Ryan Reynolds – I don't take family for granted

The Hollywood star reflects on home life and his new Applet festive flick Spirited

There's a lot to be said for taking big swings. Despite the comfort of 30 or more years in showbiz, Ryan Reynolds is on a journey of reinvention, taking on things he never dreamed were possible.

It could be that the 2016 superhero film Deadpool was the springboard to creative freedom, as seen in sci-fi drama The Adam Project and satirical adventure Free Guy, but if you ask the Canadian actor himself, it simply comes down to sentimentality.

"As I've got older in this business, I appreciate and value getting to work with either people who I already love and I'm friends with, or people I've always really hoped to work with or be around," tells Ryan, 46.

That much is certainly true of his latest left turn, Spirited, the all-singing, all-dancing reimagining of the Charles Dickens' tale A Christmas Carol, which Ryan describes as "the most challenging project I've ever done".