Bradley Cooper still suffering from The Elephant Man on Broadway

Actor Bradley Cooper suffered through physical pain while performing in The Elephant Man on Broadway and only now is he opening up about the extent of his self-impose injuries.

The American Hustle star portrayed the severely deformed John Merrick in the play and opted to forego prosthetics and instead contort his body for authenticity.

However, the physical strain left him in pain and with some lasting problems.

He tells the BBC, "Right now my face twitches sometimes... The physical challenge is having to twist my body and hold it for two hours. It's brutal, we did 120 performances in New York and in the last two weeks of the play I started to feel it in my back and my mouth and my face, all the muscles got very strong.

"This side is bigger, I don't know what's going to happen (in London). I do worry a little bit, I'm not going to lie."

To help himself deal with the pain, Cooper will be using an inversion table for his West End run, which begins on 19 May (15).

He continues, "You lie on it and then, like a bat, you turn over - I have it where I'm staying. You do that morning and night and then find a person who can do massage work every day."