Amy Sussman/Getty Brett Goldstein
Warning: The following contains spoilers for Thor: Love and Thunder.
Brett Goldstein wasn’t risking the wrath of the Marvel powers that be when it came to keeping his cameo in Thor: Love and Thunder under wraps — even where his own family was concerned.
The 42-year-old actor makes a surprise cameo as Hercules, the son of Russell Crowe‘s Zeus, during a mid-credits scene in the recently released superhero epic.
At an FYC event for his hit Apple TV+ series Ted Lasso in Los Angeles on Monday, Goldstein joked to Variety that he “didn’t tell anyone because Marvel put a chip in my neck that said, ‘If you talk about this, you’re dead.’ “
“My mom and dad, I sent them a text and said, ‘I’ve just seen Thor.’ I knew it’s not the kind of film they’d see. I said, ‘You should go see it. It’s funny,’ ” the Emmy winner recalled.
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Jasin Boland/Marvel Studios Natalie Portman and Chris Hemsworth in Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
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Goldstein said his mother texted him “all the way through the film” when she saw it, giving him a “running commentary.”
“It gets to the end bit, where it shows Russell Crowe. … My mom texts me ‘Russell Crowe’s in it again, he’s very funny.’ I go, ‘F—ing look up at the screen!’ ” he added.
The actor also said he isn’t “lying or being coy” when he says he knows “nothing” about the future of his character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. “All I know is what I did that day and that’s it. That could be it. It was a fun three seconds,” Goldstein told Variety.
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In Love and Thunder, Chris Hemsworth‘s Thor bests Zeus, who’s out for revenge in the mid-credits scene — and he is shown enlisting his son, Goldstein’s Hercules, to lead the charge.
And Goldstein’s mom and dad weren’t the only ones in the dark about him taking the role. As his Ted Lasso costar and real-life friend Hannah Waddingham recalled to Variety Monday, “He said to me, ‘I’ve been offered this thing … do you guys think I should do it?’ “
“I went, ‘Are you mental? Are you actually having a little bit of a moment? You’re seriously thinking that you might not play Hercules?’ ” said Waddingham, 47.
She added, “Then he didn’t tell me he bloody did it! So everyone was like ‘Brett Goldstein! Brett Goldstein!’ And I was like, ‘You cheeky bastard.’ “
Thor: Love and Thunder is in theaters now.
