Scarlett Johansson has revealed that she ate ‘rabbit food’ to get into shape for her new action movie Avengers Assemble.
Asked at a press conference for the Marvel adventure if she went on a special diet, the actress joked she ate ‘rabbit food’.
She said: ‘When you’re training you eat a lot of greens.’
The star plays the character of Natasha Romanoff, otherwise known as Black Widow, who has to team up with Iron Man (Robert Downey Jnr), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), The Incredible Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Captain America (Chris Evans) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) to defeat the evil Loki (Tom Hiddleston) in the new blockbuster.
She revealed that rehearsing for the fight sequences was gruelling.
Johansson said: ‘I think me, [Jeremy] Renner and Tom [Hiddleston] spent the most amount of time in the stunt gym. We had these huge, choreographed sequences which were intense.’
She added: ‘Certainly these stunts paid off.’
When quizzed about which fight move she preferred, the actress replied: ‘My favourite move is probably the thigh grip. The thigh master hold.’
The star also praised director Joss Whedon for celebrating ‘strong female characters’ in his movies.
She explained: ‘At one time Joss did meet up with us all individually and we did talk about my character’s life and her dad’s past and he didn’t say anything about my character’s gender.
‘I think Joss is gender blind. He wants his female characters to be dynamic, assured and competent and that has nothing to do with anything other than celebrating strong female characters. He’s just charming.’
Her co-star Mark Ruffalo, who makes his debut as Bruce Banner and his alter ego The Hulk in the new film, said he was stung by the mixed reception he had received online from fans.
He said: ‘I was overcome by a moment of very poor judgement earlier by going online and seeing the response to me coming in as the new Banner.
‘I won’t do that again. It wasn’t glowing and I found the fans exuberant passion to be very, very brutal. I hope we’ve amended that.’But the star said he was excited by the prospect of being the first actor to play both Banner and The Hulk.
‘I liked the idea of being able to bust out the big green rage machine.’
To film his scenes as The Hulk, he revealed that he wore a leotard in a studio that left him looking like a ‘Chinese checkers board’.He added: ‘I was by myself most of the time which was lonely in the leotard that makes all the wrong places look big and all the right places look small.’
Avengers Assemble is released in UK cinemas on April 26.
VIDEO: Check out the Avengers Assemble trailer
