Before making his superhero debut in The Boys universe, Patrick Schwarzenegger starred in a much darker show, The Staircase, alongside Collin Firth and Toni Collette. The HBO limited series told the true story of Kathleen Peterson’s tragic death and the subsequent investigation of her husband Michael and their family.
Schwarzenegger starred as one of the Peterson children, Todd, who was in his early twenties when his mother was found dead at the bottom of a staircase. Throughout the HBO retelling of the highly-publicized story, Todd undergoes a lot of physical changes as he battled drugs and alcohol abuse. Schwarzenegger told Variety that the production team had to add prosthetics to transform the actor. “He got really heavy,” Schwarzenegger admitted. “I had to wear a four-month pregnancy belly. It was weird.”
This isn’t the first time the actor had to alter his appearance. For The Terminal List, he added nearly 20 pounds of muscle to get that Navy SEAL look. “I was eating nonstop, It was fun. I had to fill out the uniform and not look like a little shrimp,” he confessed.
Next, Schwarzenegger is portraying Golden Boy in The Boys spinoff Gen V, where he will play a college student at a prestigious superhero university. He probably won’t look like a little shrimp in that show.