If an actor is starring as a superhero in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, you can pretty much bet that they’re not going to compete on Dancing With the Stars anytime soon. But, for all of those celebrities, there was a time before megastardom. Back in 2006, Chris Hemsworth wasn’t Thor, the god of thunder—he was a soap opera star who competed on the Australian edition of Dancing with the Stars. And, as he confirmed in an interview, his reality star past almost cost him his Marvel job. Read on to see why DWTS could have completely changed the trajectory of Hemsworth’s career.
READ THIS NEXT: 22 Celebrities Who Turned Down Dancing With the Stars.
Hemsworth joined the cast of Australia’s version of Dancing With the Stars for Season 5 in 2006. At the time, the 23-year-old actor was starring on the long-running soap Home and Away. Hemsworth played Kim Hyde from 2004 to 2007.
“I did get the recognition of: You’re famous. I wouldn’t say it came with a whole lot of respect, though,” Hemsworth told the Associated Press of Home and Away in 2015. “I wasn’t considered an artist or actor. But, you know, it’s a soap opera. That’s kind of the universal opinion people have on that. I mean, I have a huge amount of respect for the show. I think it’s harder than just about anything. It’s 20 scenes a day, and they’re not the greatest scripts at times.”
Hemsworth came in fifth place out of 10 contestants on Dancing with the Stars, which sounds respectable, but he did receive the lowest score out of anyone for four weeks in a row. Some of the Avengers star’s DWTS performances can still be found on YouTube.
For more celebrity news delivered right to your inbox, sign up for our daily newsletter.
It’s hard to imagine anyone else as Thor now—Hemsworth has played the character in eight movies, beginning with Thor in 2011—but he almost missed out on the part because of his Dancing with the Stars past.
“[Marvel Studios president] Kevin Feige said that almost lost me the job,” Hemsworth told BBC Radio 1 in 2017. The actor said the executive told him, “We all saw your audition, we were passing it around the office, and everyone was really into it. And then a few of the girls started Googling your name and up came this dancing video, and I thought, ‘Oh no. Thor dancing? I don’t know. The fans are gonna eat us alive.'”
But, Hemsworth obviously got the job anyway, and he said his DWTS experience actually came in handy. “It made me more nimble on my feet, I guess,” he said. “I needed to be with the cape. You might see a bit of that Dancing With the Stars quality in Thor.”
Not only could DWTS have prevented Hemsworth from being cast as Thor, but his own younger brother almost prevented him from getting the role, too. Hemsworth told BBC Radio 1 that he “blew it” in his first audition, but his brother, Liam Hemsworth, was called back for multiple auditions and made it to “the last, like, four or five people.”
“And then he didn’t get it,” Hemsworth explained. “And then I got another shot.” He joked, “Someone said, ‘We’re giving up. We’re just going to choose you.'”
READ THIS NEXT: Elvis Reportedly “Flew Into a Rage” Any Time This Star Was Mentioned.