Chris Evans is opening up about the critical panning of the Apple action comedy Ghosted and how his busy 2021 impacted his relationship and marriage to Alba Baptista.
The man behind Captain America spoke to GQ about his 20-year journey in Hollywood, entering and leaving the MCU and how he’s grappled with fame — and anxiety — for the magazine’s latest cover story, which was conducted ahead of the SAG-AFTRA strike.
After sharing what went into his decision to almost turn down the role of Captain America, as well as his ongoing anxiety issues — two topics he’s previously discussed with The Hollywood Reporter during a 2020 Awards Chatter conversation — The Avengers star reflected on the choices behind several of his starring roles.
For his upcoming film Red One, in which he stars alongside Dwayne Johnson, Lucy Liu, J.K. Simmons, Kiernan Shipka and more, Evans said he’s “just been looking for a Christmas movie my whole career.” But when it came to an already released project, Ghosted, the actor revealed that he signed up for the critically panned film because it asked “whether or not audiences have outgrown those types of films.”
“Ghosted to me felt like a movie that I grew up on, a movie that maybe we don’t see very much anymore,” he continued. “I didn’t think audiences had outgrown it prior, and I still don’t think they have, despite the fact, I mean, technically I think we did OK … in terms of viewership.”
Evans added that ultimately the movie’s biggest naysayers were critics who “didn’t like it,” but noted that “that’s more the fault of the movie as opposed to the appetite of the audience. I think the appetite’s there, if it’s done properly. We could have been better.”
The Gray Man star, who Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige credited as being one of the pillars — alongside Robert Downey Jr. — of the industry powerhouse the MCU has become, also spoke about not being on a film set in 2023 after a busy decade of back-to-back projects.
“I could just make furniture for nobody and be happy,” he said. “I don’t want to — I’ve got to frame this the right way. I was going to say, I don’t want to waste too much time in this industry, but that doesn’t really feel.… That doesn’t sound correct. I don’t want to occupy too much space in an industry that I’ve already poured 20 years into.”
Evans added, in an interview that was conducted while he and now wife Alba Baptista were still dating, that he’s been shifting how he approaches his career for a while.
“My girlfriend that I’ve had for a while, when we began dating, I was like: ‘Yeah, I do one movie a year. I try to never work now.’ And then, after like a few months of dating, boom, guess what? We’re living in Atlanta for a year. Get ready. And even when that year was happening, I was like, man, never again.”
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