Last night Batman Rises opened in cinemas around the globe and we were introduced to Batman’s the femme fatale, Selina Kyle, aka Catwoman, who is played by Anne Hathaway. She plays alongside veterans of the action film genre Christian Bale and Tom Hardy.
Anne has previously played The White Queen in Alice in Wonderland and Jane Austen in Becoming Jane. In her next role she is playing Fantine in a movie version of Les Misérables.
This morning Anne Hathaway appeared on BBC1 to talk about The Dark Knight Rises and the subject of her body and her tight Catwoman outfit was raised. She explained quite simply how she got in shape for the role.
She spent 4 months totally focused on strength training and then 6 weeks working on fight training. So a combination of weight training, bodyweight circuit training and general fitness to tone up and then martial arts training to learn how to move.
Anne Hathaway’s Workouts
Anne worked out 5 days a week to prepare for her role. She had an advantage in that she was already very slim due to her healthy diet and lifestyle, so the focus was on toning up and learning to stage-fight.
So, what do we know about the specifics of her workout? From experience we do know that she will have been focussing on compound weight training to start with, working the biggest muscles – lots of squats, lunges, deadlifts, bench press, shoulder press, rows.
Fight training is really just martial arts training including weapons training. Flexibility is worked on and simple kicking routine and punching drills are performed to teach the body to move effortlessly. Tumbles and rolls will also be incorporated for those performing their own fight stunt work.
Anne Hathaway’s Vegan Diet
One thing we do know about Anne Hathaway’s diet is that she is a vegan. She does not eat meat, dairy, fish or eggs.
She eats fresh foods rather that buying vegan processed meals. She told USA Today that she follows a plant-based diet and does a lot of cooking at home. Anne described Kale and Spelt pasta as being “amazing”. Kale is a very nutritious green leafy vegetable, from the cabbage family. It is one of the suggested foods in a paleo diet due to its nutrient density. You could argue that the only diet healthier than a vegan diet is a vegan diet with some meat – this is pretty much what a low Gi diet or a paleo diet is!
Photo of Anne Hathaway by Anthony Citrano, released on Creative Commons licence.
Hi my names Hailey and I had a question on what sort of flexibility training she had to go through. And what were the results? Was she able to do the splits or what?
She can do the splits, at least, she did do them on television in 2011 at the Kennedy Center Honours – although it did not look comfortable and she required some assistance getting up again!
She also does the splits in the 2004 movie, Ella Enchanted.
We do know that she likes to wear ballet shoes and has attended the New York City Ballet Gala, which suggests an interest in ballet. Maybe she trained ballet when younger and maintains her flexibility with ballet exercises? That is a guess though, but an educated one.
Beautiful Anne has always been in great shape but she is really stepping it up now!