Meeting One Of The Boys Star Was A Childhood Dream Come True For Antony Starr

There are plenty of strange and potentially embarrassing moments for actors on the satirical superhero series "The Boys," but for star Antony Starr, who plays the horrifying Superman subversion, Homelander, his most nerve-wracking moment came about because of a childhood crush on one of his co-stars. While Starr has had his fair share of disgusting and disturbing moments as Homelander, he told Seth Meyers during a visit to "Late Night with Seth Meyers" that it was actually a bit more intimidating to know that he would be acting alongside the dream girl of his younger years: Elisabeth Shue. 

It's one thing to act in scenes along with your childhood crush, but Starr also had to do some pretty weird things with Shue, who portrayed Vought's Senior Vice President of Hero Relations Madelyn Stillwell. In the first season of "The Boys," Stillwell and Homelander have a rather complicated relationship in which she breastfeeds him, which had to be extremely awkward for both actors. Thankfully, Starr said, working with his dream girl was genuinely something of a dream. 

While speaking with Meyers, Starr explained that he had a crush on Shue since he was young:

"When I was little, and she was actually not that much older than me, but slightly. I was a big fan of 'The Karate Kid.' I used to do karate when I was a little kid, and my dad took me to see 'The Karate Kid' at the movies. And Ali, aka Elisabeth Shue, was probably my first on-screen crush."

That meant that when Shue was cast, Starr was a little nervous. He was worried about what he was going to wear and hoped that he looked okay, though it was all for naught because "she is the nicest person." It's easy to imagine being nervous about meeting your childhood celebrity crush in such interesting circumstances, but there was probably plenty for Shue to be nervous about as well, given the uncomfortable milk fetish-based relationship between her character and Starr's. In fact, Starr also shared that there was a moment where he was able to comfort Shue a bit, which had to be a pretty cool, if surreal, feeling. 

Starr told Meyers that there was a moment when he was able to help Shue a bit through brutal honesty. She was nervous about a scene and said she felt insecure, and Starr said, "You're Elisabeth Shue. You don't come to this little jerk and say that! I don't know, I'm trying to learn from you!" His reaction probably helped her realize that she had no reason to feel insecure at all, though given some of the content of "The Boys," it's hard to blame her. She not only had to play Stillwell during her more intimate and terrifying moments with Homelander, but she also had to portray a shapeshifter pretending to be Stillwell in order to please Homelander, which came with its own unsettling requirements. 

At least Shue is no longer the only one who has had to have onscreen lactation-based scenes with Homelander, as Valorie Curry, who plays the Marjorie Taylor-Greene-inspired Firecracker, has also now had a seriously strange superhero-suckling scene with Starr's character. In season 4, Firecracker revealed that she had been taking hormones to induce lactation in order to better serve Homelander's needs, and uh, it went about how you might expect. 

It's great that Shue and Starr were able to have a good time together despite both of their nervousness, and it honestly makes watching their more disturbing scenes feel a little less icky.