The Avengers

Joss Whedon has assembled a world-class team of superheroes for “The Avengers,” but on the New Mexico set the writer-director was more in touch with his inner supervillain, according to Tom Hiddleston, who plays the evil Loki in the film.

“The brain power is astonishing and he’s always giggling about something,” the British actor said of Whedon. “He has this intermittently generous and supportive side as a director but I also think as an artist he has a really dark sense of humor. He kept telling me how much fun he had writing Loki. He steps inside the villains in a way that he doesn’t with the heroes. “

Hiddleston has just worked with Woody Allen on “Midnight in Paris” and with Steven Spielberg on the upcoming “Warhorse” and he said there was no risk of confusing those graybeard auteurs with the ginger-haired Whedon, who is the sort of director who does his own stunts on set.

“Joss gets really excited, I love hearing him giggle from behind the monitor,” Hiddleston said. “It’s almost like he’s hiding behind his own giggles. He’s lost a lot of weight during this film. There was one scene where Robert Downey Jr. has to fall to floor and we were trying to work out how to do the film and trying to work out how extreme it should be and Joss came over and said, ‘I think it should be like this,’ and he just hurled himself at the floor headfirst. I was like, ‘Buddy, are you OK? We could pad you up before you do that!’ But he went up in my estimation after that.”