Russell Crowe has said that he has no cartilage in his toes and has “a disintegrating hip” as a result of injuries picked up in his years as an action star.

As he told WENN about the various bumps and fractures he’s endured over his 25-year career, the Gladiator star confessed that practically every scar on his body is the result of filming.

He no longer performs his own stunts on set because he believes he won’t be able to recover as quickly as he once could now that he’s 52.

He tells WENN, “The older I get the less that’s just physically possible.”

“I remember when I was a young fella doing all of my stunts and the occasional older actor would go, ‘Why are you doing it? Why don’t you let the stunt guys do it

“Now that I’m an older guy, I’m like, that was a piece of kindness and wisdom that had just missed me at the time, because you do start stacking this up. I’ve got this embarrassing thing where I’ve got one scar on my body that is from something other than a film set; every other scar is about being on a film set.”

“I’ve got no cartilage in my toes anymore; that’s from doing a whole bunch of lateral stops. I’ve got grade-four tears in both Achilles tendons. I’ve got shin splints. I’ve got bone marrow ademas under both knees. I’ve got one disintegrating hip.”

‘I’ve got a rib in my upper thoracic that pops off my spine, which is a very pleasant morning if that ever happens!

‘I’ve had two operations on my left shoulder.’

He continued, “This stuff comes from committing to the job and giving myself over to the job.”

Crowe says that he told Shane Black, the director of his upcoming action comedy The Nice Guys, that he wasn’t interested in a sequence of stunts.

He was especially wary of taking too many bumps after gaining over 27 kg for his role as clumsy 1970s enforcer Jackson Healy.

“I said, ‘There’s two things at play here; one is, because I’m getting older, I want to make sure that I get through everything that I’m responsible for. The other thing is, I’m carrying a lot of extra weight, so if we start grinding on stuff and doing it over and over again I’m gonna hurt myself …”