Jaimie Alexander has a great publicist. A few years ago, I could barely pick Jaimie out of a line-up, and now she’s killing red carpets, getting major magazine covers and starring in her own network drama. Of course, her role on Blindspot is causing drama, but that just ups her name-recognition even more. Plus, she’s engaged to Peter Facinelli, which… er, good luck with that! Anyway, Jaimie covers the new issue of Shape Magazine and she comes across as a very tough woman. Physically tough, resilient, strong. It’s nice – most actresses spend their interviews talking about yoga, diets and Pilates. Jaimie talks about boxing, wrestling, push-up competitions and eating all the time.

Skinny is so not her goal in life. “I pretty much eat all day to keep my strength up. I’m primarily a vegetarian who has an occasional side of fish. When I trained for the movie Thor, there were days when I was burning 4,000 calories and I had to slam lots of protein shakes. Now my day starts with a green shake called Garden of Plenty, which is packed with superfoods and grains. When I’m working, craft services makes me these amazing gluten-free wraps with lots of vegetables and ‘vegannaisse’ or hummus. I generally keep my diet pretty healthy, but if there’s pizza, I’ll eat it. And I will knock back a beer or some bourbon, too. I don’t deprive myself. And I hate being skinny. It’s not a good look for me. When I eat well and work out, I’m truly at my best.”

She was a wrestler in high school. “In competition, I only went up against females, but I trained with the guys because there weren’t enough girls on my school team. All the discipline and perseverance I have now comes from that sport. I get through all the intense physical training for Blindspot because of what I learned from wrestling.”

She learned to box with Chris Hemsworth. “I wasn’t very healthy in my twenties—I sat around and ate a lot of crap, and my weight peaked at 150 pounds. Then I got the part in Thor. I felt as if I had a whole new purpose in life. I was like, I can do this, but I was so out of shape. Chris and I started boxing to train for our roles, and I became the athlete I was in high school. I lost 20 pounds and packed on a ton of muscle.”

On her pushup contest with Arnold Schwarzenegger: “I made a movie called The Last Stand with Arnold, and everybody went to the gym together. It was super intimidating to work out with him because he was curling a gazillion pounds, but I did it. On set, the crew had a perfect push-up contest, which Arnold supervised. I lost, but I learned that I can do 25 of them, so I felt pretty good about it.”

On getting (glued) into character: “When I read the script for Blindspot, I said, Wow, this ticks all my boxes.” The character is vulnerable but tough. The role uses my sports and fighting background. And my character’s body is a massive canvas with an endless number of tattoos. They’re actually glued onto me. The first time I got all the tattoos applied, my body kind of went into shock because my skin – my largest organ – was covered with glue! But once I relaxed, it was extraordinary, especially when I caught sight of myself in the mirror. Every Friday I take off the tattoos, and every Monday we put them on again. This has been such a cool role for me to play because honestly, if I weren’t an actress, I’d be fully sleeved with tattoos anyway.”

On being engaged to a vampire: “I never saw myself getting married or having children. It just wasn’t on my agenda. But being with Peter [Facinelli, who played a vampire in the Twilight series] is the best-case scenario, because he has these three beautiful kids and I’m so happy to be in their lives.”

[From Shape]

She comes across as very matter-of-fact, direct and dare I say, butch. That’s not a slam – people always say that I’m butch, that I write, think and talk like a dude. So I recognize that quality in other women and I don’t think it’s a put-on in Jaimie’s case. She also tells the magazine that her current workout is called The Prison Workout, and she trained with a Navy SEAL for Blindspot. She really IS that tough.

Photos courtesy of Shape.