Wild horses couldn’t drag a Strood cleaner from his acting dreams after he landed a role in Steven Spielberg’s latest epic.

Curtis Thompson, 21, who is also a kickboxing champion, spent three months on the set of First World War drama War Horse, released today.

He juggled playing a soldier in vast battle scenes with a weekend cleaning job at Strood and Frindsbury Working Men’s Club and regular kickboxing bouts.

Curtis, who has won headline fights at the Casino Rooms and Amadeus nightclubs, had no idea Spielberg was directing the film when he signed up.

He met the three-times Oscar-winning director of E.T., Indiana Jones and Jurassic Park on outdoor battle sets in Bedfordshire and Surrey.

The former New Brompton College student, who lives with his mum Helen Masters, 46, in Darnley Close, said: “I was a bit scared to talk to him to be honest, but he was very down to earth – just a really ordinary, nice guy.”

The film, based on the novel by Michael Morpurgo, tells the story of a horse torn from its peaceful farm life and sent to the front.

Curtis, whose past credits include an infamous banned Xbox advert of a baby being born, ageing as it flies through the air then dying as it hits the ground, played one of 500 English and German soldiers in battle scenes.

He said: “I am quite physically fit but I wish I had trained more. When it came to running through the mud and all that you would get weighed down and physically sick from exhaustion.

“I was shell-shocked for a couple of days doing the no man’s land stuff. Watching your friends die in front of you was horrific, even though they got back up.”
Curtis, whose stepbrothers Alex Chapman, 23, and Ben Chapman, 26, are serving in Iraq, added: “At one point we got chased by 300 horses up the field. We didn’t have to act, it was fear!”

The actor started his career with ballet, tap, jazz and street dancing from the age of four, and he is applying for a job at trendy clothes shop Hollister in Bluewater.

He said he couldn’t have done it without the support of his family and girlfriend Sarah Mosca, 20, from Chatham.

He added: “I’ll probably just go with her to see the film – I don’t want to bring all my mates! She’s great, always pushing me to do more.”