Nicholas Galitzine is pulling back the curtain on what it took to be He-Man. The 31-year-old actor, who stars in the newly released film “Masters of the Universe,” opened up about his diet and workout routine in a new “Train Like” video for Men’s Health, offering a candid look at the physical demands of preparing for one of his most physically transformative roles to date.Galitzine previously described the film as the hardest thing he’s ever done, and the details he shared in the video make it easy to understand why.
Nicholas Galitzine’s workout routine for ‘Masters of the Universe’
Galitzin explained that his training changed significantly depending on where he was in the filming process. “My He-Man training was just doing different exercises every day after building all the muscle and mostly cutting it to maintain the muscle mass I had built,” he said.Fitting training into the shooting schedule was particularly difficult. “We’d cut the weights down to about 45 minutes, but we’d basically do at least an hour and a half of cardio every day. And fitting that into the shooting schedule was a really, really tricky thing,” he said. “So sometimes I’d have to shoot a scene and when we were changing set up, I’d run out and ride the assault bike for 10 to 15 minutes, run back in, shoot the rest of the scene, run out again. And I’d say that was mentally draining because you’re always on during a shooting day.”Since putting together the film, Galitzine revealed that his training has changed significantly. “I’ve been shooting a lot of other roles that don’t require me to be so big. I got a call from my next director three days after finishing He-Man saying, ‘Please stop working.’ So I miss my He-Man training a lot.”
The Diet Challenge Behind He-Man
The dietary requirements of the role were equally tough. Galitzine went from roughly 80 pounds to between 103 and 105 pounds before dropping down to around 91 pounds for the shoot. “When you’re bulking up it’s really hard to gain pure muscle without also gaining some fat,” he explained. “I definitely didn’t feel like myself at over 100 pounds.”At the peak of his weight, Galitzine consumed between 4,000 and 5,000 calories a day. “So many nights I’d get to about 10pm and still have my sixth meal to eat. And it’s not fun food. I wish it was fun food, but yeah, very disappointing,” he said.In the cutting phase, it was also difficult to find the right balance. “There was so little food. With a movie like this, where you’re doing a lot of stunt work, you need energy. Having more fat in my diet, cutting back on some carbs, basically we found the things that gave me the most joy. The light in the middle of the day was getting some dopamine from Coke Zero,” he admitted.“Masters of the Universe” is showing in theaters.
