Dwayne Johnson plays a 70-year-old Chicken Man in first Lizard Music set photos

Dwayne Johnson has swapped the hulking frame of The Smashing Machine for a tan bucket hat, a worn coat and a slice of pizza. On Tuesday, the actor was spotted in Coney Island, Brooklyn, filming Lizard Music, the new movie from Uncut Gems director Benny Safdie — and this time he is playing a 70-year-old known as the Chicken Man.

In the set photos, Johnson walks alongside his young co-star Theo Clark Leber, who carries an oversized lizard plush. The transformation is the work of prosthetic makeup artist Kazu Hiro, who recently turned Tom Cruise into a geriatric oil baron for Digger. The images offer the first look at Johnson’s latest big-screen transformation.

It is the second time Safdie has hidden Johnson’s leading-man looks. For The Smashing Machine, the 2025 drama, the actor bulked into real-life MMA fighter Mark Kerr. This time the direction runs the opposite way — 30 pounds lighter and decades older.

Lizard Music is based on Daniel Pinkwater’s children’s book of the same name. According to the official logline, it follows a young boy who stumbles upon strange lizard musicians on late-night TV and befriends a peculiar man with an elderly chicken. Joining Johnson in the cast are Rachel McAdams, Colman Domingo, David Krumholtz, Jeff Goldblum, Alicia Silverstone and Regina Hall. It is an unusually stacked ensemble for a children’s book adaptation.

Losing 30 pounds for the Chicken Man

Johnson said during a 2025 Toronto Film Festival career retrospective that it took Safdie about 45 minutes to convince him to take the role. He also revealed that he shed 30 pounds of muscle to play the Chicken Man.

“I’m so excited to get a chance to hopefully transform again like I was able to do in Smashing Machine,” Johnson said. “[It means] eating less chicken.”

From Amazon MGM Studios, Lizard Music is set for release on Christmas Day 2027, leaving more than a year before the film reaches theaters.