Yesterday, the Daily Mail published photos of Russell Crowe in costume as Jor-El on the set of Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel, under the classy/awesome headline “Paunchy Russell Crowe suits up to play Superman’s dad (but can’t keep away from his own kryptonite… nicotine).”
That’s right, they’ve got pictures of Russell Crowe smoking cigarettes in his Superman costume. And they’re sublime, as all Disneyland-character-on-a-smoke-break pictures tend to be. Though I would argue the analogy that cigarettes are “his kryptonite” is flawed. If Russell Crowe was superman, his powers would mainly consist of being a big fat Australian, and cigarettes don’t detract from that. They’re more like an accessory. I’d call them his cape. He probably just finished a big meat pie and needed to blow off some steam. Also, I realize he’s not even that fat, but it’s fun to make fat jokes anyway. He actually looks pretty much like any aging Australian. Americans just get sort of bloated as they age, like Alec Baldwin or John Travolta. British dudes somehow just keep getting skinnier until the old version looks a like a skeleton wearing the young version’s skin like baggy clothes. Canadians don’t go through a physical transformation so much as go completely nuts, a la Aykroyd, Mike Myers, Jim Carrey… As you can see with Russell Crowe, Australians just turn into pot-bellied good-old boys. Look at him. He looks like he’s about to make a racist generalization. And you won’t hold be able to hold against him because he’s just too jolly.
I’m not sure what happens to Kiwis when they age. I don’t think many people make it past the age of 47 in New Zealand without killing themselves out of sheer boredom.
