‘The Boys’ Star Laz Alonso on Changing His Diet for Role

Laz Alonso is sharing what kind of physical demands he’s had to endure to star on one of television’s most talked-about shows. The Boys has been a huge hit for Amazon Prime, and the satirical superhero series is set to wrap up its run. In a conversation with Men’s Health, Alonso explained how his approach to the role of the intense vigilante Mother’s Milk has led to his weight fluctuating throughout The Boys run. 

“I was heavy on caloric surplus when I first started the show,” Alonso says. “Seasons one and two, I wanted to look like the comic. Season three – we shot during and after COVID and I went from looking like the comic to looking like a very inflated version of the comic.”

The actor shared that he was bulking up by enjoying some of the most popular eateries in Toronto, where The Boys is filmed. 

“[I was] Uber eating every day,” he confesses. “Eating a lot of pizza. Eating a lot of burgers. I discovered Toronto’s best pizzas and burgers and I put on close to forty pounds. It didn’t hit me until I saw the promotional posters for season three and I saw my face. And I was like ‘Who the heck is that?’ I actually asked Amazon if they’d added weight to me. I didn’t realize how big I’d gotten.”

Over time, he began to worry about his health more than his appearance, and soon he saw a window to change his eating habits and get the weight off. 

“For a guy that’s six feet with shoes on, I was pushing 250,” Alonso recalls. “And it was a lot of weight and it wasn’t healthy. Season four came around and I wanted to do something real different.”

That opportunity came in the form of the shifting storyline of Mother’s Milk in the show and a conversation with showrunner Eric Kripke. 

“I always meet with Kripke at the top of the season,” he shares. “And he told me ‘This season, Mother’s Milk is going to go through a big transition.’ So I wanted to, in his OCD fashion, depict that and show that visibly. So I went into extreme calorie reduction. I shaved, because now he reports directly to the White House. This guy is back into his regimented, military way of running things. And you’ll see that as the season progresses.”

The full final season of The Boys is now streaming. The last episode premiered yesterday. You can see Laz Alonso discussing his physical transformation for the Mother’s Milk role below. 

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