‘Captain America: Civil War’: Paul Bettany Was ‘Probably at Risk of Getting Heat Stroke,’ According to the Russo Brothers
Superhero costumes look like a joy to wear, but they also look like they can get rather hot, especially while shooting outside. Paul Bettany, who plays Vision in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, has one of the more elaborate costumes combined with a cape and a large amount of makeup. According to the Russo brothers, Bettany almost suffered from heat stroke while shooting the airport scene in Captain America: Civil War.
The Avengers brawl in ‘Captain America: Civil War’
While technically not an Avengers movie, Captain America: Civil War brings together many of the MCU’s most prominent characters. After the government wants to regulate superheroes, Captain America (Chris Evans) can’t go along with it, leading to a rupture within the Avengers. This leads to an epic airport battle between the two factions: Team Cap and Team Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.)
The airport sequence features many iconic heroes clashing such as Ant-Man (Paul Rudd), Vision (Bettany), Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen), Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), War Machine (Don Cheadle), Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), Falcon (Anthony Mackie), Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan), and Spider-Man (Tom Holland).
Paul Bettany almost had heat stroke while filming ‘Captain America: Civil War,’ according to the Russo brothers
The Captain America: Civil War directors, Anthony and Joe Russo, recently had an interview with Vanity Fair, where they dissected the airport battle. The directors revealed that the scene was filmed on a hot day where the blacktop almost reached 128 degrees. Joe Russo said that they had to take a break after seeing how much Bettany was sweating from being in the Vision suit.
“There was a moment where we had Bettany on wires outside in that heat and that suit doesn’t have any seams in it,” Joe explained. “I think we were probably at risk of him getting heat stroke once or twice. I remember he lifted his arm once and a hole popped in one of the seams and it just started squirting sweat out. It was like a stream of water coming out of his suit and as I remember we just called ‘Cut!’ and we were like, ‘You gotta get out of that suit. You probably have three pounds of body weight in sweat inside your suit.’”
The excitement of filming the scene distracted everyone
The airport scene in Captain America: Civil War is a dream for any comic book fan, including the Russo brothers. Anthony stressed that safety is always a priority, but while filming such an iconic scene, the cast and crew can get distracted from what is important.
Anthony: “Safety is always the top concern but what happens is you get lost in the moment. Everybody was so excited to be shooting this scene. Every crew member is a massive fan of these characters and a massive fan of the comics. So, the opportunity to actually stage a scene like this on camera was so overwhelming to people. We had people on set that day crying when they saw everyone lined up.”
Joe: “Because they had read the books as a kid as we had and we probably had 30 people behind us all trying to get a peek of all of these characters running at each other.”
Captain America: Civil War is streaming on Disney+.
