Joshua Jackson Did All His Own Stunts, Gained 20 Pounds for Karate Kid: Legends

The upcoming Karate Kid: Legends brings together at least two facets of the Karate Kid Cinematic Universe, with Ralph Macchio and Jackie Chan (one of Consequence’s greatest action stars ever) uniting to train a young martial arts student played by Ben Wang. However, also playing a role in the movie is Joshua Jackson (Dawson’s Creek, Fringe, The Affair), who apparently committed hard to the role of local pizzeria owner Victor, who like Jackson has a background in boxing.

Director Jonathan Entwistle told the New York Post that for a boxing sequence in the movie, Jackson was so impressed by the other martial arts set-pieces that he wanted to do his time in the ring himself. “They were like, ‘Are you sure?’ And he was like, ‘Let’s go.’ He put on the gloves. He had no stunt double,” Entwistle said. “He shot that entire sequence himself, taking every punch.”

The director added that Jackson “could box… He’d boxed at a reasonably high level through his life. He was in great shape at the time, and he got in even better shape for the role. And so, when he worked with the choreographers, they felt comfortable that he could do it himself.”

Jackson put on 20 pounds to play the role, he told People, by eating 4,000 calories a day and training hard to portray an ex-heavyweight boxer. “It was harder than I thought it was going to be,” he said. “I was eating 4,000 calories a day.”

Karate Kid: Legends arrives in theaters on Friday, May 31st. You can check out the trailer below.