Viola Davis, 60
Image Credit: Earl Gibson III/Deadline via Getty Images
Academy Award-winning actress Viola Davis pours her whole heart into her roles on screen and stage, and it seems the same is true when it comes to the gym.
Davis has fronted several action movies in recent years, including her 2022 film The Woman King, which saw Davis play a general who trains a fleet of women warriors. She, along with her cast mates, trained intensively under the guidance of trainer and nutritionist Gabriela McIan to build fighting physiques. The program included two hours of daily strength training, which consisted of weighted chest presses, shoulder presses and squats.
The star said the training stuck with her; she regularly posts videos of her lifting weights and working out alongside her trainer and her husband, Julius Tennon, on Instagram.
“All of a sudden, with this role, my muscles, my arms, my thick legs, my heavy voice were perfect. I felt unapologetic about it. I celebrated it physically in every way,” she told People in 2022. “Sometimes you do a movie and then it’s over. And sometimes, you do a movie and it shifts you a little bit. You’re a little bit better for it. And that’s what it’s been like for me with the training.”
In a 2025 interview with The Times, Davis said she carried on on the weightlifting portion of that routine to prepare for G20, in which she plays a U.S. president who has to spring into action when a terrorist attack rocks the international summit.
“I’m not one of those women who is afraid to look muscular, and I don’t believe in losing a whole lot of weight so I can be magazine-ready—there’s still a part of me that wants to represent real life,” she told the newspaper. “I wanted to look capable, a leader who’s willing to jump through the plate glass first.”