Dolph Lundgren, Nicholas Galitzine Compare He-Man Workouts and Costumes

By the power of Grayskull, there's a new He-Man in town!

Almost 40 years after Dolph Lundgren brought the Mattel action figure to life in 1987's Masters of the Universe movie, Nicholas Galitzine is doing it all over again.

Following the success of the toy line's launch in 1983 and subsequent animated series-which debuted in 1983 and ran for 130 episodes-Lundgren was the first to play the Eternian warrior in live-action. The actor landed the part, his first leading role in a film, fresh off his work as Soviet fighter Ivan Drago in Rocky IV.

The movie saw He-Man travel to Earth with sidekicks Man-At-Arms and Teela, working with two teenagers-including a pre-Friends Courteney Cox-to stop Skeletor from obtaining a device which would give him unlimited power. Released in the summer of ‘87, it was a box office misfire, but went on to become a cult classic.

Over the next four decades, numerous comics, Netflix cartoons, and video games would keep He-Man, sister She-Ra, and the MOTU franchise alive, all while studios and buff actors throughout Hollywood struggled to get another movie made. After Amazon MGM Studios finally acquired the property in 2023, Bumblebee director Travis Knight was tapped to helm a new Masters of the Universe film, with Galitzine cast in the lead role in 2024.

After Lundgren attended the new movie's big Hollywood premiere this month, Men's Journal got him to sit down with Galitzine for a chat between two He-Men. In their conversation, they compared their training routines, costumes, and overall approach to the character... before jokingly calling out superhero movie actors for not putting in as much work.

Training to Become He-Man

Both men spent about four months getting their bodies into fighting shape for their respective MOTO movies, stressing how difficult it can be to keep that physique throughout filming.

"Obviously, there's the initial getting to the size required, packing on the muscle, but also it's maintaining it throughout the job, especially if you're on a long shoot," Galitzine told Men's Journal. "Your body naturally wears and tears over time. We did some pretty intense stunt stuff and wires."

"I just remember on that last stint of the movie, I don't know if you felt this, but my body just felt exhausted," he continued, alongside Lundgren. "Every day, when you're He-Man, you're dehydrating, you're pumping up before scenes. And then it just becomes a mental game, really, your body just has to endure."

Saying he had a "similar experience" before filming back in ‘87, Lundgren considered himself "lucky" he was coming off of Rocky IV.

"I still had it in my system. I just had to put on a little more muscle, because as He-Man, I wasn't boxing as much. Wielding the sword, I had to get a little more muscle," said the 68-year-old actor. "Like Nick said, the tough part is when you try to maintain it and you just want to go and have some pasta carbonara, an apple pie and ice cream, but you can't."

Twisting the knife even further for Galitztine was the incredibly appetizing food readily available on set.

"I'll say this … this job, I have never seen such good craft services in my entire career and I don't think I had a crumb of it the entire shoot," he shared, adding, "it was torture."

The new movie finds young Eternian prince Adam sent to Earth with the Sword of Power by his parents, all so the evil Skeletor can't obtain it for himself. Adam grows into a man on Earth, before he finds himself pulled back to his homeland, where he must try to stop Skeletor and Evil-Lyn's quest for domination.

Once back in Eternia, there's a moment where Adam finally wields the Sword of Power again, physically transforming him into He-Man. In that moment, he loses his Earthly clothes, gets a brand new hairdo and outfit, and seems genuinely shocked when he sees his freshly-developed abs for the first time. While Galitzine's body also transformed during production, he couldn't pin-point a moment where everything started coming together.

"Maybe it was different for you because you were in Rocky shape already, but for me-I was an athlete growing up, I was a rugby player-so I'd been in good shape before, but I wasn't at the time I was cast," Galitzine recalled.

"The thing with the transformations that's so interesting is you yourself don't really feel it because you live with your body every single day," he explained. "Whereas, when you see people in your life maybe a month apart and you've just blown up, that's the shocking thing. So you're really looking for cues in how people see you."

Looking back to how incredibly ripped he was back in the ‘80s, Lundgren found himself asking, "What the hell? How do you get in shape like that?" Though he still feels like he's in "pretty good shape," he jokingly told Galitzine that "you'll look at yourself a few years from now, going, ‘Nan, I was in great shape back then.'"

Clothes Make the He-Man

While He-Man is known for his physique, it's his unique costume that really allows him to show them off.

After invoking the Power of Grayskull, the hero doesn't wear all that much in terms of armor. He usually sports a harness with crimson cross on his chest, forearm cuffs, boots, and a fur loincloth or furry briefs.

Though Lundgren and Galitzine both rock the trademark harness, Lundgren was saddled with leather underwear-which he's referred to as a "leather diaper" in the past-while Galitzine has a slightly more modest leather skirt.

"Which is hilarious to say, because there's really not much of my costume either, but yeah, I am certainly more modest," he said with a laugh.

"I never really got used to it because it's a bit unnatural. It reveals everything. You can never hide," Lundgren recalled of his costume. "Even in Rocky, I was wearing a uniform at times, a robe, and I could do the dehydration for certain [scenes], like the fight for two weeks. But as He-Man, every time I was on camera, you see everything. So that was hard."

Galitzine felt just as exposed, despite the additional fabric.

"Look, I felt the same way. That is the challenge of playing He-Man in a way. Luckily, I got more scenes as Adam on Earth, so I could keep cutting into production," he shared. "But I think the funny thing is how your relationships develop with the crew, whether it's your costumer or camera team, they become very used to seeing you in your underwear every day, which is a very rare situation to go into work and experience that kind of work dynamic."

Their body being so front and center, however, is evidence that they really had to put in the work to achieve it.

"I just want to remind people that most of these Marvel superheroes, they wear muscle suits. It's not their real muscles," said Lundgren. "That actor didn't have to work out that much, whereas Nick…"

"We had it the hard way!" Galitzine exclaimed.

With a laugh, Lundgren added, "The old-fashioned hard way, remember that!"

See Galitzine's He-Man in action when Masters of the Universe hits theaters June 5. Lundgren's 1987 film, meanwhile, is streaming now on Pluto TV.

This story was originally published by Men's Journal on May 22, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment section. Add Men's Journal as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

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This story was originally published May 22, 2026 at 11:05 AM.