“Thor” actor Chris Hemsworth has been very busy in recent years — but he plans to take fewer roles in the future due to the results of some genetic tests he had done late last year.
Hemsworth, 39, underwent a series of tests for his National Geographic and Disney+ docuseries “Limitless” — and learned that because he had inherited two copies of the APOE4 gene (one each from his mother and his father), he was at greater risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease than most people.
According to a report published Sunday at entertainment site Page Six, a source close to the Australian actor said that after he wraps his current projects — which include a Hulk Hogan biopic and his next appearance as Thor in the Marvel Cinematic Universe — he plans to slow down and make the most of his time with family while his kids are still young.
Hemsworth himself hinted at such a move in a Vanity Fair interview published last November, just a short time after he had learned the results of the genetic tests.
“Doing an episode on death and facing your own mortality made me go, ‘Oh God, I’m not ready to go yet.’ I want to sit and be in this space with a greater sense of stillness and gratitude,” Hemsworth explained at the time. “And then you start talking about kids and family and going, ‘Oh my God, they’re getting older, they’re growing up and I keep slapping another movie on top of another movie.’ Before you know it, they’re 18 and they’ve moved out of house, and I missed the window.”
“It really triggered something in me to want to take some time off. And since we finished the show, I’ve been completing the things I was already contracted to do. Now when I finish this tour this week, I’m going home and I’m going to have a good chunk of time off and just simplify. Be with the kids, be with my wife,” he said.
Hemsworth made sure to drive home the point that he had not been given a hard diagnosis of the progressive condition — only that he had been told he had a higher-than-normal chance of developing the disease later in life.