Callina Liang’s stunt double in Legendary’s upcoming Street Fighter movie had to wear butt pads in order to realistically match Chun-Li’s muscular physique.
Director Kitao Sakurai revealed this humorous anecdote during a Q&A session at a media event ahead of the movie’s official release. The topic was the intense training Liang underwent to achieve Chun-Li’s iconic thunder thighs, which grew her legs by 6.5 centimeters.
In fact, Liang’s silhouette had gotten so muscular that her stunt double couldn’t convincingly pull off her physique for action sequences — so she had to wear butt pads to make her glutes match the results of Chun-Li’s rigorous squat routine.
“I knew it was serious when we were filming a scene kind of later in the movie, and I saw Callina’s stunt double, and I was like, ‘What are you wearing?’ And there were like these butt pads that she had to wear just to match Callina’s physique,” Sakurai said.
Noah Centineo, who plays Ken Masters, chimed in: “Yeah, and then we had to wear them out of solidarity, too.”
“We all had huge legs,” Liang laughed.
Whatever it takes to become Chun-Li. 🫡 #StreetFighterMovie pic.twitter.com/NKDopb5iqT
— Street Fighter Movie (@Street_Fighter) September 8, 2026
Liang has been open about the work it took to bring Chun-Li to life, saying she took on a grueling martial arts routine and even ate a dozen eggs every single day to gain enough muscle mass.
“Chun-Li is all kicks. So we did a bunch of Taekwondo training, Muay Thai, and Wushu (Kung Fu). I did two hours of that a day and strengthened my legs a lot and changed my diet drastically. When I was bulking, I ate 12 eggs a day. Every two hours I had to have a meal, and I was on the verge of throwing up. But it worked. By the end of the shoot, my thighs had grown six-and-a-half centimeters each,” she said in an August interview with Empire Magazine.
That’s not all; Liang also says she downloaded every version of Street Fighter available on her PlayStation 5 and recorded Chun-Li’s moves on her phone to get a better feel for how the First Lady of Fighting Games moves in battle.
Street Fighter releases in theaters on October 16, 2026. For more on the movie, you can check out our in-depth interview with David Dastmalchian, who plays the movie’s iconic villain, M. Bison, where he told us all about how he went on a deep dive into cult leaders throughout history to bring the psycho-powered dictator to life.
Virginia Glaze
IGN News Editor / Cat Rescuer / Martial Arts / Fighting Game Girlie
Virginia (she/her) is IGN’s News Editor. With ten years of experience reporting on games and entertainment, she’s got a storied background in the fighting game community, influencer news, and viral online trends. Find her on Twitter at @TheeMissGlaze.
