There are black helicopters buzzing over Hollywood Boulevard. The LAPD has shut down traffic in both directions. Thousands of civilians are amassed on the sidewalk. If this were a comic- book movie, now would be the time when the sky opens up and the alien mothership comes swooping in, space guns blazing. But because its just the premiere of a comic-book movie Marvels Captain America: Civil War, opening this month all the hubbub merely presages the arrival of the man of the hour, the leader of the Avengers, Cap himself: 34-year-old Chris Evans, flashing an action figure smile as he steps out of a blue Audi sports car and onto the red carpet.
The sports car was not Evans idea. Audi is a big sponsor of Captain America: Civil War, and the product placement apparently extends to the premiere, where he and his co-star/antagonist in the film, Robert Downey Jr., have been asked to arrive in matching Audi R8s red for Downeys Iron Man, blue for Evans Cap. Up until then, Evans was having a stress-free evening, pre-partying at his home in the Hollywood Hills with his mom and brother and some buddies from back home in Boston, getting loose before his big night. But when he got to the theater and had to do the car thing thats when the anxiety kicked in.
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Its a little nerve-racking, Evans says two days later. Youre in the SUV with your family, your people. And then you have to pull over in some weird parking lot and do the swap. Theres security and all these people. All of a sudden youre out of your comfort zone. Its strange. The little things that can tip you over.
Its funny, says Scarlett Johansson, a frequent Captain America and Avengers co-star whos known Evans since she was 17. Hes extremely easygoing, he loves to hang out, he loves to be around people. But whenever we do a premiere, or he has to be in the fray in some work-related context, hes terrified. Downey told something similar to Jimmy Kimmel the night after the premiere: Chris Evans is such a nervous Nellie, he said. Were supposed to drive in in the Audis, and hes like, Bro, I dont know should you go first, or I should go first? I was like, Man up, dude!' (Later, to Rolling Stone, he also says Evans had to excuse himself for a cigarette.)
Youd think this stuff would be easy for Evans by now. Hes one of the biggest names in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the sprawling, $8 billion Disney-owned enterprise that includes his three Captain America films; the Iron Man, Thor and Hulk franchises; and the all-star Avengers team-ups, two of the top-grossing movies of all time. Shouldnt he be comfortable with a few cameras and fans? But to hear Evans tell it, hes one of the least-comfortable movie stars around. The acting part is fine; its everything else he cant handle.
A red carpet lasts, what, 30 minutes tops? But that to me is like 30 minutes of walking on hot coals, Evans says, sitting at home in jeans, a Toronto Maple Leafs hat and a chambray shirt with a rip in one arm. Its not like a junket junkets you sit in a room and they bring em in. I can do that all day and not have a meltdown. But the premiere thats overwhelming. Its the volume of it: Youre in the center of this thing. You can fight a whole army if they line up one at a time. But if they surround you, youre fucked.
Evans mom, Lisa, is sitting in the next room (she stuck around after the premiere), and his one-year-old puppy, Dodger, a rambunctious golden-retriever mix, is on his lap. The house a midcentury number he bought after the first Avengers is perched near a stunning cliff-side overlook with IMAX views of the San Fernando Valley, including, if you know where to squint, the headquarters of Marvel Studios: the conglomerate thats both the source of most of the great things in Evans life as well as the cause of much of his agony.
When Marvel first offered him the role of Captain America, Evans turned it down repeatedly. Partly it was the proposed nine-movie contract. (Its nuts, he says. If you make a big movie like Independence Day, theyll lock you up for three movies. But nine is insane. We got it down to six.) But he was also afraid of all the other commitments the promo tours, the corporate tie-ins, the cameos, the auxiliary stuff. This is the most outside asks you can incorporate into a movie, Evans says. I love acting but thats not all youre asking me to do.
He was also afraid of losing his anonymity: In case you havent figured this out, hes super-private, his mom says. And interviews were the worst of all. Ive been dreading press since January, Evans says. Its nice to talk about the work with people who are interested but I freak out when I hear stupid questions about stupid things, and youve gotta act like you give a fuck. Its part of the job, Ive got to sell this thing. But its just a gross feeling. It makes me insecure.
Its not like a junket you sit in a room and they bring em in. I can do that all day and not have a meltdown. But the premiere thats overwhelming. You can fight a whole army if they line up one at a time. But if they surround you, youre fucked.
You dont really expect this from a guy like Evans. He seems like an amiable bro, a thoughtful-yet-beefcake-y leading man who worships Tom Brady and the Patriots, and once served as the model for a surfer named Tyler in the board game Mystery Date. (Favorite class: Study hall. Ideal date: Walk around the cliffs.) But the truth is, behind the shredded biceps and the star-spangled suit, Evans is just as awkward, sensitive and neurotic as all the rest of us.
Chris can be a delicate flower a little bit, Johansson says. You just want to pat his back: Aw, Chrissy. Youre all right. Its not like Robert [Downey Jr.], who I think puts on a persona to protect his private self. Its not in Chris nature to put on a face that isnt totally natural.
His other problem, Evans says, is that he suffers from what he calls a noisy brain. It makes him second-guess everything, turns casual conversations into whirl- pools of self-doubt. Its a real nice spiral, he says, grimacing. Hes tried calming his mind through meditation and Buddhism he once spent three weeks studying with a guru in Rishikesh, India, and he says reading Siddhartha changed his life and by reading the works of Oprah-approved spiritualist Eckhart Tolle. Ive gotten better, Evans says. But he still struggles sometimes with overanalyzing things, with letting his self-consciousness take over, with not just being present in the moment.
We used to call Chris the thinker,' his mom says. When wed go on long car rides, Id say, Bring your Gameboy, and hed say, No, Mom, Im just going to look out the window and think. Sometimes I say, Get out of there, honey. Get out of your head. Come out here with the rest of us. Its really nice out here. But this is who hes been since he was a little boy.
It can be hard for Evans in Hollywood. I dont like having silly surface discussions, he says. A lot of times thats required in this business. Thats when the social anxiety kicks in. When you feel kind of un-invested, like youre playing some sort of game you know you shouldnt be playing. Youre making just more noise, and more trash, and almost selling something, and nothing of this is clean. Its all a river of garbage, and youre just in it.
But when hes acting, on the other hand, that part of your brain just gets quiet, Evans says. The noise goes away. Youre just leaned into the experience. Youre really riding the wave of just living.
And then, in classic Evans style, he plays that last part back in his head. Thats an incredibly douche-y thing to say, he says, cringing. Please dont put that in there. Ugh! Riding the wave of just living? He laughs. No! Fuck!
Evans has a shield in his house. Marvel sent it to him; sometimes it comes out at parties once everyones had a few drinks. Its a pretty good selfie prop. You want to see it? he says.We walk over to a junk-filled hall closet and he opens the door. Propped on the floor, theres an exact replica of Captain Americas red-white-and-blue shield. Its heavier than it looks. Yeah, its dangerous, Evans says, hefting it. Then he lays it back on the ground and closes the door.
According to Downey, out of all the Marvel franchises, Captain America was, weirdly, the riskiest. Its easy to forget $1 billion in box-office receipts later, but the character, with his old-fashioned morality and World War II-era squareness, had the potential to be a real cornball. Cap doesnt drink or swear; until recently, Evans thought hed never even had sex. (At this point, he probably has, Evans says. He has to have. But hes respectful he never talks about it.) Evans has done a great job taking a character who could have been, as he puts it, a real piece of cardboard and injecting him with humanity, wit and charm.
Theres a sort of a loneliness about the way that Chris plays [Cap] that I think is very touching, Johansson says. He has a kind of longing, self-searching quality that Chris has given him like hes struggling with something maybe all of us are struggling with. Downey, who helped persuade Evans to sign up for the role, agrees. Somehow or another, he says, he made Captain America cool.
Hes a little vanilla, admits Evans of Cap. Hes a good man, but hes not exactly flashy. He doesnt have the great one-liners; hes not flying around shooting missiles. Hes probably not the one your kids want to dress up as. So its tricky.
As a kid growing up in Sudbury, a clich suburban town about 30 minutes outside Boston, Evans never dressed up as any comic-book character. He loved drawing and animation, especially Disney films (Beauty and the Beast made him want to be an artist, and he can still sing all of The Little Mermaid), but surprisingly, he had no interest in comics (Not even one, his mom says). Lisa was a stay-at-home mom, and his dad is a dentist. Theres a line in Civil War when Tony Stark says to Cap, Sometimes I want to punch you in your perfect teeth. My dad loves that line, says Evans, grinning.
Evans has compared his family to New England Von Trapps: He has three siblings, all of whom grew up performing. Theres no greater joy than being at a premiere with Evans family, says Downey. Its like the classy, cultured version of The Fighter. At 10, Chris started acting at a local youth theater, doing plays like The Velveteen Rabbit and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. (I actually got hosed in that one, he recalls, laughing. I should have been Willie Wonka. I got Grandpa Joe.)
In high school, the six-foot Evans played lacrosse and wrestled, but really he was a drama dork in a lax bros body. He starred in productions like Bye Bye Birdie, and his senior year, he was voted most theatrical. (He wanted to be best-dressed,' says Lisa.) To this day, You can start singing any line from Oklahoma! and hell just break out in song, Johansson says. After a summer internship at a casting agency in New York, he got an agent of his own, and soon landed a pilot and moved to L.A., where he found work as the handsome leading dude in high school films like Not Another Teen Movie and The Perfect Score.
He was trying to figure out where he fit, recalls Johansson, who co-starred with Evans in the latter film, and again a few years later in The Nanny Diaries, in which he played a character known as Harvard Hottie. He was kind of pigeonholed as this all-American hunky guy, and it didnt seem to be satisfying his creative urge. At the time, I think he was actually considering going solely into directing, because I think he felt that he had more to offer than what he was being given. Its ridiculous to say that hes plagued by these devastatingly good looks but with Chris, its almost like the studios need to mature, more than the other way around.
In 2004, Evans was cast in a Marvel superhero movie that would change his life: the first version of The Fantastic Four. It was exciting, he says of his role as Johnny Storm, a.k.a. the Human Torch. It was the best Id been paid so far. You knew it had a franchise hope. So I was thrilled. But at the same time a little uneasy because the movies werent exactly the way Id envisioned them. (Evans polite way of saying not good.) It started to wear on me, he says. I want to make movies Im proud of. And when that doesnt happen, it can get really challenging.
The whole experience may be what made him gun-shy a few years later when Marvel came calling again, this time about Captain America. I was thrilled to have been chosen, Evans says, because there was no way I was going to do it. I looked at it as the thing that would get me to the next thing. Then all of a sudden youre doing it, and youre like, Oh, fuck. What did I do?'
The new movie, Civil War, focuses on an existential question that crops up frequently in comics: Are the Avengers superheroes or vigilantes, and who should be held responsible for the civilian casualties left in their wake? That debate pits Cap, a.k.a. Steve Rogers, and his supporters against Iron Man, a.k.a. Tony Stark, and his a conflict thats been brewing since the first Avengers movie, when Cap told a wise- cracking Stark to put on the suit, lets go a few rounds. (I have to tell you, Evans mom says. Before he made Avengers, Chris was absolutely terrified of Downey. He said, Mom, Im so nervous. I dont want to screw up.') Interestingly, its Captain America by-the-book member of the Greatest Generation and literal tool of government propaganda who comes down on the side of defying U.N. authority, while Stark, erstwhile arms dealer and roguish billionaire, favors submitting to their control.
Its a nice role reversal, says Evans. You have a company man like Steve who always believed in the hierarchy of the military, but in the last couple of movies has seen the people he was loyal to misuse their power. Whereas Tony, whos always danced to the beat of his own drum, is feeling guilt for the collateral damage theyve left. But thats why I like this movie: Theres no clear villain in terms of right and wrong. And the truth is, I actually think Tony is right. To see Steve prioritize himself over what other people need is selfish. Thats what makes it interesting.
L.A. is where I come to work, where I have meetings and, unfortunately, where I feel moments of anxiety. Sometimes L.A. is great. And sometimes you just drive down Sunset like, Ugh. Fuckin Hollywood.'
Now that hes done five movies as Cap, Evans would love to play someone with more of a dark side, like he did in 2013s excellent Snowpiercer. Since 2010, Ive never gone more than a year without putting that fuckin thing on, he says of Caps suit. He still enjoys the experience, but hes excited to figure out what comes next: Id love to find something where I get to be, like, a flashy defense lawyer. Someone with the gift of gab. He also wants to try his hand at directing again, after learning a lot on his first feature, 2014s Before We Go a Linklater-ish love story he made with a budget of $3 million, roughly what Downey gets paid for commuting to set. Evans even thinks about going to New York and getting back into theater someday. Theres no press junkets for a play, he says enviously. You do your work and you get to go home.
Evans has been in Los Angeles 17 years now half his life and its wearing on him a little. I dont knock L.A., he says. But L.A. is where I come to work, where I have meetings and, unfortunately, where I feel moments of anxiety. Sometimes L.A. is great. And sometimes you just drive down Sunset like, Ugh. Fuckin Hollywood.'
Weve been talking for a while when Evans buzzer rings. Its D! his mom calls from the other room.
One of my buddies from Boston, says Evans. With my mom in town, some of the guys I grew up with who live here now are coming through to say hello to Ma Dukes.
A moment later, Evans old friend Demery walks in, carrying his 11-month-old son, Noah. What up, man? Evans says.
Sup, brother? says Demery, high- fiving him. You good?
Demery retires to the patio with Noah and Evans mom to chat. Its nuts, says Evans. D has a kid, man. Hes his whole world. I really want them. My sister has kids theyre seven, five and three and going home and being around them feels great. Im really trying to have kids soon. Certain things have to fall in place.
Like what? Evans laughs. Gotta find a wife. Hes been linked to actresses including Minka Kelly, Lily Collins and a pre-Timberlake Jessica Biel, but right now, he says hes single. (His date at this years Oscars was his sister Carly.)
Evans calls Civil War, definitively, the last installment of Captain America. In November, he heads to Atlanta for back-to-back filming on the third and fourth Avengers. Like, 10 months, he says of the shoot. Ugh. My bodys gonna fall apart. Downey says Marvel movies are like the presidency, in that they age you prematurely: I hope hes enjoying this moment, where hes still tall and blue-eyed and handsome.
Avengers 4 is the last Marvel film that Evans is committed to. His original contract had him through three only, but like Downey whose contract ended after Iron Man 3 and whos been negotiating huge re-ups for every one since Evans extended for one more. Better believe he got paid for it, too. Oh, yeah, he says, laughing. They didnt punch their Chris Evans card like, You get the seventh one free! Yeah, no.
Evans is supposed to leave the house at five to catch a private jet to Phoenix, where he and co-star Sebastian Stan are going to surprise the audience at a Civil War sneak preview. A few minutes later, his friend and assistant Josh comes in carrying a green juice (Evans: Is that for me? Sweet!) and reminds him that its 4:40.
Its 4:40? Evans says, leaping up from the couch. Oh, shit! I gotta go! All of a sudden, the panic sets in. I have to shower, he says, looking frantic. They cant leave without me, right?
But then he takes a breath. Wait, wait. The car may be coming at five, but he doesnt have to be there until six. And theyre flying from Burbank, just 25 minutes away. Hes got plenty of time. Its OK, he says, exhaling. Everything is OK.
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