This month, Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated The Odyssey hit theaters, and between controversy from purists and praise from film buffs, the epic film is the talk of the town right now. Its protagonist, Odysseus, played by Matt Damon, has also found himself in the spotlight due to the dramatic physical transformation the actor underwent to get into character. But the credit for what we see on screen, the actor recently explained, isn’t solely his. As a guest on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Matt Damon revealed that his biceps were “almost 100 percent” real, but the rest belonged to his stunt double, Devyn Dalton.
In fact, it was the stuntwoman who stood in for Damon during some of the scenes, including the fight with the Laestrygonians—armored giants that Nolan made look imposing not through CGI but by using a clever low-to-high camera angle. The lead actor explains: “There were these stunt men who were all seven feet, and then they got stuntmen who were under five feet,” including Dalton, as he explained: “My double was a woman, a female stunt performer, who had the greatest arms I’ve ever seen.”
Praising Dalton’s work, Matt Damon added: “When she came into the catering tent was the first time I met her, I went up and I hugged her and thanked her for all the work she’d put in.” According to her profile in the Stunts Unlimited Directory, Dalton is a stuntwoman with a background in dance, specializing in boxing, kickboxing, Muay Thai, sword fighting, and the use of weapons on set. Among the actors and actresses whose roles she has taken on in action scenes is Millie Bobby Brown.
