Natalie Portman Says Her Children Inspired Her To Join ‘Thor: Love And Thunder’

Natalie Portman’s character in the latest “Thor” film takes on a superhero persona and her kids could not be more excited.

In “Thor: Love and Thunder,” Portman’s scientist character Jane transforms into the Mighty Thor when she carries the mystical hammer Mjolnir. Enchanted by the whole story and the costumes, she said her two children encouraged her to join the new “Thor” movie.

“I feel like it’s the phase of my career where I’m really trying to just impress my kids," she told Variety. "My 5-year-old and my 10-year-old were so enthralled by this process, getting to visit the set and see me dressed up in a cape. It made it really cool. You know, it’s very rare that my kids are like, ‘Please go to work!’ Usually, it’s quite the opposite."

Portman, 41, shares son Aleph, 11, and daughter Amalia, 5, with husband Benjamin Millepied.

Helmed by Taika Waititi, “Thor: Love and Thunder,” is the fourth installment of Marvel Cinematic Universe’s “Thor” franchise following “Thor: Ragnarok” in 2017. Though Portman did not appear in the last movie, she played Thor’s love interest in the 2011 “Thor” and again in “Thor: The Dark World” in 2013.

In transforming into the buff superhero, Portman said she worked with a trainer for 10 months to build up her muscle mass.

“I definitely got as big as I’ve ever been,” Portman said. “You realize, ‘Oh, this must be so different, to walk through the world like this.'”

The crew also had to come up with a creative solution to increase Portman's height as Jane's version of Thor stands at 6 feet tall.

“We’d rehearse the scene, they’d see the path, and then they’d build a path that was like one foot off the ground or whatever, and I would just walk on that,” Portman explained.

Also in the Variety feature, Waititi said the idea to bring back Jane’s character to the movie was always in the list but they had to do better than getting onboard a character who “feels like just a love interest.” A “Thor” comic series launched in 2014 provided the ideal solution for Jane’s return to the film series: Jane gets superpowers courtesy of the Mjolnir.

In the latest “Thor” teaser, Chris Hemsworth, starring as the titular character, gives a speech to rally his superhero friends to unite and fight the movie’s primary villain, Gorr, played by Christian Bale.

“Thor: Love And Thunder” opens in cinemas on July 8.