'X-Men' Star James McAvoy Says He 'Nearly Died' From 'Botched' Lung Procedure: 'It Was Crazy'

X-Men star James McAvoy, 47, said he “nearly died” after undergoing a lung biopsy in 2017 that didn’t go as planned.

He explained on Dax Shepard’s podcast “Armchair Expert” on Monday, October 12, that complications related to the biopsy resulted in him being hospitalized for several weeks.

McAvoy said the problems began after doctors spotted a shadow on his lung. He explained that he underwent a procedure known as a lung puncture to allow for a biopsy to check for cancer, and fortunately, the biopsy showed no evidence of cancer.

However, the relief didn’t last.

The Atonement star then told Shepard, “But that was botched, and I nearly died,” adding he got "an infection.”

Past reports described the complication as an infected surgical scar.

McAvoy said that a medical emergency occurred after his biopsy. “I was at home two days later, my lungs just collapsed in bed one night, and I was on my own as well, so it was crazy,” he remembered.

He was hospitalized for what he described as “two or three weeks,” during which time doctors attempted to treat the infection. “They tried everything to clean [it] out,” McAvoy said. “Nothing was working.”

Ultimately, the doctors told him surgery would be needed.

“So they were like, ‘We’re going to cut you open, big style. Go in with, like, dish soap, basically, and just, like, clean you out, scoop it all out,’” he said.

The health scare occurred shortly before McAvoy began preparing for M. Night Shyamalan’s 2019 thriller Glass, in which he reprised his Split role as Kevin Wendell Crumb, a man with multiple personalities, including one known as the Beast, opposite Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson. McAvoy said his personal trainer for the role, Magnus Lygdback, helped regulate his diet, “trained [him] just right,” and “basically rehabilitated” him throughout the first four weeks after he left the hospital.

On the podcast, McAvoy also walked Shepard through the physical preparation he did for the role once he’d recovered enough to start building muscle.

McAvoy ultimately gained 16 pounds of muscle for the film role. “It nearly killed me,” he said of the infection in a previous interview. “It was very scary. A terrifying f------ thing to go through. But weirdly, I could lift f------ 160 kilos.”

His recovery also gave him a chance to rethink his priorities after nearly three decades in acting, according to a past interview.

Early in his career, McAvoy was known for youthful, boyish roles in projects such as Shameless, Atonement and The Last King of Scotland. In later films, McAvoy appeared much more muscular. Glass went on to earn over $240 million worldwide at the box office after its January 2019 release.

This isn’t the first time McAvoy has spoken publicly about the harrowing experience. In a 2019 interview, he said doctors didn’t provide him with clear answers about what was occurring, and he recalled that one of his abdominal muscles disappeared after surgery without any explanation from doctors.

McAvoy is best known for portraying a young Professor Charles Xavier in the X-Men film series, starting with X-Men: First Class in 2011. Earlier this year, McAvoy released his directorial debut, California Schemin’.