Dwayne Johnson Looks Unrecognizable as an Elderly Man on Set of His Next Movie with Smashing Machine Director

Johnson will costar with child actor Theo Clark Leber, as well as Alicia Silverstone, Rachel McAdams, Colman Domingo and more in ‘Lizard Music’

Dwayne Johnson is embracing the physique of an older man for his new movie — and he’s looking far different on set than how audiences are used to seeing him.

Johnson, 54, was photographed filming his new movie Lizard Music in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Tuesday, Oct. 20, with child actor Theo Clark Leber. The actor’s physical appearance looks vastly different than his typical muscled body in recent releases like The Smashing Machine, for which he received his first Golden Globe nomination, and the live-action Moana as he sported grey stubble and hair.

On set for the new movie, Johnson — who portrays a character known as The Chicken Man in the film — wore a tan bucket hat with a matching coat over a blue shirt, gray pants and a blue tie. In addition to the silver stubble on his face, he also had age spots on his face and earrings in both ears as he carried a slice of pizza in the scene.

Lizard Music is Johnson’s second collaboration with writer-director Benny Safdie after last year’s The Smashing Machine, in which Johnson portrayed early 2000s MMA fighter Mark Kerr. The new film is based on a children’s book of the same name by author Daniel Pinkwater.

Deadline reported on Monday, Oct. 19, that Lizard Music follows Leber’s character, a young boy who “stumbles upon a secret late-night broadcast of lizards playing otherworldly music, and a hidden door to the extraordinary swings open,” according to a synopsis published by the outlet.

“His search for answers leads him to an eccentric and whimsical old man nicknamed The Chicken Man and his beloved companion, an 85-year-old chicken named Claudia – the boy and the old man become kindred spirits who find each other at just the right time,” the synopsis adds.

In addition to Johnson, the movie boasts an A-list cast that also includes Alicia Silverstone, Tim Heidecker, David Krumholtz, Arya Parvathi, Regina Hall, Colman Domingo, Jeff Goldblum, Rachel McAdams and Andrew Dice Clay, per Deadline.

Johnson previously shared that he was working with Safdie again when he appeared at the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. After the actor bulked up to portray MMA fighter Mark Kerr in last year’s The Smashing Machine, he shared at TIFF in September 2025 that he was losing weight for Lizard Music.

“This is me slimmed down,” he said at the time. “In the process of slimming down. I still have a long ways to go.”

At the time, Johnson shared that he plays “a very whimsical and eccentric 70-something-year-old man called the Chicken Man” in the new movie.

“And his best friend is a 70-something-year-old chicken,” he shared, to laughter from the audience at TIFF. “I’m so excited because I get a chance to hopefully transform again like I was able to do in Smashing Machine. Can’t wait.”

Deadline reported that Amazon MGM Studios intends to release Lizard Music on Dec. 25, 2027.

Via: People