Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson health struggles explored as actor’s lean physique at Venice film festival sparks concern

Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson debuted his new film, the Benny Safdie directed The Smashing Machine at the Venice Film Festival on September 1. Aside from receiving thunderous applause and a 15-minute-long standing ovation for the film, Johnson’s appearance at the festival also sparked concern among fans who were stunned to view photographs of his relatively slimmer appearance.

According to Page Six, social media was flooded with comments on Johnson’s appearance at the Venice film festival, with a few fans joking about The Rock’s changed appearance and many expressing concern about his health. Page Six also reported that Johnson’s slimmer appearance could perhaps be attributed to the fact that the Moana actor recently confessed to The Hollywood Reporter that he underwent a physical transformation to play UFC wrestler Mark Kerr in The Smashing Machine.

Nevertheless, concerns about Johnson’s health stem from a few candid confessions that the actor and wrestler has made over the years.

The Rock is currently going viral after losing a lot of muscle👀 pic.twitter.com/joGhS4GMo1

— kira 👾 (@kirawontmiss) September 1, 2025

All about Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s health struggles

During a recent conversation with Dr. Mark Hyman for The Dr. Hyman Show, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson opened up about suffering from gut health issues, which confounded him for a long period of time. After years of dealing with the problem, Johnson confided in his business partner, Ari Emanuel, about the issue in 2023, who connected him to Hyman, who deals with functional medicine, as per The New York Post.

During the interview, Johnson, while describing his conversation with Emanuel, said,

“He’s like, ‘What’s going on?’ I said, ‘I’ve seen doctors and I can’t quite nail it. I can’t quite fix it. It’s in my digestion. I feel great — and that’s the odd thing — but I just can’t crack it.’”

Johnson reflected on his conversation with Hyman, and said,

“And you had said very succinctly, you had said, ‘I'm not going to treat your symptoms. I'm going to go deeper than that and I'm going to treat the root cause of what's going on.’ And I said, ‘I love that.’”

Continuing to recall his health journey, Johnson said,

“You said, ‘hey, we're going to do a deep dive with your blood panel and we're going to do a stool test and we're going to do all these tests. So, we're going to find out what's going on.’ And that was at the beginning of 2024. And I was just getting ready to launch into what would what would become a 9 month work for me, workload for me of non-stop work.”

As per Johnson’s own admission during the conversation, he was having trouble digesting. Eventually, Johnson’s doctors discovered that the actor was having trouble due to consuming two rounds of antibiotics that had destroyed important gut bacteria. Hyman recalled during the interview,

“There's a a very important bacteria that can easily killed when you take an antibiotic called acromancia, which is basically coating the lining of your intestine. It protects you from having food and proteins and bacteria leaking in and causing inflammation in your body. And when you have gut issues, it can, you know, it can spread. It can lead to your whole body being out of balance.”

The doctors solved Johnson’s issues by having the actor take more probiotics and plant chemicals to rebuild the bacteria in his gut.

Apart from his gut health issues, Johnson has also dealt with mental health struggles over the years. According to ABC News, the actor recounted his early struggles with mental health during The Pivot podcast, and said,

“I left school, but the interesting thing at the time is, I didn't know what mental health was. I didn't know what depression was. I just knew I didn't want to be there.”

The wrestler also shared that over time, his attitude towards mental health improved. However, he struggled with depression when he divorced his wife in 2008. Recalling the period, Johnson, as per ABC News, said,

“I knew what it was at that time and luckily I had some friends that I could lean on and say, 'Hey I'm feeling a little wobbly now. I got a little struggle happening.’…I've worked hard over the years to gain the emotional tools to work through any mental pain that may come to test me.”

As for the recent change in his appearance, Dwayne Johnson has not commented on any health issues that he has been struggling with of late. Despite that, fans are concerned and are keeping their eyes peeled for any news on Johnson’s health.