Robert Downey Jr: Not A ‘Superhero Dad’

Robert Downey Jr is currently doing promotion for the film The Avengers, which he’s featured in as his most popular box office role to date, Iron Man, but as he’s told Esquire magazine he doesn’t want to be known as a “superhero dad.”

Downey Jr., 47, told the magazine that he’s fine with being seen as “a very real human being” by his 2-month old son, Exton, who he welcomed with wife Susan. The couple have been married since 2005 after they met on the set of Gothika, a film Susan Downey (Levin) produced and Downey Jr. starred in alongside actress Halle Berry.

Robert Downey Jr. also tells Esquire in their May issue, about the fears and feelings since the birth of his newborn son stating:

I guess here’s what’s come to me in the last three weeks: That anticipation and fear are going to come back. Am I going to know what to do with them? Does any new parent, even if you’re not a first-time parent, ever really know what to do? Only thing you have to do, the only requirement, if you can hack it, is to not transfer your own discomfort in the moment to this fresh soul, right? You got to be mindful. I don’t want to be so confident in myself. It’s that balance between being relaxed enough to not be communicating anxiety and present enough to not be creating the very thing that you were anxious about by being so relaxed — because I’ve seen that parenting style, too.

Robert Downey Jr. also has an elder son Indio Downey, 19, with ex-wife Deborah Falconer. The two divorced after a tumultuous 12 year marriage.