Mackenzie Crook is convinced fame has left him with a recurring back problem as he has spent years hunching over to avoid fan encounters.
The Pirates of the Caribbean actor, who shot to fame in U.K. TV comedy The Office in 2001, reveals a recent scan showed he has five slipped discs - and he has blamed his poor posture on his star status.
He tells Britain's Daily Mail, "People are only ever nice to me, but I just kind of curl up a bit. When people come up to me in the street I never know whether I have met them before and should stop and talk or just say 'Hi' and scuttle on. I tend to look at the ground to avoid eye contact; it avoids embarrassment all round.
"My back started really hurting when I went to America so I went for a scan and it turned out I had five slipped discs. They reckoned the injury was 10 years old; there was nothing that I could think of that would hurt me like that. But it is 10 years since The Office started; 10 years of walking around with my back hunched.
"In New York no one recognised me so I stood upright with really good posture. But as soon as I came home I was doubling over again."