Ricky Blanchard worked with the cast to get them in shape
Immortals is released this week on DVD and apart from being a great action film, it's filled with plenty of toned, ripped and fit actors and actresses.
Whilst some manage to stay in this shape all-year round not all have the time to stay in 'fighter fit' shape, so, they enlist the help of a personal trainer to make sure that the stars are ready for their close up.
Ricky Blanchard was on hand to help director, Tarsem Singh, create his vision which he saw in an image that he gave to Ricky to work from.
Henry Cavill, Luke Evans, Kellan Lutz these are just a few of the actors that Ricky worked with on set and it wasn't surprising that he was chosen for the job to get them film-ready after the work he done with Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler on Law Abiding Citizen.
"Jamie always wanted to make the workout fun. He would always play basketball then hit the gym, whereas Gerry loved the gym. Everything from kettlebells and gym rings, he would spend hours in there," explains Ricky.
For six weeks the actors worked relentlessly to get themselves in shape for the film.
"They were great, they worked together encouraging each other, thriving off one another. Everybody brought it," says Ricky.
Whilst he worked with all of the cast, both Freida Pinto and Isabel Lucas didn't need much help. He says that they are both in great shape anyway that they didn't need to spend much time changing their body shapes.
But Daniel Sharman, who played Ares needed to bulk up and quickly. "Nobody could leave any food around, he would eat everything in sight. He needed to gain as much weight as possible, he really needed to bulk up."
When I put the question to Ricky about whether or not the average person could take on a regime similar to this and change their body shape to something similar of the star Henry Cavill's, the response was immediate and definite: "Absolutely, people just need to remain disciplined."
Ricky sticks by his training philiosophy; "I believe that good health and well being is only achieved by bringing together what I like to call the five elements - exercise, diet, rest, stretch, stress and management - it's all about balance."
He explains that with six weeks to get these actors ready to shoot, he took on a different approach than he normally does. Using lots of functional exercises where we often worked in the aerobic zone, allowing for lots of movement, helping them to shred quicker.
"We worked using high intensity and high reps with very little rest time. The Super Stacking Way, and must say everyone 'Left it all at the gym' so to speak.
"This training method workout helps the entire body bring about results in a very short space of time which is perfect for onset training."
It wasn't just the training side that Ricky took care of, he also took full control of the actors diet plans. "I worked with catering day and night to make sure that the meals were correct, not only in portion but also in being balanced, and even ensuring that for most their six meals a day were catered for.
"Our huge table of supplements was also well maintained, making sure that we had all the necessary supplementation needed to continue the brutal training, from vitamins, to Nitric-oxide, proteing powders, BCAAs, pre/post workout supplement."
We'll next get to see Ricky's training work in Mirror Mirror: The Untold Adventures of Snow White were he worked with Julia Roberts and Lily Collins.
He shares the typical training day for the cast of Immortals:
9.00 am- Crossfit (1hour)
10.00 - 10:25am - shake break
10:30 – 12.00noon stunt training
12:15 –1:15pm Lunch
1:30pm - medicine ball toss, group warm up game.
2:00 - 3:00pm - Gym/fight choreography
3:00 - 3:30pm - Shake break
3:30 - 4:30 - Gym /fight choreography (switch groups)
4:30 - 5:00 - Stretch
Ricky Blanchard is the official personal trainer for Henry Cavill and the cast of Immortals, out now on Blu-Ray and DVD.
Femalefirst Taryn Davies