Credit: Kristin Callahan/Everett Collection
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We’re going to be honest: It’s always nice when folks stand up for daytime. In the entertainment world, it seems that too often soap operas are ignored at best, if not outright looked down upon as inferior. It should be no surprise that we here at Soaps.com don’t just love the genre, but have a whole lot of respect for it and the hard work that goes into it. So naturally, when Chris Hemsworth took a moment to shout out his time as a soap actor, we couldn’t help but take notice!
Hemsworth, who’s been playing Thor in the Marvel Cinematic Universe since 2011, clearly enjoys his role in the superhero world. But, as he made clear in a recent interview with our sister site Variety while doing press for Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, he also has a healthy amount of respect for comic book films. And that’s not an accident, as it’s something he learned when just breaking into the industry — though about a different, though also much maligned genre.
The actor took aim at those actors bashing comic book movies after making them, likening them to actors who started in daytime, then turned their nose up at the medium.
Hemsworth may be synonymous with Thor, but he started out in showbusiness playing a very different role!
Credit: Walt Disney Co./Courtesy of the Everett Collection
“Look, I grew up on a soap opera,” Hemsworth told Variety. “And it used to bother me when actors would later talk about the show with guilt or shame. Humility goes a long way. One of the older actors on Home and Away said, ‘We don’t get paid to make the good lines sound good, but to make the bad ones work.’ That stuck with me.”
Before landing a role on Home and Away, Hemsworth made television appearances here and there in Australia, including a brief appearance on another soap, Neighbours. His big break, though, came when he played Home and Away’s hunky high school drop-out, Kim Hyde for four seasons.
And for those who doubt the soapy credentials, in his time on the sudser, Kim had an ex who tried passing off another man’s son as his own, a girlfriend who was murdered by a serial killer, a baby he thought was his but whose paternity results were switched by the former girlfriend who nearly killed him when she quite literally blew up a wedding. So Hemsworth knows what he’s talking about. Check him out on the soap below.
For those wanting to check out another Australian soap, Neighbours has moved to Amazon Prime, which you can sign up for a free 30 day trial.
And of course, Hemsworth’s Marvel films can all be found on Disney+, which you can sign up to bundle with Hulu for $9.99 a month or Hulu and ESPN+ for $14.99 a month.
Before heading out, take a look at our photo gallery of the soap stars who’ve made it biggest in primetime.
