Actors are no strangers to therapy. But when Michael Chiklis found himself on the phone with a psychologist during the filming of "Fantastic Four," it wasn't to talk about a creative block or the effect of location shooting on his marriage. He needed to vent about his costume.

"For the first time in my adult life I faced a challenge that made me think, 'Oh my God, I can't do this,"' said Mr. Chiklis, who plays Ben Grimm, aka the Thing, in "Fantastic Four," which opens on Friday. "I was saying: 'I'm too scared. I'm too freaked out."' For more than five months, he spent up to five and a half hours a day getting into his comic book character's hugely complicated makeup and wardrobe. "Once they glued the suit on me, I couldn't get it off without help, no matter how hard I struggled," he recalled. "I had six people around me all day, to take me out of the suit, put an air conditioner in my head and feed me water. I couldn't eat real food, and I lived on protein drinks during the entire shoot. Going to the bathroom was horrendous. It was a physical and psychological nightmare."

Dr. Nancy Subel, the Los Angeles clinical psychologist with whom Mr. Chiklis spoke at least three times, told him to ground himself in the reality around him and to resist giving in to anxiety, lest it snowball. "She had me describe to myself everything in my dressing room and reminded me that actors often live in the moment, no matter how difficult that moment can be," he said. "Then she told me to get out of the makeup chair and walk around," advice he followed -- even though his costume's shoes weighed 13 pounds each.

His talks with Dr. Subel weren't the only therapy Mr. Chiklis received as he filmed his first major film role since winning an Emmy for "The Shield." "Thank God the Red Sox were on DirecTV all last summer," he said. "Watching the games while they did my makeup saved me." CRAIG MODDERNO