Taron Egerton is speaking candidly about what it really took to achieve his dramatically lean physique for Apex — and he says the process was much harsher than audiences might assume.
During the Monday, August 10, episode of Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert podcast, the 36-year-old actor reflected on the pressure male performers can face when their bodies become part of a movie’s image.
Egerton admitted that even he sometimes compares himself to the extremely fit version audiences see on screen.
“Every day I punish myself for not looking like that,” Egerton said of his appearance in Apex. But he quickly added an important reality check: “The truth of the matter is that I starved myself.”
“I was running myself absolutely ragged to get there,” he continued.
For Egerton, the experience has changed the way he thinks about highly polished Hollywood physiques. He recalled advice from a friend who encouraged him to “smash” the idealized version of himself rather than spend his life trying to live up to it.
Egerton said that perspective has been “a tremendous help,” especially as he continues navigating an often complicated relationship with his own appearance.
The Pressure Didn’t End When Filming Did
The actor also acknowledged that body-image struggles have affected him during other physically demanding roles.
Egerton said he experienced periods of intense self-criticism while filming shirtless scenes for both Apex and 2014’s Kingsman: The Secret Service.
“I couldn’t enjoy it at the time because I’d completely lost any distorted sense of perspective,” he explained.
Looking back, however, Egerton seems determined not to give those feelings more power than they deserve.
“Also, it ain’t that deep,” he said. “You bounce back, you carry on. It’s fine. It’s just what it is, you know?”
His comments offer a reminder that the bodies viewers see in movies can represent a very specific moment created for a role — not necessarily a healthy or sustainable everyday standard.
Taking on a Darker Role in Apex
In Apex, which was released on Netflix in April, Egerton stars opposite Charlize Theron.
Theron plays a grieving woman who finds herself being hunted in the Australian wilderness by Ben, a serial killer portrayed by Egerton.
The actor previously told Netflix’s Tudum that the intensity of the character was one of the things that attracted him to the project.
“The extremity of the role really appealed to me,” Egerton said, describing Ben as “just about the most fucked-up character I’ve ever played.”
Although the character is deeply disturbing, Egerton said he believes effective villains still need some recognizable humanity.
“With good villains, there’s always a part of you that empathizes, or at least recognizes their humanity or how broken they are,” he explained.
Egerton stressed that he would never excuse his character’s actions, but said the story provides enough clues to show that Ben is also an extremely damaged person.
Egerton Wants to Keep Changing Lanes
Apex is another shift for an actor who has repeatedly moved between very different kinds of roles.
Along with the Kingsman movies, Egerton recently starred in Netflix’s 2024 thriller Carry-On, playing a TSA agent who is forced to help a mysterious passenger get a dangerous package aboard a plane.
Egerton said he admires actors who regularly change direction instead of becoming associated with only one type of character.
After the broader success of Carry-On, he specifically wanted his next work to challenge the image audiences might have formed of him.
“The actors I most admire often change lanes a lot,” he told Tudum.
With Apex, Egerton appears to have done exactly that — both through one of his darkest characters to date and through a physical transformation he now openly acknowledges came at a significant personal cost.
