Ryan Gosling explains his decision to avoid roles that “put him in a dark place” for his children

Ryan Gosling is the most talked-about man of the moment, with the world still not over his iconic portrayal of Ken in Greta Gerwig's Barbie. And with his new film, The Fall Guy, now in cinemas (and getting rave reviews across the board), this shows no sign of slowing down. 

Gosling stars in the highly-anticipated comedy alongside Emily Blunt, following retired stuntman Colt Seavers (Gosling) forced into real life action after a major movie star goes missing. 

And being two of the most popular stars of the moment thanks to their "Barbenheimer" success, their interviews in the film's run-up have been going viral.

This week, it was Gosling's words about his role selection that made headlines, as the 43-year-old opened up about his recent move away from dark, edgy characters. 

According to Gosling, the shift happened when he became a father, with the actor and his partner Eva Mendes being more selective about roles for the sake of their family, sharing two daughters, Esmeralda, 9, and Amada, 8.

"I don’t really take roles that are going to put me in some kind of dark place,” Gosling explained in a recent interview with WSJ Magazine. “This moment is what I feel like trying to read the room at home and feel like what is going to be best for all of us.” 

He continued: “The decisions I make, I make them with [Eva Mendes] and we make them with our family in mind first.”

Gosling reflected however that his daughters did have one request on his most recent film, recalling that they "asked specifically" that he not do pyrotechnics. 

“My kids didn’t want me to be set on fire,” he explained further in a recent interview with PEOPLE. “Even though I said, ‘Well, it’s actually, technically the safer thing to do because there’s a lot of protective stuff involved.’" But according to Gosling his daughters "were like, ‘No. No fire.’ So I didn’t do it.”

The Fall Guy is out now and available to watch. 

We will continue to update this story.