Antony Starr, who plays Homelander in The Boys, turned a behind-the-scenes flying stunt into an unintended public confession: he is terrified of heights. Footage from Gen V showed Starr suspended on wires above the set, visibly uncomfortable and repeatedly signaling that he wanted to come down as the crew lifted him into the air.
The clip quickly spread as a viral blooper because Starr’s reaction was so raw. He later said he was “genuinely” surprised he “didn’t pee the suit. Or worse,” and admitted he probably should have let a stunt double handle the scene instead of doing it himself.
That reaction landed with more force because Starr’s day job is playing a flying superhero who soars over cities. Off camera, he says the experience was nothing like that. In an Instagram post, he wrote, “Face of regret. The place I went that caused the regret….high….The boss, [who] also regretted putting his actor that high.”
Starr revisited the episode in an interview with Wired, saying he was told he would be harnessed with thin wires for a shot and then found himself about 40 feet up before the stunt pushed to around 85 feet. “I never thought (…) that’s a long way off the ground,” he said, adding that he started swearing and was “freaking out.” He also said, “I really do have a fear of heights that I didn’t realize I had.”
The actor said the moment did not make him braver overnight, but it did give him a clearer read on what still gets under his skin. “I think the more you do something, the less afraid you get,” Starr said, before describing a recent flight in which turbulence set him off again. “I’ve been flying a lot lately, and I just flew in yesterday, and there was a big bump, and I grabbed the little old lady next to me. I literally grabbed her arm because I don’t like heights and I thought I’d dealt with it, but I haven’t,” he said.
That tension between the character and the man is why the footage kept circulating. Starr is best known as Homelander, a role built around flying, dominance and control. The blooper showed the opposite: a performer hanging high above a set, trying to get back down, and laughing later at how badly the stunt rattled him.
The question raised by the clip is not whether Starr can play a man who flies. He does that already. It is whether he can ever make peace with being lifted off the ground himself. For now, his own answer seems plain enough: not yet.
