If you’re looking for a cure for any unwanted Sunday Scaries, look no further than Zac Efron and his puppy companion.
Efron, 36, took to his Instagram Stories on Sunday, January 14, to share his adventures with a furry friend. The Iron Claw star stood shirtless in a kitchen as a friend held a big dog up to Efron’s face. Efron adorably puckered his lips, seemingly about to give the pooch a kiss.
Efron is a big animal lover, adopting his first canine, named Puppy, in April 2012. Puppy, an Australian shepherd, died in 2016. Eventually, Efron added to his family and rescued dogs Chapelle, Dreamer and Maca. Efron also likes to help other pups in need.
“I rescued a dog. He was a puppy and he got away,” he previously revealed during an April 2016 interview with BuzzFeed. “I just ran out in the yard to go save him, like in the street, in my underwear — I just woke up — and snagged him and was like, ‘No, don’t run away.’ And I looked up and my neighbor and his whole family were like, ‘Morning!’ I was like, ‘Hey! This is awkward. You have a lot of kids.’”
While Efron was no doubt in shape when he saved the stray dog in 2016, he’s even more so now. Training to play former pro wrestler Kevin Von Erich in 2023’s The Iron Claw required an intense physical transformation.
“It was shocking at every point of the transformation,” Efron recalled to Entertainment Tonight in November 2023. “I remember Harris [Dickinson, my costar] and I were walking out of hair and makeup and it was the first time we had to wear the full kit, and we were both thinking, ‘What the hell are we doing here, man? How did we get into this?’”
Zac Efron Courtesy of Zac Efron/Instagram
According to Efron, he was inspired to bulk up by Von Erich, now 66, himself.
“The physicality he brought to the ring every single day was really unique. It changed wrestling,” Efron added at the time. “I knew that was going to be the hardest [thing] for me to master and get right. So, I put everything I had into it.”
Efron costarred in The Iron Claw with Dickinson, 27, and Jeremy Allen White, who both also got in peak shape to play pro wrestlers.
“It was wild. One of the cool things in the movie is Jeremy … does these overhead push-ups from the ground. Like, those are hard to do,” Efron quipped of White, 32, during a December 2023 appearance on Barstool Sports’ KFC Radio. “I can’t get many reps in those [and] I was impressed, man. You blew out, like, 10 to 15 in one take — and then again when you were doing that kegstand.”