Dwayne Johnson Would Like a Word, Please

He’s at thirty-five thousand feet in the bird, somewhere over the Mojave Desert, and Dwayne Johnson is talking about his balls. One of his balls, actually—the one on which he felt a lump last Friday night while he was taking a shower. It hurt when he touched it. His tequila on the rocks sloshes gently in the mahogany cup holder as he describes the lonely terror he felt in that moment, then beyond that moment, for the rest of the night at home, and for the whole weekend, when he kept hoping it would get better and it got worse. On Monday he was supposed to stand on a stage with Kevin Hart and Jack Black promoting the newest Jumanji movie, yukking it up and smiling for a thousand photos, but all he could think about was whether his left testicle might kill him before his fifty-fourth birthday.