Actor Chris Hemsworth on Jay Shetty Podcast (Transcript)

Really, really special.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. I love the show and I’m glad you could make it out here and we could do this in my hometown.

Growing Up in the Outback

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it’s beautiful. Well, I wanted to dive right in because in the doc we get such an up close and personal feel of who you are, your family, your parents. And I love understanding how people became who they were.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: So the first question is, what’s a childhood memory that you have that you feel defines who you are today that feels like it is such a strong part of your personality today?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: What you see in the documentary is the road trip my dad and I take back to the community that we grew up in, this Indigenous community, Northern Territory in the outback of Australia. And they were definitely my most vivid earliest memories. I have trouble remembering years earlier than that and years after that, because I think one, it was so starkly different to the environment in Melbourne where I grew up.

But I think there was—it had such a profound impact on me just due to, for so many reasons, the connection with the land, the people in that community. The experience itself was so dramatically different to anything else I’d done. But the immersion within that Indigenous culture in Australia and having feeling this sort of influence from the, I guess the sort of traditional way of life that they embodied and the welcoming we received in that town, I still have.

When I think about who I am and my appreciation and sense of gratitude and place in the world, definitely I’m brought back to that period of my life. I’m trying to think of a sort of a single sort of thing for you, but that period of time for me is the most vivid and wonderful.

JAY SHETTY: What images flash in your mind when you’re thinking about that time?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Not owning a pair of shoes, not having a TV, being the only white kid in an Indigenous school, buffalo walking down the street, being five hours drive from the nearest shops. You know, it was a little remote community in the middle of the outback. But how normal it all felt, you know, and to be sort of thrust back into that environment now would be sort of a shock to the system in many ways.

But that was as familiar and comfortable and organic as sort of anything I’ve ever felt. And, you know, I see photographs now that prompt instant sort of visceral feelings and a deep sort of nostalgia and warmth and happiness, you know, and a sense of connection, because that was, you know, we lived in a tent at one point, you know, with my parents and my older brother.

We then lived in a sort of very older, sort of rundown house. But it was as, you know, wonderful of a childhood as you could ask for. You know, there was no—it was sort of boundless. The opportunities where the imagination could go and the sort of the physical experience, you know, it was again, unlike kind of anything else I’ve had since then.

You know, there was a real sort of Peter Pan quality to that sense of fantasy and adventure that was instilled in us from that age. But that environment definitely awakened in us.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. And I guess when you’re living it, you don’t know how special it is.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. I think all of our experiences that, you know, they’re the norm is what is in front of you, you know, and if I had something to compare it with at the time, I may have, but it was—that was my way of life.

And then it was kind of a shock coming back to Melbourne and adapting into, I guess, the world that, you know, suburban neighborhood, you know, structured sort of, you know, town that we lived in and catching the bus to school and the train and all the sort of the usual things that for me was an adaptation that was, I remember kind of going, oh, this is very different to where we had sort of where we’d come from.

“I’m Going to Hollywood”

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. Your dad in the documentary says that as a kid you would say, “I’m going to Hollywood.”

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Go to Hollywood.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, “I’m going to Hollywood.” Where did that come from? From this world that you grew up in.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I think part of it was growing up in Northern Territory because there was this sort of sense of adventure instilled in me then. And I remember my dad reading Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit to me and my mum as well. And that sense of sort of fantasy and imagination awakened through a sort of a very big cultural difference.

But also, I think being outdoors, you know, the opportunity for—not boredom, but not being continuously stimulated and entertained like we are sort of nowadays with devices and so on. There was, I guess, being in that environment awoke something in me that I still now either try and get back to or when I do attach myself to, ignites that sense of fantasy and that sense of adventure, but through reading books.

And then when we moved back to Melbourne, every weekend was, you know, we would go to the movies or we would hire a film, or we’d go on hikes and we’d go surfing and we’d go camping. And I remember from a very young age not wanting to be an actor, but wanting to be one of those characters in one of those films, one of those books.

And the closest thing I could be to, you know, an elf in the Lord of the Rings was, you know, if I dressed up and played one in a movie or the closest thing I could, you know, get to as far as intergalactic travel or something was playing the character in that movie. And I guess it was a sort of an escapism of sorts, but not that I was escaping from anything I didn’t want to be a part of. It was—it kept me captivated, you know, and still does. The transportation to other worlds and inhabiting other characters and other spaces.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: And it sort of—it comes from a different—each film and each character I sort of—I look at. And that sort of journey I embark on. There’s a sort of a real organic attachment to it, as far as I wouldn’t say I’m seeking out that character as much as I sort of arrive. And then as you sort of fall into a character or fall into a film, it then sort of takes on a life of its own and takes you to places that I think you just have to be open to, you know, interpretation. But open for the journey.

JAY SHETTY: You mean by playing a character. Yeah, it opens up a different mindset or different—

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: For sure. It probes different parts of your soul or psyche. And there’s a premeditated sort of approach and a sort of calculated approach. And then there’s an absolute sort of demolishing of all that preparation and surrendering to the process.

And then that’s the part I love, you know, and you only get that through an extreme amount of preparation and calculation. But then the letting go portion of it, and which is where the risk is involved. But then that, for me, is where the greatest adventure occurs. Is through kind of really leaning in and really surrendering to the experience that rings true.

Structure Leads to Spontaneity

JAY SHETTY: I had the fortune of sitting with Kobe Bryant before he sadly passed away on the show, and he talked about how structure leads to spontaneity. But it was that discipline, as you’re saying, leads to the ultimate ability to be free and surrender.

But as I hear you say, I’m wondering, it’s obviously not something that you mathematically, strategically access because you’re saying it’s happening in this really natural, authentic way where it leads you. What roles made you feel that way, or which ones are the ones that have a strong memory for that for you, where you went, oh, wow. This led me to a place I didn’t imagine it would.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I mean, it’s interesting because I sort of—I think I undulate from the extreme, analytical, over ruminating, calculated analysis of something and then into the sort of, you know, more sort of mad scientist, you know, intuitive sort of approach. But they go hand in hand. You know, the sort of—the polarity between the two, I find is really helpful.

And I’d say I did a film with George Miller, part of the Mad Max series, called Furiosa, and that, for me, was probably the greatest example of that kind of character taking over and being led into a place which, you know, you didn’t plan for. But it only the sort of improvisational portion of it, or the experimentation of it, or the, you know, throw caution in the wind and just leap in head first, came from months and months or actually a couple of years, because I had read the script two years before.

And while I was doing other films, I was thinking about that character. It began to sort of infect my thoughts daily and to the point where I had to kind of try and put it aside because I had to get back to the film I was currently on. I was talking to George Miller about that, and he goes, “Well, selfishly, I don’t mind. You know, you can give our character more of that.”

And it was the first time I kind of started journaling as the character and started doing a—you know, he was a pretty ugly, villainous individual on paper and on screen as well, I guess. But I had to find a way to sort of understand and empathize with his position. And from his point of view, he was the hero, as in, you know, everyone’s—

And so by the time I got to set, everything that I’d sort of planned began to fall away. And each day was, again, kind of an experiment and a real sort of deep dive into the psyche of this individual and what were the sort of justifications for his actions, which were perceived from one angle as, you know, horrific, but from his angle and his position, from where his people were standing—survival of the fittest.

And, yeah, I’ve had that a few times in my career, but that certainly stands out as one of the biggest ones.

The Empathy of Acting

JAY SHETTY: I feel like there’s so much empathy in becoming an actor because you’re trying to understand this character that you don’t know, but you have to kind of get to know, and you may not feel what they feel.

One of my friends is an acting coach in LA and I—he invited me to just go watch one of his sessions with actors at night. So I went to see him a couple of weeks ago and I was just, if anyone feels lonely, they should just go to an acting class. Everyone was so encouraging of each other and there was this real camaraderie that everyone had and everyone give each other feedback, and all of it was about dissecting character and emotion, feeling.

And I was, wow, I’ve learned more from this than, you know, about human emotion and about human potential and depth than you would going to a class, because there’s so much study and there’s so many layers and there’s so many—and as I’m hearing you talk about it, I’m, yeah, there’s such a—but it sounds like you love that. It sounds like—

The Psychology of Acting and Performance

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, I mean, I’ve always had a big interest in psychology and understanding our sort of inner workings of soul and our psyche and us as human beings and how we interact with one another. And nature versus nurture and the how and why of it all.

And for me, there’s just something therapeutic about the experience of acting and putting on the clothes of a completely different individual and having the chance to look at the world through a different lens. And I see that as a real sort of gift compared to a lot of sort of, I guess, our working life. There’s just an abundance of creativity and exploration there, which I find incredibly helpful.

Just even, I mean, from each character, I find I come out whether or not I agree with the character or not. I’ve been able to sit in their shoes for a moment and look at the world in a different way. And I think there’s a sort of humility that’s forced upon you in that sense, which I find a really interesting sort of experiment.

And as you’ve pointed out, I think very healthy for all of us to do. I know a lot of directors that have never acted, and it scares the hell out of them. But they go and do acting classes for that reason, to understand the psychology. Also understand how you’re going to come at this character or what the position is that you might take, as opposed to standing on this side of the fence and making assumptions, stepping into those different environments. Certainly. And that gives you a greater sense of agency.

JAY SHETTY: Has there ever been a character you played where you felt, I wish that one didn’t rub off on me or left a bit of them with you, that you—

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I mean, it’s—

JAY SHETTY: It.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I find it’s not that the lines get blurred, but I’ve been on set as defending my character. And then we tapped on the shoulder and like, the guy killed a bunch of people. I’m like, oh, yeah, okay. Besides that part.

And so it’s sort of, I don’t think the state I will get myself in for certain characters through the day. A very heightened sort of fight or flight type state where there’s sort of feels like there’s electricity running through my bones. And especially when there’s a lot of dialogue and there’s a lot of reaction, a lot going on that I find very hard to switch off.

It’s not so much the character that I’m trying to shake. It’s the energy that’s required to that character. And I find it with one of the hardest things, the high to come off is improvisational sort of comedy, you know. And I remember doing, when we did Ragnarok, there was a lot of that in there, and it was a very new version of the character.

And I would get into this sort of ecstatic, sort of, you know, electrified state and be kind of drinking coffee and Red Bull and slamming, you know, energy drink to try and elevate that more. And then it was like I’d have to kind of rein that in and get home, and I’d just be sort of twitching and go to sleep and try to come off that.

So I find that the residual effect of the state of the character more so than the character.

JAY SHETTY: It’s more about getting into character.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Because you could put that. I don’t necessarily have to believe I am the, you know, leader of an army or whatever. It’s more, what would I feel in that situation that you then embody and then that sort of takes over.

Anxiety and the Obsession with Success

JAY SHETTY: That’s fascinating to hear. Yeah. But the jitters are real. Like, that’s like, you’ve talked before about this idea of how your acting career has actually brought on huge anxiety and stress. Where’s that come from?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I remember when I first started acting, I had it immediately. Once I sort of locked into the idea that I was going to become an actor, it was an absolute obsession. It was an addiction. It was all I talked about. It was sort of, there was no shadow of a doubt that was what I was going to do.

And there was an ignorance and a naivety that was there about the reality of how difficult that was going to be. But you need a fair amount of madness, I think, to sort of excel in any space. There needs to be a certain amount of absolute, deeply profound sort of commitment to it.

You know, you talk about Kobe Bryant and anyone who’s excelled in their field and, you know, numbers of sports players and individuals that I look to. That’s sort of on the spectrum in some sense. You know, there’s a sort of a mastery there which is otherworldly, but it does require a sort of an insane dedication to it.

So I remember when I was finishing high school, it became this obsession that was all I was going to do. And everything I was going to do from it was I was going to help pay off my parents’ house, I was going to do this, I was going to do that, I was going to take care of my family and friends and, you know, look at all the amazing things I could do.

And every time I go into a job as small as it was and inconsequential in my mind was like, if I screw up this one scene, then it will somehow make its way to Hollywood from Australia and I’ll never get a job again if I screw up this one audition. And it was that kind of pressure. It was, I was thinking 10 years ahead.

And then, so by the time I got onto Home and Away, which was, you know, that big, big soap opera, longest running soap opera in Australia, which I’m from London too. I flew into that, that experience with enthusiasm and excitement. And I was, it was great for a couple of months.

And all of a sudden I was hit with this wave of anxiety because I was looking at the outcome rather than the sort of process. And I was looking at the, I’m doing it for this reason and that reason rather than being in the moment, in the present. And it really detracted from what I was doing each day.

And that would be the last thing I’d think about before I go to bed, was what scenes I’d screwed up and how I should have done this, I should have done that. And as soon as I’d wake up, it’d be like a shot of adrenaline about what I was going to screw up.

And I don’t know what. I think it came from a sort of expecting too much of myself, which is, there’s a slight sort of contradiction to that too, because as I said, it requires that obsessive, you know, addictive sort of concentration. But it’s the ability to sort of hold that obsession and that absolute need and want for it to achieve something great that you want to achieve and then at the same time, to completely let it go and not care.

And so I had to do this strange dance around trying to convince myself I didn’t care. But in the preparation time, to motivate myself, I would have to care a hell of a lot. And so it’s sort of the, you know, the two voices, the Jekyll and Hyde version of oneself that is sort of, both need to be kept in check.

You know, it’s your purpose pulls you, your fear pushes you. There’s a sort of strange balance with the two extremes I find useful, but also terrifying when not kept in check. That sat with me for years, that anxiety.

Reinterpreting Fear as Excitement

And then I remember, and I’ve talked about this in a couple of interviews, but reading a few books around performance anxiety specifically, and looking at different sports players and musicians and people who performed at a high level of public speaking, and they took their, all their sort of measurements, you know, the physical sort of responses prior to these engagements and said, are you scared or are you excited?

And whether, you know, half the group was in this scared category, half isn’t excited, the physical response was exactly the same across the board. Elevated heart rate, all the things, you know, you would imagine. So it was about the sort of, the takeaway was it was about an interpretation to that feeling.

And so when I would have nervous energy come up and all those things that at one point I would signal to myself for fear, I should just narrate that in a different sense and say, oh, no, this is my signaling for excitement. This is not my signaling for fear.

And again, I still have to keep that in check. And it sort of out of nowhere will take me down one path or the other. And I’ve got to kind of wrangle my way back to the preferred place, which is that the enthusiastic shot at.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. What’s fascinating about that, as I’m hearing you say, is it actually makes you better at what you do.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Like that pressure. It sounds like that you were putting on yourself when you’re doing Home and Away.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Even though it wasn’t a great experience for you, it’s making you better at the thing.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And that’s what I find so fascinating about people like yourself or high performing athletes or any of the types of people you mentioned, is that the thing that makes you better at the craft doesn’t necessarily improve the quality of your life and your mind.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And that’s that dance you’re talking about, which is, so I’ve got to kind of be able to unleash the beast to be able to do the work that I do. But then I don’t want the beast to eat me.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Because then there’s nothing left.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: When the beast is, you know, satisfied.

Befriending the Beast

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: For sure, it’s sort of a blessing and a curse in a way. And it’s because I’ve had experiences when, you know, the thing I was trying to remove, which was that heightened sense of awareness and then in fact, you’re absorbing too much information and it’s every little movement or sound. I’m like, oh God, I wish I could numb that. I wish I could reduce this sort of state and be more present.

And then I’ve found my way to that place either through not caring for one reason or another, being purely exhausted, you know, night shoots. You just got, there is no adrenaline left in the body. I’m like, oh, this is great. I’m comfortable. And the first note is, it’s a bit flat. Then the next take, you know, and I’m like, oh, great. The thing that I’ve been trying to get rid of is actually the secret sauce.

And so that again, about the interpretation, I don’t think the feeling itself is the problem. It’s our label we put upon it, you know, which then causes all the problems. And so I say this to friends of mine who are auditioning or on set and having anxiety or problems. I’m like, you’ve got to just, you’ve got to make friends with it.

You’ve got to look at it. It’s very hard to recognize now, but it is a gift in that sense. It is your spidey senses coming alive. It is the ability to think quicker and react faster and be more attuned to things if you’re allowing it in the space as opposed to, you know, don’t think of a pink elephant whenever you think of, that’s pink elephant.

And I’ve had so many people talk about meditation prior to walking on stage and calming down. And for me that is a house of cards because it’s like you’re in that state and then the one little thing sets you off. Whereas I beforehand want to get my state and myself into that ecstatic sort of state because it’s on my terms and now I own it, as opposed to it being something that creeps in the back door.

I’m like, no, I want this. Bring it on. Big, deep breath, kind of, you know, absorb it, use it. And then I found that that has been really beneficial and I’ve been able to use it for the good, you know, version of it as opposed to it transforming into the one we’re afraid of.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, it’s, what I hear you saying is that when it’s in control of you, it feels like pressure and fear. And then when you’re in control of it, when you’re embodying it.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: It’s now part of your narrative and part of your purpose and part of you feeling like, oh, this is fuel. Yeah, how I want to perform, rather than, this is just reminding me of, if I miss these three things, no one’s going to care about me and I’ll mess this up. And that obviously is not helpful at all. And so you’re saying befriending it is transforming it from being pressure and fear to being friendship and purpose.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Absolutely, yeah. There’s an acceptance to it, there’s a surrendering to it, there’s an ownership to it, as opposed to it being something you’re trying to avoid. But that only comes through, I think, understanding the mechanisms or the mechanics around the fact that it is beneficial if you have that relationship to it. You know, it is the worst thing in the world if you’re trying to avoid it.

JAY SHETTY: Yes.

Reframing Anxiety as Excitement

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: You know, shallow breath, heart rate’s up, sweaty palms, like you can’t think, everything just shuts down, you know. But if it’s like, no, no, this physical response, this emotional response, I programmed myself to see as a positive. Therefore it can be. And again, you’ll see me broke down at one point. Go, that trick ain’t working today, is it, Chris? Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: I’ve had a similar experience with public speaking, where I’ve been public speaking for years on stages.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And if I really care, and that’s my narrative kicking in, if I really care, I’ll still get sweaty palms. I’ll still be shaking a little. I’ll feel my heart rate go up. And I’ve learned that all of those things are just a sign that I care. Because I know if I get asked to speak someone, I don’t really care.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Then I won’t feel any of those things.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And so I’m like, oh, I feel like there’s some stakes here. And, yeah, this is important. And then I have my practices to embody that and feel good about that. But then at the same time, when I went on tour two years ago and we were doing nearly 50 shows across the world, I was feeling a completely different level of anxiety than I’d ever felt.

And I remember two days before when we were in rehearsals, I was just being really tight chested. I talked to my doctor and went in for a checkup. And they’re like, it’s just stress. And I was like, why am I stressed to do this all the time? But there’s always what still makes you nervous or what still gives you a little bit of that stress.

Playing a Character vs. Being Yourself

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Now, I mean, this stuff, you know, depressed, you know, walking on set, it all definitely awakens that feeling. And then it’s a constant sort of dance and adaptable sort of experience. But I think, you know, I probably have a much easier time now playing a character than I would being myself.

Like, in fact, with the series Limitless, that was very new to me to, you know, be in the documentary space and play Chris and I felt really uncomfortable from that. And I got better with it probably in the second season and this last episode with my dad. But earlier on it was like, I have nothing interesting to say. I’m not educated on these topics and I’m sort of a guinea pig in the experience, so maybe that’s a good thing.

But you’re far more critical of yourself than you are, I think, of somebody pretending to be. Like you said before, it’s a signaling that you care, I guess, that discomfort, that anxiety, it’s a signal that it’s important on some level and it’s something that should be respected and paid attention to rather than, oh, I’m anxious, how dare I be anxious? And then the criticism and the judgment and then it’s like slippery slope.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. Yeah. It’s so interesting to me how so many of us, it’s easier to pretend to be someone than ourselves. Not just for actors, but all of us.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Whether you’re playing a performance at work in a persona or a persona with your friends, and it’s so hard to just let go of that.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Persona. And it’s almost like when I speak to comedians, they’re always like, yeah, I just feel everyone just wants me to be funny all the time.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And they just feel that constant pressure on friends, family, everything, and they just want to be normal and have a bad day or whatever it may be. And, you know, everyone feels that pressure to perform in a certain way.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And it’s almost like we’re waiting for the person we can take off the outfit around and just kind of let go.

The Universal Experience of Imposter Syndrome

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I remember my mom talking to me about this years ago, and she was a high school teacher at the time. And I said, oh, I’m nervous about this, that, and the other, and being on a set and a producer and this. And she goes, it’s the same in any environment. You go, she was me as the teacher. Okay, well, the principal is the producer, and my students are the audience or, you know, and my work colleagues or the other cast members.

And in any line of work, you’re faced with this. It’s this sort of a human experience that you can’t escape. And she talked about the same thing, about kind of understanding that and accepting that. It always is a challenge. It’s always a navigation of sorts. And rather than looking at it as my experience is unique and special to everyone else’s and has more pressure than yours or this, that, and the other, that’s the trapping, you know, as soon as you kind of understand it is more common than uncommon. I think there’s some comfort in that.

Like, I remember listening to Anthony Hopkins and Cate Blanchett, you know, people I’d worked with and admired and looked up to, talking about, you know, imposter syndrome and this might be my last job, and thinking, really. But there was deep truth in that. You know, they still had that doubt, but aware of the fact that maybe that doubt was a good thing because it kept you humble, it kept you motivated, it kept you pushing forward and searching as opposed to thinking you need thinking. You have all the answers, you know, and then there’s a sort of, and there’s a lack of humility here.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, well, you’ve talked about that as well, right? You’ve talked about that idea of fearing, saying no.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Because what if it all disappears? And when I read that you said that, I was like, wow. Like that. You just wouldn’t expect that. But we have these codings from whether when we were young or wherever we picked them up, where there’s like a sense of, like, oh, well, this could all just go away.

Growing Up with Financial Stress

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, we’re growing for the house. You know, loving, beautiful household and great parents, but we had no money. And I remember the kind of financial burden that was on my parents and overhearing conversations about bills and, you know, them borrowing money from our grandparents or their parents to, you know, before payday came on every Thursday, or, you know, the $20 we might have had in our piggy bank kind of saying, can we borrow that? We’ll give it to you next week.

And not that they ever put that on us by any means and probably tried to shelter us from that and but being very aware of it. So I felt that responsibility and that need to remove that pressure for them from a very early age and but still this crazy, irrational thought that, well, it’s going to run out or it’s going to be taken away and I won’t be able to do that thing.

It’s like, well, you’ve already done that thing. You know, they’re all taken care of. Family, cousins, friends, you know, and not to say my career couldn’t end tomorrow, but financially that wouldn’t be a concern due to kind of what we’ve put in place. And it’s, I don’t know, it’s irrational, it’s illogical. But again, I think it, I don’t know, it’s sort of, I don’t mind a little bit of that just to keep you hungry.

But it has to be tempered, like all of it, because the insanity of too much of that thinking is incredibly detrimental. And you never enjoy what you have because it’s always about, I need to get more, there’s not enough, or what else can I do, I do to secure this even more? And it’s this obsession with safety I think we all have and the need for abundance and security.

But then I look at my own childhood where I couldn’t have felt more secure and safe. And so money isn’t the answer to that, yet you sort of trick yourself into thinking it is. And whether that’s from societal sort of understandings and expectations and the sort of our relationship to money as human beings and how we signal or represent safety and comfort in the wrong spaces, maybe, but it’s a constant navigation, isn’t it?

Money Doesn’t Equal Safety

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it’s almost like what you’re talking about is the power of pattern. It’s almost like when you’ve had a thought that’s been practiced. So you, with you giving the examples of like, oh, we’re going to borrow this money here and we’ll pay back next week. And so you’re constantly living in a cycle of, we don’t have enough, we’re going to have to figure it out. And that doesn’t disappear when an external situation changes.

You can all relate to that. I mean, I can relate to it in my life too. And what I love about what you said the most was, it’s not about, I think everyone over, and I don’t, I don’t like it when anyone says this whole money can’t buy happiness stuff because, like, well, it solves a lot of problems for a lot of people. And I don’t think that’s the point, but I love what you just said about this safety idea, that you felt safe growing up and it wasn’t because of that.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And I think that’s an even more powerful truth where it’s like, wait a minute, what about if it was about safety and we all want to feel safe and secure? I felt very safe and secure because my, I’ve always described it as my mom’s love was like this protective shield where I never grew up ever questioning whether I was lovable or not.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: My mom loved me so much and that makes me feel very safe. And that wasn’t because we had money growing up and it wasn’t because we always knew what was coming next. It was because you felt loved and you felt safe and secure because of that, for sure. And so there are certain problems that money solves and it’s not safety.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And it can provide and help for that, but safety is a more core emotional need.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: That comes from other things.

Money, Love, and Raising Kids with Abundance

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: That’s another thing I was talking to my mum about—the fact that the lessons I learned and the person I am, my brothers, who we are, you know, growing up in that household, we didn’t have money. Well, now my kids, we have money. What’s that going to do to them? Are they going to not learn the same lessons that we’ve had and have the same sense of gratitude and appreciation for things?

And she said you could look at households that had a lot of money, households that had little money, and you could pick about the same amount of successful stories versus unsuccessful. And at the end of the day, it comes down to love, security. Do I feel like I’m connected and part of this household and appreciated and that I’m safe to explore who I am as an individual or not?

You know, regardless of the exterior environment, the larger environmental, superficial elements of it, it’s around those core components of love and connection. And that always gives me comfort, you know, when I’m sitting here thinking I’m destroying my kids, like having this big house and abundance and all this and so on. But it’s always a complex one to navigate in any space, I guess.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it’s true, though. I think it’s what you’ve been saying this whole conversation already is that you keep talking about how everything’s somewhat of a gift and a curse.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And it is that. Right. Like everything is like—and as soon as you accept that everything’s binary.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And there is no black or white.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: It is all gray.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And it is all teaching people to see the gray and see the nuance and see the complexity and recognizing that complexity is simplicity in the sense of as soon as you accept that it is all of it.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Then all of a sudden it’s simple. Whereas when you’re trying to find a definitive right way of doing it, it’s pretty impossible to find it. And you can rack your brain forever.

The Polarity of Grief and Love

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: It is. And the thing you’re searching for only exists because of the thing you’re not searching for. Like the polarity of things and it’s the, you know, there’s no north without a south. There’s not a one-sided mountain. You only know love because you know grief.

And I had this—a friend of mine passed away recently and I had the normal response of grief and anguish and pain and the why and the questions. And then through that, all of a sudden this lightness and this stillness because all the trivial things that I was ruminating around day to day all of a sudden dissipated.

And it was like, wow, it’s that simple. It can be gone in a second. And I wouldn’t know one without the other. And so the grief is as much a blessing as the love is and the joy because they coexist. You know, there isn’t an individual experience. You can’t have one without the other.

And that for me, I find helps navigate the complicated spaces of life. And these moments of adversity is kind of you realizing that they’re one and the same thing. And I don’t do that. I don’t exist there all the time. But every now and then I feel like I get a glimpse of it and there’s a quiet peacefulness to it. You know, it’s like the louder it gets, all of a sudden things just stop. Alan Watts talks a lot about that. I love his philosophy around what he presents in that way.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. I’m sorry for your loss.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, I mean it’s, you know, it was a sort of out of nowhere kind of tragic tragedy as, you know, we all experience at some point. But I just remember having that moment, that very odd sort of lightness in amongst the grief which let me pause for a moment and consider where that came from and where that stems from and what that message is.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah. Your grief is only as deep as your love. You don’t feel grief about something like that. Well, there’s probably—because you didn’t care. It didn’t have that love and care. But yeah, it’s not that that’s easy to recognize in the moment or pause. But when you get that access, it’s something worth holding onto.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. And that was to try to reconcile the dichotomy around those two feelings, you know, that the—I almost then followed as guilt that I wasn’t feeling as sad as I was a moment ago. And it’s like, what is this complex kind of push and pull between those two states? And it’s like—I don’t know, living in the questions rather than needing the answers to it all the time. The answers of trying to define the definitive why to something and the absolute certainty of something is just like a danger and a trapping.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah. For sure. For sure. Yeah. And we—we will just—and the funny thing is, even if you get a perfect right answer, you still won’t be satisfied with it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Because then you’re like, wait a minute. If I look at it from this angle, you know, and it’s fascinating how the human mind wants completion.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, yeah.

JAY SHETTY: But still keeps locating all the incomplete loops.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Absolutely.

JAY SHETTY: To get lost in.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: It’s like the only certainty is uncertainty. You know, the only constant is inconstant. Like, yeah. It does a number on you, for sure. It’s like, I don’t know, when you’re a kid, you’re kind of lying awake at night thinking about how big the universe is or what happens when we die. And then nothing. And then like—oh, it’s like your brain arrives at a place of nothingness, you know, and that’s as terrifying as it is kind of liberating.

The Gift of Brothers in the Industry

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. Does it help to have brothers in the industry too? Because, I mean, that’s rare.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: That, you know, all of you have got incredible careers and it’s like, how does that—is it helpful to be able to share some of these challenges? Or do you find that that’s not really the case?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: No, it is, definitely. Yeah. There’s a point of reference or a camaraderie, for sure. And a support network between the three of us. You’re in your quieter moments of reflection. You can kind of go, is this normal? Am I kind of, you know, wrong to feel this, that and the other? And what’s your experience in that? And so, absolutely, having someone who is a complete safe house for those discussions is a real benefit.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it’s really powerful. I feel like that’s the hardest thing for most artists or athletes or people who go and live otherworldly lives. And then it’s almost like you have all your best friends back home or the people you grew up with.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And you need them because they’re the only ones who remind you of where you started and where it came from. But they don’t understand the new world that you deal with. And so you kind of have this version of it where they can reconcile with you the challenges. It’s not like, oh, well, Chris, you’re rich and famous. It doesn’t matter.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: It’s like they’re like, oh, no, those things are still real.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And you still experience imposter syndrome and you still experience anxiety. And they can vouch for that because they probably go through the same thing.

Traveling with Your Team: The Power of True Friendship

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Oh, for sure. I mean, I feel very lucky to have them in the same space. But I’d say the thing that has had the biggest effect on me is the team of people I get to work with, which is from my, you know, the hair and makeup team, my costume guy that I travel with, my assistant, my trainer. That group I’ve known for about 14 years. My assistant, my trainer I’ve known for 35 years, that I went to school with. They’re my two best mates.

And to have the five or six of us travel together is—I thought it was quite common. Why wouldn’t you bring along your mates and have the same people with you? And the amount of people I’ve met in the highest of positions that live this isolated, lonely existence and don’t have true friendships around and groups of people who remind them who they are really, and remind them also—there’s a grounding quality to that. I thought it’s such a tragedy.

They give this abundance of opportunity and this, you know, one in a million chance to participate in this journey where you get to travel and you’re dealing with all this experience and activation and interaction with the world on a level that, you know, most of us wouldn’t get to experience. Yet you’re doing it alone. You have no one to share it with.

And I think that’s the—about the social connection. It’s like it’s only as good as the people standing either side of you that get to walk that journey with you. Because there’s times when you become a little jaded about it. There’s times when it becomes a little normal, times when it becomes boring and have someone to shake you and go, “Hey, this is pretty cool. Remember where we came from. Remember what we could be doing. Remember what we used to do” is incredibly invigorating.

And I find myself, the thing I’m most grateful for, I think, in my career is having those core people with me constantly.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. How do you define a real friend?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Someone you can laugh with and who you can laugh at each other and it’s not offensive or it can be, and that’s okay. Someone you can really push it too far with and they’re going to go, “I’ll let that one slide. I’ll get you next time.” A true friend who keeps you humble, I think, keeps you grounded.

The obvious things to say, but, you know, through thick and thin, they’re still standing there next to you. And whether it was all to be taken, if it all got taken away, they’d still be there having a laugh, patting you on the back, saying, “Well, we’ll give it a shot.” And I’ve got a lot of those people in my life I’m very thankful for.

The Art of Australian Banter

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, I love that. It’s definitely—British banter is a big thing. But I got to learn that Australian banter’s as strong, if not better as well. Because when I was touring in—when I toured Australia two years back and we did three shows at the Sydney Opera House, we did Melbourne and Brisbane and I have lots of moments in my show where I bring people up on stage and we’re going through all sorts of experiments and activities and every single person would banter back.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: There was no one who’s letting me get away with a joke at their expense.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And I was like, this is amazing. It was so much fun. Everyone was so fast. The quips were great.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. It’s good. There’s a good self-deprecating quality.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. Yeah. And I love that too. I feel like, you know, I have a WhatsApp group with all my best mates back in London and all we do is just roast each other all day long, whether someone posts something on social media or sends this video out, whatever it is. And I think that that’s such a good test of friendship.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Oh, for sure.

JAY SHETTY: And when we—when me and my wife’s from London, too, when we moved to America, me and my wife roast each other just as you would roast one of your boys. And everyone on my team would just think we were having a massive argument because they just weren’t used to it. So they thought we hated each other.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: It’s our love language.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. We were like, no, this is, you know. Yeah, it’s not passive aggressive.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: This is.

JAY SHETTY: This is just how it works. Yeah.

The Power of True Friendship

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I think that there was a study done recently, and I don’t know where I read it, but talking about that, it is a sign of true friendship that you can roast each other and give each other shit. And it’s a sign that there is a trust there, because you don’t—I wouldn’t speak this way to someone that I didn’t know that well and didn’t trust that it was going to go okay with. It’d be, yeah, I’m in trouble.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, the worst. The worst was when I first moved to LA and I was learning about getting a stylist and all this kind of stuff. And my friends would just take terrible pictures of me off the red carpet. Keep putting them in the group. They’re like, “Why are you wearing a skirt? What are you doing?” I’m sure you’ve had a million of those.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Oh, for sure. Most of mine will send me pictures of, like, you know, certain sort of fashion sort of moments and looks, and it’s like, “Oh, it’s number seven.” You know, the hand on the air and the scratch above the head and—and you kind of—I find myself doing those shoots and then stopping myself because three or four guys back home are going to see it and tell me about it, rather than the vast majority of people who might not think twice about it.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love that. And you need that.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: You need that for sure.

JAY SHETTY: I think about it all the time. Every time my hairstylist tries a new hairstyle, whatever it is, I’m like, yeah, all right. I know who’s going to send me a picture of this tomorrow.

A Father’s Alzheimer’s Diagnosis

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it was—I’m so grateful that I got to see the documentary because I went through a really—and I share this because of how powerful it was for me to watch it. And so my greatest spiritual mentor, who I grew up around in London, he passed away during the pandemic and I couldn’t go back to his funeral. I was stuck in the United States. And he was based in London.

And I just remember finding out it was almost like everything changed for him and changed for us in, like a night. It felt that way, at least when we became aware. Watching your experience with your father was so beautiful because it was all the—I was like, people are going to watch this and they’re going to know what to do. And that is such a beautiful thing to give people. It’s such a gift to give to people.

Because I didn’t know, because I’d never been through—I’d never seen anyone publicly go through it. So when I watched it, and I can’t wait for everyone who’s listening and watching right now to watch it too, because it gave me a real resolve to be like, yeah, this is going to help people. It’s going to help a lot of people.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Right.

JAY SHETTY: And I wanted to ask you about that. Your father obviously got diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. It’s like, what was that like the day you found out? Like, what—how did—well, how did you even notice it before the day you found out, did you start to notice things?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, yeah, it’s funny. I remember in the first season of Limitless and Peter Attia, yeah, I did a bunch of blood work and, you know, looking at my genetics, and the plan was on camera, he was going to tell me about, you know, what I had a predisposition to and what I had a vulnerability to, what my strengths were and so on.

And he said, “Oh, I don’t want to do this on camera. I got to talk to you about something.” And I thought, oh, God, what is this? You know? And Darren Aronofsky called me and said, “Peter wants to call you.” And I got really nervous about what he was going to tell me.

And he said, “You’ve got two copies of the APOE4 gene, which you get a copy from each parent. A 2 is not too bad, a 3 is a little worse. The 4 is the worst one and you’ve got 2.” And basically, I think 1% of the population has two copies of these genes, and it puts you in a high risk category for Alzheimer’s. It’s not a predeterministic gene. It’s just an indication that you have a greater vulnerability to Alzheimer’s.

He told me that. And I was like a moment of sort of shock, a moment of what does mean? And then about 15 minutes later, I was like, something old people get. Whatever. I told my parents about it and I remember my dad saying, “Oh, look, don’t worry about, we’ll figure it out. That’s, you know.” And I was like, yeah, I’m not concerned, it’s just a strange thing to be told.

And he was like, “It’s fine, mate, you know, plenty of time, we’ll figure out what you need to do to prevent it,” and so on. And I remember vividly that conversation of him sort of telling me not to be concerned about it.

And then about two or three years later, my mom saying to me, “I think we’ve got to get dad checked, because there’s these signs and things I’m concerned about”—the obvious one’s memory and sort of slight mood changes and shifts and forgetfulness and so on.

So he went and got tested and found out he had two copies of the APOE4, as did my mum, which—so if you’ve got 1% of the population is APOE4, I don’t know what the math is on—

JAY SHETTY: Finding each other.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Finding each other. So then by default, me, Luke and Liam all have two copies of APOE4. So this sort of anomaly of genetics combinations.

But my dad, I was immediately hit with the reality of what that meant for him, because I had just gone through a, “Ah, it’s a long way down the track, don’t worry, push it aside.” Then all of a sudden it was right in front of—and it was incredibly confronting.

But again, I think the “we’ll figure it out” mentality was still very prominent. And then as it began to get worse, it became a real sort of shaking into the moment and a real sort of shock to the system and, “Oh, wow, this sort of everything we thought was solid and true and consistent was going to dramatically change and shift.”

Creating the Documentary

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. And then we—I remember when I was looking at doing another episode for that series, the discussion around would I do something around brain health with my dad? And my first instinct was I just spent a lot of the press tour for the previous show trying to tell people that I didn’t have Alzheimer’s. And, you know, and I said, “Ah, I don’t want to go through that, but I also don’t want to exploit or feel like I’m in any way putting him in an uncomfortable position or exploiting this kind of condition and how’s it going to make him feel?”

And I spoke to him about it and he was like, “Oh, absolutely, yeah, no, let’s, you know, maybe this will help shed some light on the issue and people will benefit from it and we might learn something along the way.” And off we went in that direction.

But there was a huge amount of grace and humility in his attitude to it. You know, he says it in the documentary, but his biggest concern was being a burden. And that was heartbreaking to hear and consider.

And I had never even up until we shot the documentary, I didn’t know even how he felt about it because I hadn’t asked him. And I felt this strange mix of sort of guilt while shooting, as well as concern for his condition, but guilt that I had an arcist prior. Now I’m doing it on camera. And so it was this strange sort of orchestration of events.

But what came out of it and what wasn’t planned was this beautiful connection that my dad and I were able to have in this beautiful discussion that we probably wouldn’t have had otherwise.

And someone who had just seen it recently, he said, “I’m about at the same—you know, I got diagnosed a few years ago. I’m in the same space as your dad’s in.” And he said, “I wish my kids could see this documentary. I hope they see it because there’s so much stigma around it. They don’t know what to say. They don’t even talk to me about it. They don’t ask me how I’m feeling about it. They don’t ask me am I afraid? Am I concerned? What am I concerned about? They just sort of talk to me about the footy, or they talk to me about, you know, work.”

And that was sort of a beautiful moment of realization. I was there with my dad, and I said, “This is hopefully what, you know, this is going to do for people. Is it motivate people into reaching out and removing the sort of awkwardness around the uncomfortable conversations and actually reaching out to people and allowing each other to be vulnerable. Allowing each other to talk about their fears and their concerns and help navigate it together, as opposed to, again, having blinkers on and sort of burying our heads in the sand, you know?”

Breaking the Stigma

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. I feel like this is, you know, it’s almost—it’s such a big thing, and it’s such a hard thing that it’s hard to be like, “Oh, when we’ve had hard things happen in the family before we talk about it.” This is different to that. Even though everyone’s an adult now, your family and everyone’s grown up, it’s a difficult conversation to have. And have you as a family always had open conversations and emotional conversations and difficult conversations, or has there not really been a need to have one?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: No, we have, but there hasn’t been a need as—as, I guess, as important as this one. You know, it wasn’t as personal. Like, we’ve obviously had, you know, people die and situations occur and things that we were all, you know, confronting and the, you know, human experience or tragedy and so on, but it wasn’t as in front of us as this was.

And the interesting, the complex thing about, I think, dementia and Alzheimer’s is it’s when the signs first start to show, they’re very subtle. So you still sort of think, “Oh, we can manage this,” you know, and then it gets over time a little worse. And depending on the regression, you know, some people it happens in six months and they’re sort of vegetable catatonic state, whereas—and there’s some people, it’s a slower regression.

And so again, there’s an easy option to sort of ignore those subtle changes. And I think this experience made it far more prominent for all of us than we had to pay attention to it.

And even my mom had said, you know, my dad did the interview. She’s like, “I’ve never even heard him talk like that. I didn’t even know he felt that. I didn’t know he was experiencing that.” And because he didn’t want to put that burden upon someone else.

And so, yeah, I guess I’m thankful for the opportunity to embark on this sort of journey with him. And as far as the documentary went, because it ignited something in, I think, all of us in my family to be a lot more proactive and a lot more present and—and a lot more connected because, you know, we’re watching sort of memories disappear in front of us.

Witnessing the Decline

JAY SHETTY: The first time you’re going through it, you like—and same as my experience, like before the pandemic, before he did pass away, I would go back to see him.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And every time I’d go back, I’d notice, especially because I was living in LA. So every time I’d go back, I’d notice big changes than the people who were with him every day. And it was like I go back maybe every four months to see him or whatever it was.

And it’s like the first time he’d still remember my name, but he’d forget that I was there after like 10 minutes and then say hello again. And then the next time I’d go, he’d remember my name, but then he’d only—he’d forget me every 30 seconds or whatever it was. And then, you know, you just—I saw that decline because I wasn’t with him every day.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: How long between when he was—oh my God.

JAY SHETTY: Diagnosed maybe like I think I’d have to check the exact time, but maybe like three to four years.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Wow.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, like three to four.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s—it’s my—the same time my dad was diagnosed. The—a friend of ours was diagnosed and my dad’s actually in a remarkable position compared to a friend of ours who can barely speak and that glazed vague look of sort of confusion 24/7.

My dad is the short term memory, you know, and it’s—the older memories are still very strong and evident. He can sit here and recognize people, but there’s some repetition now occurring more than there was. But you know, I’m thankful that it’s hasn’t happened as fast as a lot of instances, you know.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, it was about probably four, maybe even five years ago, you know.

Reminiscence Therapy and Rebuilding Childhood Memories

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, that’s beautiful to watch you go back to your childhood. Hope like rebuilt, redesigned. And when everyone watches it, they’ll know what I mean when I say that. But it’s such a special thing to do. I can’t imagine what it felt like for him and for you to even go back there as a grown adult because he was an adult when he was there last.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: You know, it was reminiscence therapy is what it was called. Basically stimulating old memories in the hippocampus and triggering memories that held a great amount of larger emotional responses. So whether it be exhilarating, exciting, nerve-wracking, those intense memories to stimulate those via looking at old photographs, talking to old friends from the past, discussing things that happened in the past.

What we did was a very elaborate, supercharged version. We had a film crew with us and a production and they basically took the house that we grew up in and stripped all the furniture out and somehow sourced furniture and posters and DVD players and whatever that we had as kids and set the house up the way it was when we lived there.

And it was beyond sort of comprehension that when I first walked in I was struggling to sort of articulate how I felt about it because my brain didn’t know what to do with it. And it was remarkable. Sort of seeing my dad sort of come to life in moments and it trigger all of his other memories. And then my mum going through the house and it triggering a different experience for her. You know, it reminded her of the passage of time and the memory she had then. But the memories we may not have, you know, in a few years time of it is disappearing. But it was, yeah, a pretty wild experience.

Making Memories That Matter

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it just fully takes you back. I imagine that while you’re doing this, because you’re doing the supercharged version, there’s a sense of, I wonder how your thoughts on making memories has changed. Because we say that as humans, like, oh, we should make memories, let’s make memories, but I don’t know if we really think about it as profoundly as you do when you’re faced with not knowing how many more you can make and how many of the past. So how has your thought process on the idea of making memories been impacted?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I think my time that I spend with him now is a lot simpler than I would have thought would have attempted in the past. I thought it had to be a bigger experience. We had to do something, you know, incredibly memorable. And I’ve realized now that the greatest moments are just sitting there, being with him and seeing him, having someone listen to him and see him, having someone see him and pay attention.

And watching him through this, even this documentary, all of a sudden he had agency in something again. And not just because of certainly having Alzheimer’s. The awareness around I’m losing control and I can’t sort of lead the pack or be in charge of this space. I’m very much a passenger or maybe a patient, but also that thing that happens at a certain age.

And I’ve watched my parents the last kind of ten years, the transition of, wow, they’ve been the authority and now they’re looking to us and what that does to the ego. And it takes a great amount of grace and humility to go, oh, I now have to seek support where I used to lead the way. And I don’t have the answer to that. And now, you know, my kids may be the authority on a lot of these subjects. You know, even though we thought we were, you know, all through our egoic, youthful times, but that sort of transition.

And so for him that was really, you know, I looked at that making the documentary as, I thought I was very thankful for watching him. And a lot of the crew said this. Wow. As the days went on, he really sort of took charge and felt like he was in the driver’s seat again. And I think that’s really important for people to remember is to still give them some agency. And still, as much as there is a lack of control, but I don’t know, allowing them to embody some authority and narrative on their life as opposed to, like, now you just have to sit in this space and have your hand out.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah. You think you’re helping, but actually you’re hurting.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. It’s like you, and I try and, you know, I ask my dad questions I know the answers to, but just, I know he’ll feel like he has, hopefully he doesn’t hear this because he’ll forget it anyway, but, you know, I’ll ask him things just to sort of stimulate some, again, agency and authority in his thinking.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, I mean, it must have been pretty amazing to see him ride a motorcycle. Like, that’s pretty impressive. When I saw that, I was like, wow, that must feel great for him to get, because he used to be a, you know, it just, to me, that also must feel like some agency for him to still be so active in that way.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, and that’s the thing I think I’m most scared for for him, and I think probably he is, is there’ll come a time when he won’t be able to do those things. And at the moment, you know, I mean, he still races in historic races with old Harleys and different bikes and things. And, you know, we’ll blitz the pack and young blokes will rock up on their bikes. And he used to go. And they’ll go, whoa, who is this guy? And he ends up on the podium a lot of the times in these. An incredible rider still.

But I don’t know at what point that will occur. But that, for me, brings me great concern, you know, as it does for him as well, because it will be the, I think, the most obvious representation of the lack of agency and that you’re taking a real backseat to things, you know?

Discovering His Father’s Vulnerability

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, well, no, hearing you talk about is just genuinely so, as hard as it is for you and obviously for your family, and even just hearing you say how hard it was to make a documentary about something so personal, I definitely think that even hearing you talk about it today, I’m like, this is helping people. Because I feel like there’s so many, it’s not talked about enough, and there are so many families that go through it.

And like you said, it’s so easy to pretend like it’s not happening or try and just tell that person what actually happened, because that’s what our logical brain does. And what did you learn about your dad through this experience only that you wish you’d learned sooner or understood earlier?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: My dad had, certainly has always been my hero. You know, he’s represented such nobility and integrity and compassion and strength and a great, deep, profound sense of justice and injustice and right and wrong, and has been very present and vocal about situations like that. You know, he worked in child protection and taking care of the most vulnerable of us and being children, you know, and there were big shoes to fill.

But I think what I didn’t realize watching this documentary was that he had all the same fears and concerns that I had or I have. And he isn’t unshakable and unmovable and he’s human. And watching him be vulnerable and express concern and fear about things made me love him on an even deeper level. You know, it’s like, oh, wow, the walls came down.

And I don’t think he was presenting those walls out of avoidance, but there wasn’t, he wasn’t as, not emotionally invaluable, but he wouldn’t let you see that side of him as much. And now there’s this gentler, sort of open, vulnerable side which that I wasn’t aware of as much as before. And I think that I’m very thankful for that. It’s quite beautiful.

So watching his interviews, which I wasn’t present for, but the master interviews that I watched after and thought, oh my God, I had no idea that those were the things he was considering, but also the sense of humor he had with it and the humility and the sort of self-deprecating sort of nature that he had even in discussing the most difficult things, you know.

JAY SHETTY: It must be really special that you have all those tapes.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, absolutely. I had, I think you said this at the start of our chat, but he had a friend of mine say, because I was really concerned about doing this. And even through it and even after we’d finished, I was talking to the director, I was like, oh, it’s just a good thing if I, you know, again, I don’t want to feel like this is exploiting any of this.

And he said, you know, I lost my father really suddenly and never had a chance to have these conversations. And the fact that you’ve been able to have this experience and force these conversations out of one another, what a gift. And then so many people who were at the screening, the premiere a few weeks ago said, I wish I had done this or I am now, I’m going to do this. I’m now going to reach out to my parents or that loved one or friend that I hadn’t said these things to because it was just a reminder of the fleeting nature and of all of it, you know.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, well, that’s what’s amazing about it, that it doesn’t have to be all.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, you’re not.

JAY SHETTY: It’s just about having time and space to reconnect and see your parents for who they are and who they didn’t show you because they were protecting you and who they didn’t want to or they weren’t ready to. And it’s hard because we all have, everyone has different relationships with their parents and everything, but there’s something beautiful about being able to just sit there and see them and them being them, allowing you.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Because even, like, making the documentary was like, on one hand, I sort of, you know, we’re out to sort of understand Alzheimer’s or dementia and find the fix, find the silver bullet. You know, looking to reminiscence therapy, looking to different medications, looking different modalities and approaches on how to handle it.

And then by the end of it, it was exactly that. It was like, oh, wow, this is about connection. This is universal to all of our experience. This isn’t just about Alzheimer’s. This is about supporting one another and being there for one another and being part of a family and a community and that interconnected nature of all of it, as opposed to one lane with dementia, Alzheimer’s, cognitive health. It was about love and support and connection.

And that, for me, was the biggest takeaway, I think, you know, or equally as sort of beneficial. The connection with my dad was about what it meant universally to all of my relationships.

Finding Pride in Meaningful Work

JAY SHETTY: What did you learn about yourself that you weren’t aware of or that you hadn’t come across before?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I felt just that I was doing something right. I think, I know that sounds kind of strange, but I had so much doubt and criticism and concern about it. And then I was sitting at the premiere and my dad kept, like, holding my hand and just never done that, you know, and he was both emotional and laughing, and I thought, oh, wow, this is like, out of all the things I’ve done and things I’ve put on screen and the things I’ve made, this feels profoundly important and deeply personal, but special and unique to probably anything I’ll ever do again.

And I don’t know a little bit of what we’re saying before, but I don’t walk around thinking I’ve sort of, I am the thing. I guess I try and present of having figured it out and having this sort of, you know, being entirely in control of things. I have more doubt than, you know, or as much doubt as anyone, or more doubt than anyone. I don’t know. But I have a lot of inner criticism and so on.

And this, I don’t know, I felt a real lift in that and I felt like there was plenty. There are plenty more opportunities or should be to do things that have a deeper message and can resonate on a larger scale and they can mean something. It doesn’t just have to be purely entertainment. It doesn’t just have to be. It can have a deeper message, you know.

And I don’t know, I cut myself some slack. I guess I got a sense of sort of pride that I hadn’t felt before.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, I love hearing that. I’m glad you finally, you know, giving yourself some.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: And I’m not saying I’m kind of, you know, disapproving of everything I’ve done and, you know, but I don’t know, it resonated on a different level to me.

Learning from Presence and Connection

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, I think that’s real. I think it’s real. I think that’s—they just feed different things, right, in the same ways that you can make something purely entertaining that makes people have the best time and laugh and whatever it is, making something that personal.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, there’s—

JAY SHETTY: There’s nothing like it. Like, I’m sure it was almost more gratifying watching your dad watch himself. 100%. It was ever seeing any of your movies. Because that’s how we’re designed. Like, yeah, I feel like we’re wired for generosity as humans and we’re wired for that connection. So it’s, you know, when you’re seeing that person that you love watch themselves. Yeah, it’s way better than seeing yourself on a screen.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: He was sitting next to me and I spent as much time looking to him as I did at the screen. And at the end of the film, something he said to me—my first ever film, I spent a small part in Star Trek. And he flew in for the premiere in LA with my mum. And at the end of the film, he grabbed me, kissed me on the top of the head and he goes, “You were the best in your row.”

And every single film I’ve done, he’s like, “You were the best in your row. You were the best in your class,” type thing. And it’s this, like, his way of saying, you know, and then he would go in and give it the greatest sort of summary of it all. But then I leant over to him and I said, “You’re the best in your row.” And he goes, “Yeah, not as bad as I thought it was going to be.” Just, again, this wicked sense of humor about it.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, no, he comes across—I mean, yeah, obviously I’ve never met your dad, but, like, he comes across, like, so lovable, so charming, so endearing. Like just, you know, just a great dad. Like, he definitely, like, you know, he should know that.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Human.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. A good, good, like, good people. Good, good human. And there’s that beautiful picture that almost the whole documentary is kind of centered around of, you know, you and your dad. And I was wondering if you would go back to that younger self in that picture, what would you say to that younger self?

Advice to a Younger Self

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I don’t know. I’d be cautious to say anything because it’s all—it’s worked out pretty well, you know, the slightly older version of that kid. I’d say it’s going to be okay in those sort of worrisome nights that I would kind of spin my wheels on one subject or another and be full of concern and anxiety and regret and guilt and all this kind of strange concoction of emotions.

I don’t know why, but I would like to appease and remove some of that, if I could, to my younger self by saying, “Don’t worry. Just trust in the process and go with the flow a little more.” But then again, as I said, I wouldn’t change anything, so I don’t want to see myself off the path.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. It’s like almost if you went back and did that, then you wouldn’t be doing what you’re doing today.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I want the same outcome, but I want it to be less challenging.

JAY SHETTY: Isn’t that all of us? That’s so funny that that’s literally it. It’s like, that’s—that would—that is everyone’s desire in life.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: It’s almost like—

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Never the case. It’s—or even this—even you making this documentary. It was uncomfortable.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And now you’re sitting back, reflecting, going, “I’m really proud of it. It made me feel good, you know, sitting with my dad,” like. But it was an uncomfortable journey of, “Do I make it? Do I not? Is it—how’s it going to look?” And so it’s such a—the discomfort to joy path, it’s so real for all humans.

Embracing Adversity and Growth

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: And I don’t know how many times you tell yourself the adversity is what builds the strength. Whether it’s in the gym or whether it’s emotional experiences, it’s like, you’ll be better for this afterwards. Always. Yet each time like, “Oh, why? Why me? Why again? Why is this happening? How can I avoid this? How can I?” You know?

And it’s like, it’s a—I don’t know whether you ever arrive at a place where you’re just completely on board with the suffering, the challenges of the adversity and you’re like—but then if you did, then it wouldn’t be suffering. So then you’re not learning anything.

JAY SHETTY: Like, then you’re not working out. Then you’re not actually going through it.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Oh, I’m okay with this because it’s not hurting enough.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, exactly.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Give me an extra 10 reps. Yeah. Okay. There it is.

JAY SHETTY: It’s like when you’ve been in the cold plunge for seven minutes and now it’s not—yeah, you’ve just normalized. It doesn’t matter anymore. Just in there for the ego boost.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: So now it’s not doing anything. You need to do eight. It’s like, yeah.

JAY SHETTY: What do you think that younger self in that picture or even a bit older would say back to you?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I think they’d be like, “We’re going where?” You know, and have the—and I think that often about if my younger self knew what was in store or what was coming, they would be, you know, “We’re going to play a superhero. We’re going to play dress ups and we can travel the world and be in this crazy, crazy adventure with our friends.”

And I think they’d be—I think they’d be grateful. I think they’d be excited. I think they’d make sure I was enjoying it, you know, and not being caught up in the next one or the over calculation of it all, you know?

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it’s almost like that. It’s almost like living life from that perspective is the only worthy one. Because from that lens, you look at it and you go, “Oh, I’m grateful, I’m happy, I’m joyful.” And there’s some power in just looking back at your life from that younger self.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: For sure. Yeah. And they’d look up and go, “You’re doing a good job.”

JAY SHETTY: You know, they wouldn’t have the criticism.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. It’s like, who are you? You’re trying to better the situation for that younger version of yourself or the dream you had then or this sort of the thing you, you know, the sort of, the prior imagining of it all, you know, and yeah, and I’ve thought about that before. Like the younger self would be wildly impressed by it, you know, so—so should you.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: But you know, you’re like, yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Well, that’s the funny part, right? That, that, that younger self that’s still inside of us.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Is the part of us that doesn’t have the criticism and the judgment and the harsh words and just has like this childlike excitement and thrill and enthusiasm and it’s still there inside all of us. It’s just you don’t, you almost don’t let it breathe because you kind of treat it as like not as smart or not as intelligent, you know, I mean, that’s a—

Childlike Wonder in Performance

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: And that is what I chase all the time in a performance setting is like, how would the—what would my mindset be as a child in this situation? How vivid would my imagination be? How, you know, let it run wild? And every now and then I get a hold of that or I find myself in that state and it’s completely unencumbered with thought and the criticism and you’re like flying. You’re in the moment, you know.

And I had Downey, Robert Downey, say this to me once in a scene where I sort of improvise something and something happened and he comes up and he goes, “How do you feel?” I said, “I’m not cool. That was wrinkling.” He goes, “Happens like a couple of times in the career. He goes, grab a hold of it. Remember it?” And I was like, yeah, but what it was was that the non-judgmental, childlike version of herself, you know.

And I think to take that into all aspects of life, not just when I was in front of a camera, has been really important and has been a real lesson is to be more adventurous and inquisitive and curious and not so much outcome based, focused, you know, just be sort of moment to moment and allowing that sort of the cheekiness of children and the sort of, the slight rebellious sort of, you know, less concerned with the rules version of ourselves coming out.

Yeah, but like you said, you’re like, “Well, but then it’s, you know, that, that’s, it’s inconsistent with how the adult version should behave and that’s irresponsible and so on.” It’s like, doesn’t matter. I don’t know anyone getting hurt. No. Yeah, we’ll carry on.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. I think there’s a big difference between being childlike and childish.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, that’s, yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And we don’t often know the difference.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And so we pressure down or suppress our childlike self.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Because we—we’re scared we might get childish. And it’s the intelligent self sees the childish partners or whatever.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: But it’s the childlike self that we know exists and has that power. There’s this—when I’m doing workshops, I have this thing called the 30 circles test. It’s basically an A4 piece of paper with 30 circles on it. And I’ll do this with executives across the world and big companies and all the rest of it. And I’ll say, “You’ve got 30 seconds to uniquely complete 30 circles.” That’s the only instruction they get. And they all have a pencil.

So everyone starts scribbling. There’s a timer, and then the time starts going down. And then I go, “5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Time’s up.” Some of them keep scribbling like, you know, trying to get some more time in. And then they stop. And I ask them what they’ve done.

And the top five answers are always—someone wrote the numbers 1 to 30 in every circle. The second answer is, people wrote A to Z. And then ABCD. And then people do squiggles, people do emojis and little smiley faces, sad faces, footballs, pizzas, all that kind of stuff. And that’s pretty much it. And these are like the smartest executives, CMOs, CEOs, whatever, of all the big Fortune 500 companies and all the rest of it.

And then I’ve done the same thing with kids and with 10-year-olds usually. And I learned this from the person who built the 30 circles test. And the kids just come up with these amazing things. So this one boy, he put a line around it, put a little sign on top, and then put lines on the circles. And when I asked him what it was, he said it was a bag of tennis balls. And because he plays tennis.

And then there’s this other girl who—she did all this intricate line work, like straight lines on each piece and different things. And when I asked her what it was, she said it was a bird’s eye view of a chessboard. And—and because she—she loves playing chess.

And then my favorite one, I always remember this one. There’s this little girl who did intricate circles and curves and all this kind of stuff and asked what it was. She held the paper like this. She goes, “It’s bubble wrap.” And it was just like this really, like childlike, you know. And you never get an adult doing any of them. No, because we just hear 30 seconds. 30 seconds, get the job done.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And you get, you get these kids who just have this little bit of freedom still where they haven’t got trained to shut that out.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: But we haven’t deeply embedded our neural pathways around ideas and expectations and the assumption around the right and the wrong. The mind is wide open at that point and yeah, I think we all can do with a heavy dose of getting back to that time of our life.

Family and Lessons from Children

JAY SHETTY: You’ve been married for 15 years now?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, right?

JAY SHETTY: Something like that, yeah, yeah, yeah, 15 years. And—and you’ve got three wonderful children. You know, it’s like—and how old are the eldest now?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: My daughter’s 13.

JAY SHETTY: India. Right?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, you’re right.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah. So she’s 13. Yeah. What would you say your kids have taught you that you didn’t anticipate they would?

The Lessons of Parenthood

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I’d like to say they taught me patience. They’re attempting to teach me patience, you know, because I don’t know that I’ve figured it out. I mean, you talk about the ways you kind of can be in control and be in authority in spaces and have it all figured out, and then that door opens and it’s just chaos. And it’s like I’m failing at every single component of this.

Again, the importance of time and things that I thought were going to bring great joy and the things that I was going to provide and give comfort, security. It’s far simpler than that. It’s attention. You know, they want your presence, they want your space, they want your focus. And we over complicate it so often with attempts at sort of more extravagant experiences and things, and yet they just want your time, you know.

And that for me has been terrifying at times, realizing how quick it’s gone, you know, and I think I’ll get to that. And then a year goes by and I’ve done a couple of films or whatever and gone, “Oh, wow. Which part of their brief childhood have I missed?” And so they’ve taught me a greater awareness around the importance of this moment because their personalities change every second and every day and every week and every month.

And you kind of—you’re mourning a version of that child every month because they’re gone. You know, you look at the three year old and you think, “Oh, wow, this is it. And can’t wait till they’re out there in nappies and doing this.” And then all of a sudden they’re four and five and they’re out in nappies and you’ve put the stroller away. You’re like, “Oh God, I wish I had that version back.”

And then so you’re constantly saying goodbye to little versions of these people and so just pay attention, just be here, be present. And they don’t care about the things, the sort of larger achievements and you know, an award or a big film or this and that and the other, you know, they do momentarily. “Oh, it’s cool, whatever,” gone. They just want you there. And that’s comforting, I find, because the pressure you put on yourself about those, you know, more superficial sort of accomplishments and things are important on one hand, but not as important as just being there.

The Secret to 15 Years Together

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah. What’s been the key to 15 years together?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Having fun, I think, you know, both having a sort of an adventurous spirit, making time for one another. I think the complicated times have been when it’s been all work, all kids and all of a sudden the “us” in the relationship is sort of non-existent. You know, you’re just kind of managing a household or the work family schedule and Elsa will be off on work and then I’ll be off from work and then it’s chaos at kids and the kid time.

And so sort of removing ourselves from all of that and just having time for the two of us and making space for each other rather than the rest of the world. That can be so all consuming, you know.

JAY SHETTY: That must be so hard though, right, with your schedule?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, it is, it is. I think it’s harder sort of for anyone really. You know, it’s all relative and we—yeah, it’s challenging, but we also have opportunity to make it work. We have no excuse as far as how much time we can make for each other due to the support we can get situation.

So yeah, just making each other laugh, you know, just kind of—because it’s so—there’s so much over sort of focus on these kind of the importance and the intense sort of things and the big decisions and then it’s the same with the kids. It’s the stuff that really resonates and when you really get along and you really kind of feel like you’re just here in this space is when there’s humor involved, when there’s adventure, when there’s curiosity, when there’s openness to kind of make a fool of yourself and self deprecation and all that.

I think that’s what you can hold. There’s always that spark and that attraction. But what it comes down to is friendship, companionship at the end. And the moment you run out of things to talk about and you lack that curiosity and interest in one another is, you know, that’s what’s concerning. And that’s a—you know, you’ve got to keep digging, you know.

Sort of again, coming to some arrival or insisting on a sort of finite conclusion to it is there’s a finish line. Then, you know, and to understand, you don’t entirely ever know each other, and you’ll continue to try and figure it out. And as you’re trying to figure—as you’re trying to have a greater understanding of yourself as well in that experience, I think is important to keep at the front of your thinking.

It allows you to forgive each other. It allows you to be more compassionate with each other, allows you to have greater understandings for both your shortcomings. And the things we might—the lesser versions of ourselves that we might think of. Yeah. I think it’s that that, you know, has kept us in check.

The Beauty of Not Knowing Each Other Completely

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. I love the part of you saying when you still don’t know each other. That’s, I think, such a beautiful thing if you still believe there’s more to know about this person.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: That you see every day.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And live with. And you still believe, “No, there’s more to know. I don’t know them fully.”

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And that keeps it fresh and new and exciting because there’s an acceptance. Whereas as soon as you think, “Oh, I know them.”

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And I know their habits and I can kind of predict everything they do.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And there is a part of that, and that’s a helpful thing. “Oh, I know when they’re tired and I know when they need space, and I know when they’re hungry or hangry or whatever it may be.”

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And that’s helpful. Of course it is. But then it’s also the acceptance of, “I actually don’t know them because they’re changing and they’re growing, and I haven’t seen the mother version or the mother of three or the mother—” You know, there’s all these iterations that we almost think, “Well, no, people stay the same.”

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. Yeah. And it is. And it’s having a sort of allowance for that and a bit of compassion around, you know, do we ever even know ourselves entirely? You know, how could we ever entirely know somebody else? But you have to keep reminding yourself to be curious and to sort of embody the humility to go, “Oh, I don’t entirely understand or know that but that’s okay. I don’t have to. I don’t have to entirely—”

You know, there’s sort of a pattern recognition, and you have your expectations and so on, but having a little more openness to and curiosity, enthusiasm to understand what is it that makes you tick today versus tomorrow versus yesterday, you know, as opposed to thinking, “I know all of your tricks. You know all of mine.”

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: It takes away the sort of presumption, I guess, that we have around each other, which is, you know, is often cause for complication, I think. You know, “I know why you did that. I know why you’re going to do this.” I don’t know. It’s just—then comes the eye roll and the contempt, and then you’re down to dangerous passage, you know?

JAY SHETTY: If Elsa was here sitting right next to you right now, what would she tell me about you that would surprise me?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I don’t know. I don’t know.

JAY SHETTY: I’m going to have to ask her.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: You have to ask her.

JAY SHETTY: I’m going to have to ask her.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I love seeing their interviews. I’m like, “Why’d you tell them that? That’s not true. Is that really what you think?”

JAY SHETTY: That’s the best. Does she do that? Does she react to it?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Oh, yeah. You know, good ways. And then ways I’m like, “That’s not true. I don’t know.”

Talking to Kids About Alzheimer’s

JAY SHETTY: Have you had to—have you had the conversation with your kids about their granddad’s Alzheimer’s? Walk me through that part. How do you explain it? How does that conversation go?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, it’s been really interesting because they’re the—they’re the biggest kind of lessons and the most sort of profound sort of shifts in our sort of our growth, I think, as individuals, is around confronting moments. And it was very important for me to have them understand what was happening and articulate what this meant and also what it meant for me, you know.

Rather than, I guess, protect or, you know, avoid that situation for them or that discomfort, I was kind of—it was very important. And so when I would talk to them about it, initially, they were like, “Okay, what does that mean?” “Yep, he’s going to forget his memories.” “Okay.” And then they’d go and see him, and they’d go, “Ah, Daddy’s fine.” Yes.

And then they would come to me and go, “Oh, he asked me this three times.” And I said, “Well, this is what it is. And now you might have to look after me one day. And this is what we do. This is family. This is the importance of this connection, the support we have for one another, and having compassion for vulnerable, challenging times.”

And they’ve been great with it. They have big hearts, my kids. I’m so thankful for that. And there is an abundance of sort of compassion there. And they’re like, “Okay, cool. What do you need from us?” “Yeah, okay, cool.” And they’ll rally, go around, and they’ll ask dad questions and things and talk about old memories and things I’ve talked about with them. And then they’ll also be little maniacs, not care about any of it on other occasions. But for the most part, they’ve been really good.

And my son, one of my boys, actually, at the screening, was really emotional, and it really kind of—I was really surprised. And then he was in the car on the way home, got really upset. He said, “I just love Craigie so much.” And I said, “Well, he’s still here. Make sure you tell him.” And he said, “I am. I want to go around there more, and I want to have more barbecues and ride motorbikes with him.”

And it was this great kind of, I think, sort of awakening for him. It was real, but until he saw the documentary, it wasn’t as real. And his brother, who isn’t probably as articulate with these sort of emotions, was—it was still affecting him, you know, and both were—and he was sort of agreeing, “Yep, yep, let’s go and be with him more, and let’s, you know, let’s make the most of this opportunity.”

JAY SHETTY: So, yeah, that must have been an amazing scene, their reaction to it as well.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, it was. It was. And it was—I wasn’t even focusing on it, you know, it was—I was sort of right there with my dad, and at the end of it, they were there and in the car on the way home talking, and I thought, “Oh, wow.” I was sort of focused on this moment, but now this is the next generation, you know, coming. And that sort of the—the transference from one to the other, and the experience that my dad had and passed to me and now I passed to my kids.

The Power of Storytelling and Celebration

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, it’s—it’s also the power of just media and storytelling in a way that if we could all personalize in a world where you’re not a movie star and you’re not making a documentary. And it’s almost like I went to two friends’ 70th birthday parties this year, and I’ve not known them—I’ve known them both separately. Two different people. And I’ve probably known them both for maybe the last 10 years, if that. So I’ve not known them for 60 years of their life. I’ve got to know them in the last 10.

And these birthday parties were filled with people they’ve known for, you know, nearly 70 years. And it was old friends and, of course, their kids and grandkids and families and, you know, there weren’t huge parties, but they were—they were big in that there were lots of very close people there. Teachers and, you know, business partners and just—just everyone.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: And—

JAY SHETTY: And it was so beautiful. It was—it was such a special thing to attend as someone who’s not 70 years old and go, “Wow, what an incredible life these two people have lived. How amazing it is to see them celebrate it and how—” And they’re not movie stars and how amazing it is for their families to have made media about them.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: So whether it’s like a little homemade video of their highlight reel for 70 years or whether it’s messages from over the years, and I was just like, the power. And it’s like, I’ve only known them for the last 10 years, but I’m like weeping at these videos. And I haven’t even been there for that long, like, compared to everyone else in the room. But there’s a power to that and how connected we feel when you see someone’s story being told.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And it makes you wonder how much more we can all do that for our families and the people we love. Even if it’s not on a big, you know, you’re not going to a premiere or anything like that. But how much of a need there is for celebrating people at milestones.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. For sure.

JAY SHETTY: And kind of taking a moment to create storytelling around them so other people can appreciate them better.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah. It is. It’s, I think, the most important thing to see one another and to be seen and to recognize in others the beauty and what they have represented, what they have given you. We don’t often, you know, I mean, at the milestones, the parties and the birthdays and so on, we might offer that up, but I don’t think we do it enough.

And it’s incredibly important because without that recognition from someone else, we don’t really know kind of our effect on the world. We don’t really, you know, we can assume and think this or that, but for the most part, it’s a sort of imagined experience. And the actuality of it, the reality of it, when someone else taps you on the shoulder and says, “Hey, this is incredibly important what you’ve done, and this is incredibly memorable and have this incredible, amazing, profound effect to me. What you said this one time.”

We don’t. Yeah, we. I don’t think we’re as comfortable saying it, but we don’t sort of do it as often as we should. Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. And, yeah, it’s a good. It’s this. This is definitely a good reminder of that.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, for sure.

JAY SHETTY: To see it and for everyone to recognize that you can do your own version of it. That’s kind of what I was. The whole time I was watching, I was just like, yeah, I wish I did that with my mentor, and I wish we got the opportunity. And in a good way. Not in a painful way, in an excitement.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Everyone else who. And, you know, doing it with my mom. I remember a few years ago, I interviewed my mom, not on the podcast, but just over dinner, and it was my sister’s 30th birthday. We’d gone away together. It’s me and my mum and my younger sister, and we just. I just interviewed my mum over dinner. It was one of my favorite things I’ve ever done because I learned so much about her.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: That she’d never told me. She’s 70 now, or she was at that point. And it just. It was so special just to ask her some questions that she would never tell me the story about or she wouldn’t. She never makes her life sound exciting or different or special. And then you get into. And you go, oh, my God, your life is all of those things. And. Yeah. Just. Yeah. What a beautiful thing to give people the right vocabulary. I wonder, with everything you’ve been saying, what’s something that you want to get better as a man?

Slowing Down and Being Present

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I want to slow down a bit. You know, I feel like that I have been sort of chasing something for so long and achieving something and arriving at a point and then quickly replacing it with something else. And it’s afforded me an incredible life and I’ve achieved some wonderful things, but it’s. I would love to take pause and take stock in kind of this moment more.

And it’s not to say I don’t want to keep working and achieving things, but I want to be less kind of focused on the outcome of it and just be there for the experience and be there for the joy and the thrill and the adventure and have a greater curiosity around it without being consumed with the “what if it goes wrong?” portion of things. But it’s a strange thing because as we’ve discussed a few times, well, can you have one without the other?

But I, you know, I have. This has made me slow down a lot, you know, with my dad recently, and I’m looking at next year and I have films to do, but I’ve turned down a lot of things just so I can be here with him more and more, because I know I’m not going to get 10 years down the track and go, “I’m glad I did those extra three or four films.” I’m going to say, “I wish I spent more time with him and with my mum,” you know, and with my brothers and my wife, my kids and family and friends.

And because it’s, you know, you wake up and 10 years has gone by, it’s like. It’s been fun, but a lot of it feels like a sort of a blurred Polaroid photograph. I’m like, I just kind of remember that, you know, and that it was sort of all consuming and so busy in such intensity and such high emotions and such sort of big risk, big reward, big payoffs, big loss. And that’s fun and there’s a sort of excitement to that, but I find sometimes there’s just pure exhaustion as well. And I just would like to kind of reset a bit and recharge and have a greater amount of sort of stillness and not want so much from a situation, just kind of just be here.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: You know.

JAY SHETTY: Is that why coming back here was so important instead of being in LA as well?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, definitely, definitely. And it was right when I had kids, we were in LA and we had a big beautiful house there, but it just didn’t feel like home and it was chaotic and every time I’d leave the house, I was reminded of work and reminded of what I was doing or what I wasn’t doing. And that was documented by paparazzi and then plastered across various news outlets and so on. And it wasn’t fulfilling on a sort of personal soul level. It didn’t feel nourishing at all.

And we came back here just for a holiday, but in a sort of a subtle attempt from me to sort of convince my wife to move here. And it wasn’t. It wasn’t a hard sell moment. No, it wasn’t a hard sell at all. She was instantly like, “Oh, this will do. This is pretty special.”

The Impact on His Mother

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. Is your dad’s transition most hardest on your mum? Do you see that?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: For sure. Yeah, that’s the one that has become really complicated because it’s sort of. What’s scary is she has the same two copies they proe for. I think there’s a high probability of women getting it as opposed to men. So she’s in an even higher risk category. And the stress and the concern that she carries is incredibly dangerous and detrimental to her health.

And so my brothers and I, you know, big attempt to sort of offload that as much as we can. And also watching, you know, you don’t want to be in a sort of romantic, loving relationship and then one have to be a carer, one have to be a patient. It’s such a tragedy. And I think at times that’s where the roles have been assigned and there’s good days and bad days, but I think not being able to do the things that they used to do and not having the same connection and the same conversations that they used to have.

And that there’s a beautiful connection and love there, but there isn’t the same depth to some of the conversations and interactions they have now. There isn’t the same support and, you know, obviously no one’s fault, just there’s sort of an inability or an incapacity to be there and provide that now because the memory isn’t as strong as it was and the short term things are rapidly sort of declining.

So, yeah, we’re sort of trying to implement a lot of things currently for her health and for his, but also trying to allow there to be some autonomy in my mum’s life as well, and a bit of agency in her space so she doesn’t have to feel like she is the carer.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah. It’s such a strange one, isn’t it? It’s like you’re caring for the person who’s actually unwell.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: And caring for the person who’s caring for the person who’s unwell.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Who often gets forgotten sometimes.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Peter Attia said it to me when my dad was first diagnosed. He said, “How’s your mum?” I said, “Oh, yeah, she’s fine. Yeah.” He goes, “She’s the one I’d be concerned about,” you know, because your dad, you know, we can slow the regression of Alzheimer’s sometimes. We’re yet to sort of reverse it, but once it starts, that’s the path you’re on.

He said, “Your mom isn’t there yet. It doesn’t have sort of cognitive decline. But,” he goes, “but this is the environment where it will promote that is the stress and the sleepless nights, the increase in cortisol and that anxiety and concern.” He said, “All of those are like, that’s the environment for her to now sort of be forced down that path.”

So he said, “We’ve got to pay attention there.” And that was a beautiful reminder from him. And he said it a number of times. I came in contact with him a lot and says, “How’s your mum doing? How’s your mum doing?” Yeah, she’s definitely a big focus.

Final Five

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, love that. Chris, it’s been such a joy talking to you.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Thank you. You too.

JAY SHETTY: Truly, just. It’s beautiful feeling let into someone’s life and heart in this way, because it’s. It just, you know, puts so much into perspective for all of us to hear. You kind of be so vulnerable and so open. It can’t be easy. And of course, seeing the documentary, you just see how much you’re letting everyone in.

And we end every episode with a final five. These questions have to be answered in one sentence maximum. Often we go off piece because I get enthusiastic and excited. But, Chris Hemsworth, these are your final five. We ask these to everyone on the show, or at least a few of these. So question number one, Chris, what’s the best advice you’ve ever received?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Best advice I’ve received. I remember being asked this when I was doing Home and Away, this soap opera many years ago, and my answer was, “Be kind.” And I remember the journalist at the time mocking me and saying, “Oh, it’s like something you read on a teddy bear or whatever.”

But that advice that was given to me by my mum is just be kind to people, be compassionate, has stayed true and been my North Star through everything I’ve ever done. And in its simplicity, there’s some profound wisdom to it. Be kind to yourself, be kind to others. It’s about, as, you know, if we embody just that one thing, I think we’ll do okay.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, I love that. Second question. What is the worst advice you ever heard or received?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I don’t know. Ask me what I was afraid of and what makes me nervous. This.

JAY SHETTY: I love that.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: What were all those tricks I was trying to. Yeah, it was a good anxiety Chris.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, exactly.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: The worst advice I’ve had on many occasions. Just one more drink, one more beer.

JAY SHETTY: It doesn’t work out.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Doesn’t work out. It’s always the worst idea. The one more was always the problem.

JAY SHETTY: You know, it leads to overweight Thor.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: It leads overweight Thor, it leads to confused Thor. Get Paul Thor. Catastrophic Thor.

JAY SHETTY: I love it. Question number three. What do you believe makes a good dad?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Someone who truly embodies the things they’re trying to bestow upon you. Someone who truly represents those virtues that they’re trying to teach you rather than talking about it. Their behavior represents that. And that has been my dad. His actions spoke a lot louder than his words and he didn’t necessarily speak in sort of poetic one liners that were memorable.

It was his. The way he walked into a room and the way he treated people, the way he behaved and held himself and took care of people and was compassionate that and he was true to his word and honest and still is and holds a beautiful amount of integrity and love and yeah, someone who models their behavior honestly.

JAY SHETTY: Question number four. What do you believe makes a good son?

The Responsibility of Being a Good Son

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Being in not just a state of receivership, but also giving back, you know. And I remember when my dad’s father passed away, I was in LA and he called me and I said, “Oh, sorry about your dad.” And I remember him getting choked up and on the other end of the call kind of thinking, oh wow, he’s crying. I hadn’t really seen him cry, I don’t think ever.

And I was sort of listening and okay, how are you? All right. And then he started talking and we changed the subjects and we went. And afterwards, maybe a year later, I thought, God, I wasn’t there for him.

And then as time went on, realizing how important it was for me also to show, give recognition and how important he was rather than just him taking care of me, realizing I had a part to play. And so what makes it a good son is also the recognition that you have a position and a place to hold in this relationship. And it isn’t just to be taken care of, it’s also to share that responsibility and take care of one another. It’s a convoluted answer.

JAY SHETTY: Beautiful. I feel like we’re living at a time where roles are so hard to understand and undefined and it’s so beautiful to just have like a North Star of like, as simple as it is to have like, yeah, your dad’s a good dad. Someone who’s true to his words and lives by example. That’s a beautiful, simple thing that we can all try to aspire to live towards as opposed to, you know, complex ideas.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I remember having a friend of mine’s dad who was very well read and you know, would quote various philosophy and psychologists and things and it was like, oh wow, that’s a really interesting, that’s a great thing. And I would take it, but he didn’t embody any of it, you know.

As the years went on, I was like, ah, it’s all talk, you know, it’s not action. And just to sort of reiterate what I was saying before, it’s, you know, it’s one thing to sort of be able to spout off wisdom and quotes and so on, but it’s like, do you truly, when push comes to shove, is that what you’re representing or not? Yeah, I’m trying to avoid the next question.

The Final Five: Creating a Universal Law

JAY SHETTY: We’re on question. Oh, we did question four. We’re on question five. This is it. This is the one that I told you I, right at the top of the show that you’ve been thinking about the whole time. Chris, the fifth question that we ask to every guest who’s ever been on the show. And by the way, everyone knows these questions and no one ever prepares for it, so don’t worry. Fifth and final question. If you could create one law that everyone in the world had to follow, what would it be?

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: To have a three day work week or four day, maybe to work less, you know. And I think we would have, I would think we would work harder and more efficiently when we do. And their entire life wouldn’t be around productivity and work, work, work, work, work. It would be about hopefully more enjoyable experiences, you know.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I mean, and the weekends are beautiful and needed and wanted and waited for with such anticipation because we’ve worked. Yes. But I think a day or two less would be universally beneficial.

JAY SHETTY: I have no idea how humans signed up to a five day work week. Can you imagine when that got instated, how everyone just goes, yeah, we’re going to, I don’t know how we did it.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: No.

JAY SHETTY: Like I don’t know how we ever agreed going, yeah, we’re all going to work five days a week.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: No.

JAY SHETTY: And in some cases six. In some places across the world, like six, seven people are working and maybe church on Sunday.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Mental fatigue and the physical fatigue. And now with phones and all the other ways we’re sort of, you know.

JAY SHETTY: Now it’s 24 hours. Right.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: There is no, there is no switching off down. Brutal.

JAY SHETTY: Yeah, yeah, that’s a good law.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I hope you get rid of phones.

JAY SHETTY: Maybe one day when you’re, when you’re prime minister or you know, that’s right. In state, four day work with three day work Australia. And then you can figure out, you know, how it goes.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Yeah, yeah, let us know. Test it. Yeah, yeah.

JAY SHETTY: Chris, it’s been such a joy. Honor to talk to you.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Thank you.

JAY SHETTY: Really wonderful getting to know you on such a deep level. Thank you for being so open, vulnerable, and so grateful that you’re sharing your and your dad’s journey and your family’s journey with us.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: I appreciate your time, mate. Thank you very much.

JAY SHETTY: It was definitely worth coming 24 hours.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Thank you.

JAY SHETTY: It was amazing. Thank you. Thank you.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Thank you very much.

JAY SHETTY: Appreciate it. Awesome, man. Thank you so much.

CHRIS HEMSWORTH: Thank you.

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