In less than four years since landing in Hollywood in 2014, Celebrity Trainer Body Transformation Specialist, and TV Personality, Corey Calliet has become a go-to guy for helping to sculpt Hollywood’s A-listers into the bodies the iconic characters they display on the screen.
Calliet who has been named one of the 50 Most Fit men in the world on the Flex50 list by AskMen Magazine alongside Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, and Conor McGregor; was brought on board by director Ryan Coogler for the much anticipated Marvel Cinematic Universe film Black Panther. The fitness guru chatted with us about getting the actors such as long-term client Michael B. Jordan into character physically and more.
The Knockturnal: How did you become involved with the film?
Corey Calliet: Well I’ve been training Mike since Fantastic Four, and we’ve basically been together for every single movie, so every time you seen him look good it was me. And Ryan of course since we did Creed, I feel like we took the whole Creed family and brought it to Black Panther, and they told me what I needed to do and we got to it.
The Knockturnal: Compared to training Michael for Creed, how was the training different this time around for Black Panther?
Corey Calliet: For Creed, I wanted to make him look like a boxer, so it was more of a boxing style mentality type of style training when it comes to fighting all the time, the climate and the conditioning. This time I know he needed to look savagery that’s the word I want to keep using when I talk to people because when you think of the word savage you think of a villain. I needed him to look big, through bodybuilding, old school hard heavy weightlifting. Real good training.
The Knockturnal: How did you go about tailoring the training process for the different actors and actresses?
Corey Calliet: Everyone was different. So, Winston Duke, I trained him briefly for the movie for a couple of months pre-film and we were doing a lot more stuff to get him conditioned to get him bigger. He needed to look wise. So kind of mixed it up just so I could get him to drop some fat and add muscle so it was like weight training and plyometric and HIT training type of work and nutrition was very much key. I did work with Angela Bassett very very briefly because we didn’t have the time. But I didn’t want to do weight training with her just to keep her looking good you know like she always does. So I did HIT training with her differently.. anaerobic exercises. And with Michael, of course, it was bodybuilding sculpting training, I needed to make him look like a Marine or a sophist that plays the NFL or something like that. He needed to look really big.
The Knockturnal: Who was the most challenging/hardest to train?
Corey Calliet: Honestly nobody was really hard to train. It wasn’t the fact of being hard it was more of the consistency and timing, and I spent most of my time with Michael. So when it came to most of my time being spent if you want to call that hard then hey it was Michael, he had to spend a lot of time from taking his body where it was at because he didn’t get out of shape but he wasn’t in that good of a shape to build him up for that role.
The Knockturnal: Can you speak a little bit about the difference of training an actor for a film role as compared to training an actor or person to look good aesthetically for non-film purposes?
Corey Calliet: Well when you’re dealing with a film there’s a type of aura that’s put in a person needs to look a certain type of way. When you training a person every day whether they just want to look good it’s a difference between just looking good and looking perfect like you’re putting on a costume. That’s what I call it when you’re getting on film, I’m getting you ready to play a person so I need you to look like that. So it’s more of an art form, it’s more of me creating the character by using you, making you look like the person you’re gonna actually be.
The Knockturnal: What inspired you to want to become a celebrity trainer?
Corey Calliet: I wanted to be one of the best trainers in the world and the only way that I can do that is I need people to see that all over the world and one way to see that is on tv, on the big screen. I love training people and I felt like if I could just have one actor in the whole world to see what I could really do.
The Knockturnal: What else do you have in the works?
Corey Calliet: Of course I have Revenge Body season 2 that’s actually out right now. I’m designing a clothing line. A whole bunch of things, but that’s some things I’m working on right now.
The Knockturnal: How has being on Revenge Body helped your career?
Corey Calliet: I love Revenge Body. I think Revenge Body helped take my career to another level. The Kardashians, I love Khloe very much. Being on that show after we finished doing Creed, I got a call. They wanted me to come in and asked me about being on the show. And of course when the name Kardashian comes up who’s not gonna want to be involved with them because they really do help take you to another level. And they came interviewed me and we started filming. What I realized about the show is that it’s not fake. It’s not like these other shows that you gotta be locked up in the house and you get tortured every day. These people have to keep their lives going. So they have to deal with the mix of all the mess that’s going on in their life and still try to found a foundation in fitness and health to change themselves. And that’s my goal, I love to be able to help people change their lives and not just their body. I think that’s what this show does. This season you’ll see a lot of that, you’ll see a lot of transformation from within first then the outside, seeing people became a better version of themselves. That’s why I love Revenge Body.
Black Panther is now playing.
