Marvel star Chris Hemsworth has announced that he is putting his acting career on hold after receiving some unnerving health news.
Hemsworth revealed that he has a genetic predisposition to Alzheimer’s disease and he feels the need to take time off to explore what that means and if there is a way to stave off the disease.
The 39-year-old Avengers star found out about the issue in an episode of his new Disney+ docuseries Limitless that his DNA contains two copies of the APOE4 gene, and he has an eight to ten times higher chance of developing the disease than the average person.
“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,” Hemsworth told Vanity Fair.
“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 [the] house, and I missed the window,” the Australian-born star added.
“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,” he said.
“I’ve had older, very experienced directors go, ‘Don’t do what I did.’ They talk about their kids having grown up—and they missed it. What was interesting about it was, they were admitting the fault—but at the same time, they were still on set, still doing it. There’s an addictive quality to it, I think, about being in the mix and being a part of the chase and being part of the adrenaline that comes with all of it,” he said.
Still, he said he does not intend to quit acting.
“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’m not talking about retiring by any means,” he added.
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