Glenn Close says she’s hitting the treadmill ahead of return to ‘Sunset Boulevard’ in London

LONDON – Glenn Close is getting ready to reprise her starring role as silent screen diva Norma Desmond in “Sunset Boulevard” — by taking to the treadmill.

Close said Monday that her preparation involved working out. “You have to have strong muscles in you to project that kind of energy on the stage.”

“So I’m getting on the treadmill, which is not something I really love to do,” she told reporters at the English National Opera’s Coliseum theatre.

Close won a Tony Award in 1995 for the Broadway production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical, based on Billy Wilder’s 1950 film.

Two decades on, she will play Desmond — the faded femme fatale who declares “I am big — it’s the pictures that got small” — for 43 performances at the Coliseum starting April 1.

The production will be “semi-staged,” with the opera’s orchestra onstage alongside the cast.

The 68-year-old “Fatal Attraction” star has been nominated for six Academy Awards. She has won three Emmys and three Tonys.

Next year’s run of “Sunset Boulevard” will be Close’s first time on the London stage since she starred in “A Streetcar Named Desire” at the National Theatre in 2002

Close said Norma Desmond “haunted me after I left her,” and playing her again would be like discovering a new character.

“It’s going to be another exploration for me, because I’ve had 20 years of life, I’ve had 20 more years of my craft, and I think she won’t be exactly the same,” she said.