'The Avengers' enjoy benefits of teamwork - Chicago Sun-Times

BY CINDY PEARLMAN April 26, 2012 4:44PM

Updated: April 27, 2012 9:51PM

LOS ANGELES â€" Think of it as a surreal superhero dream. “You walked on the set and suddenly you were back in junior high school again,” says Chris Evans. “I looked to my left and there was Iron Man. I looked to my right, and there was Thor. Then I blinked really hard and thought, ‘Nah, that can’t be The Hulk?”

This scene wasn’t a 15-year-old fanboy’s dream. And it wasn’t a really great Halloween party in Hollywood, but something much bigger.

“Filming this summer’s ‘The Avengers’ was like going to the world’s coolest superhero sleepover camp,” says Evans, who incidentally is no slouch in the cape and tights department.

After all, he is Captain America.

Chris Hemsworth, who is Thor, thinks of it another way. As a kid, he would pretend to be Batman’s sidekick Robin. “I had a Robin costume. Why I wanted to be Batman’s sidekick, I don’t know.”

“It was a nice pair of green underwear, a yellow shirt and a red cape. I was only 7. The next day, I’d throw a towel around my neck and pretend to be Superman.

“Being Thor in a room full of other superheroes filming a major summer movie was so much better than what I did as a kid,” he says.

Are you on superhero overload yet? It takes a lot of Spandex to save the day in “The Avengers,” which opens Friday, the first film of the 2012 summer movie season. If there were an attendance roll call, it would go like this:

Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Thor (Chris Hemsworth) Captain America (Evans), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo). They’re under the guidance of team leader Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson).

The plot revolves around Thor’s evil, exiled brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston), who decides to attack Earth. Writer-director Joss Whedon’s script dictates that the stakes are high enough that a superhero team must unite.

Downey says that the film was all about “finding the right tone. You had to tip your hat to the fact that a group of superheroes were in a room, but not take it so seriously that you kill it.

“This is a comic book film, but you buy into the reality of it,” he says. “Joss did a great job finding everyone’s frequency. “

This included those with less than the right intentions.

For his part, baddie Hiddleston says, “I think there are no villains in this world. There are just misunderstood heroes. I, like Loki, have thought he was a hero, but his life didn’t work out as planned and he has a few issues.”

The film questions the true perils of being a superhero. It’s not the concussions or risk to life and limb.

“One of the themes is that it’s sort of solitary business being a superhero,” Evans says. “At the same time, these are very definite personalities, so the story also talks about some clashes within the group.”

Iron Man and Thor actually join forces, after a bit of tension.

“There’s a lot of action, and a little bit of discord at first, which makes it fun,” Evans says.

Hemsworth says that underneath there is a message that you can work â€" solo or in a group â€" for the greater good.

“I don’t want to sound hokey about it,” Hemsworth says. “But I love to do these movies with heightened realities. I love that we can be swept up in these fantasies with these larger-than-life heroes.”

“There is the possibility that someone is much more powerful than we are and greater. I think it’s inspiring to watch people who put themselves on the line and sacrifice their own safety for the greater good of others.”

Evans says that the first day on the set was for the greater good of fanboys and girls everywhere, including members of the cast.

“As I walked on the set, I looked at the call sheet because it was a scene where most of us were required to be there. I walked around the set thinking, ‘There’s Downey in his suit. He actually wakes up in the morning and puts on that suit.’

“As for Downey,” he says, “I just can’t say enough good things about the guy. He’s just the coolest. I think the pressure was off the rest of us because he was there.”

If it were a group of women, there would be tabloid reports of squabbling. Since this is a bunch of guys, there weren’t reports of anything more than some guys’ nights out at a watering hole for some of the cast.

“We all got along phenomenally well,” Evans says. “A lot of actors embellish how much fun they had on a specific film set, but this was a genuine summer camp experience.”

“It was just all of us hanging out in our costumes, which are amazing and crazy at the same time,” he says.

Hemsworth says the guys could commiserate on what it takes to look so super. “Before I did the first ‘Thor,’ I had never really lifted weights to that capacity. You don’t just have to live in the gym, but you have to force feed yourself.

“To become Thor again, I had to eat many chicken breasts, mounds of rice and many steaks â€" all very boring and plain. The eating was more exhausting than the working out.

“It’s not like we sat around this set eating hamburgers and pizza,” Hemsworth says.

As for some superhero lore, Hiddleston, who is 6-2, reveals, he did go up for the part of “Thor” for the 2011 film. “Just like every English-speaking actor over 6 feet who has blond hair, I went up for the part of Thor. But I’m not built like a house.”

“I couldn’t do what Chris has done,” he says. “It was always meant to be this way.”

Hemsworth says he did have to reacquaint himself with his Thor know-how. “There are thousands of comic books â€" 40 or 50 years worth,” he says. “I certainly could read enough to get a sense of Thor and his world.

“I also read some Norse mythology and this sort of fatalistic view that they have that everything’s preordained. That leads the Vikings into this fearless sort of attitude in battle and with their lives.

“They’re also not easily swayed,” he says.

“All that information is good, but then you get to the set and you just have to make it truthful. You think, ‘How do I play a powerful god?’ ”

Ruffalo says he wasn’t as deep about The Hulk. “I basically based my character entirely on my 10-year-old boy, who is a force of nature.”

Hemsworth says his definition of a hero begins at home. “Growing up, my parents were my heroes. I loved the way that my mom and dad conducted their lives.”

“My dad works in child protection,” Hemsworth says. “He has spent many years in that line of work. Now, that’s a real hero.”

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