"
