Robert Downey Jr on Iron-Man 'I am not my work'

Los Angeles: For over a decade, Robert Downey Jr has been Tony Stark aka Iron-Man for Marvel fanatics around the world but the actor is clear, in real life, he is not the beloved superhero.

The actor, whose career stemmed from theatre, said his off-Broadway training taught him to maintain "aesthetic distance" from the characters he plays in order to remain in touch with his identity.

"I am not my work. I am not what I did with that studio. I am not that period of time that I spent playing this character (Iron-Man).

"And it sucks, because the kid in all of us wants to be like, 'No. It's always going to be summer camp and we're all holding hands and singing 'Kumbaya'," Downey Jr told The Hollywood Reporter.

But both Disney's Marvel Studio and the actor benefited from the mirror-like personas of the Hollywood star and Iron-Man.

The 54-year-old actor earned USD 50 million as backend profit participation for Avengers (2012), and he made USD 75 million for Avengers : Infinity War.