One of Avengers: Endgame‘s most surprising scenes was certainly when Captain America returned to our timeline as an old man, revealing he has lived his life in another time with Peggy. And yes, this was indeed Chris Evans portraying the part, just with a whole bunch of makeup and CGI.
Ageing and de-ageing actors is becoming more and more common today so perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that they were able to pull this off so effectively. Speaking to EW, Anthony Russo commented on the process:
“Obviously, if it doesn’t work perfectly, it can undermine the emotional intention of the scene. We did a lot of practical effects, so it was a very elaborate makeup job that was then augmented with CG, because there’s certain things that you can’t do with makeup in order to make Cap credibly that age.
“You can’t shrink Chris Evans’ neck on set, you know what I mean? He’s still got that yoke neck. [CG helps] things that you can’t achieve, like the way the face drops. It’s a balance we want to always strike between making him feel credibly aged, but also not compromising the performance.”
Joe Russo also added that Cap’s voice wasn’t altered at all, this was Chris Evans performing. Anthony then said: “We always say this about Chris — he’s so technically sophisticated as an actor and you can see it in that scene when he plays an old man.”
Joe then added: “Everything you’re seeing is exactly his performance, just with his face aged. That’s it. We didn’t change anything about it.”
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Were you impressed with how authentic old Cap looked? Let us know in the comments below and on Twitter @flickeringmyth…
Avengers: Endgame stars Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man), Chris Evans (Captain America), Mark Ruffalo (Hulk), Chris Hemsworth (Thor), Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow), Jeremy Renner (Hawkeye), Josh Brolin (Thanos), Brie Larson (Captain Marvel), Paul Rudd (Scott Lang), Don Cheadle (War Machine), Karen Gillan (Nebula), Chadwick Boseman (Black Panther), Tom Holland (Spider-Man), Sebastian Stan (Winter Soldier), Anthony Mackie (Falcon), Elizabeth Olsen (Scarlet Witch), Benedict Cumberbatch (Doctor Strange), Danai Gurira (Okoye), Benedict Wong (Wong), Chris Pratt (Star-Lord), Zoe Saldana (Gamora), Dave Bautista (Drax), Bradley Cooper (Rocket), Vin Diesel (Groot), Karen Gillan (Nebula), Pom Klementieff (Mantis), Tom Hiddleston (Loki), Gwyneth Paltrow (Pepper Potts), Evangeline Lilly (The Wasp), Letitia Wright (Shuri) and Tessa Thompson (Valkyrie).
Originally published May 9, 2019. Updated May 10, 2019.
