3 things you likely don't know about actor Ryan Reynolds

When I sat down to interview actor Ryan Reynolds for CBC's The National, I wondered: is there anything about him that I didn't already know. Anything that hadn't already been written about.

Just look at the past few weeks. From a stealthy appearance in a Super Bowl ad, to promoting the new Netflix movie The Adam Project, to he and his wife Blake Lively matching donations of up to $1 million for Ukrainian refugees, a lot of people are paying attention to and talking about the actor/entrepreneur/philanthropist.

But for a guy whose Twitter handle is @vancityreynolds, it turns out asking him about his connection to his hometown unveiled a few surprises.

I knew the teenage Ryan Reynolds worked at a Vancouver supermarket, and not just any supermarket. It was actually my neighbourhood store, and I shopped there so often I probably walked by while he was stocking shelves.

But what I didn't know, until we chatted, was he had his own celebrity-spotting moment there. 

Before I get to that, Reynolds told me he "loved" working at the supermarket — usually on the overnight shift — and said a few of his co-workers were, "the funniest people on Earth. Some of the biggest impressions on me, actually, like as a performer, were the people, the folks I was working with at night."

Occasionally he worked the checkout, and that's where the lives of two Vancouver stars crossed paths.

"I used to bag Sarah McLachlan's groceries, and I always noted that she was incredibly kind to everybody that she met in that store. Didn't have to be. No-one even knew it was her, half the time she had a toque pulled down. But yeah, it was her. She was awesome."

He didn't make the comparison, but it wasn't lost on me. Two pretty big Vancouver stars, well known for being very kind to fans.

WATCH | Actor Ryan Reynolds reminisces about working the night shift at a local grocery store in Vancouver as a teen:

If you've done much driving in downtown Vancouver, you've probably crossed the Georgia Viaduct, an overpass flanked by the home rink for the Vancouver Canucks and BC Place Stadium.

In 2015, it was closed for two weeks to film Deadpool, an unusual kind of superhero movie. Reynolds' Deadpool was funny and vulgar and very appealing to audiences. 

But apparently the studio was much less confident.

Reynolds says Deadpool was his "first foray into producing," and it came with a big challenge. The budget was so tight, "we had to turn every dollar into what felt like a hundred dollars."