Transformers actor Shia LaBeouf has moved away from his Jewish roots to embrace Christianity following his latest role.

Mr LaBeouf, whose mother is Jewish and who had a barmitzvah, told Interview magazine that his time spent portraying the deeply religious Boyd ‘Bible’ Swan in David Ayer’s Fury had greatly affected him.

“I found God doing Fury. I became a Christian man … in a very real way. I could have just said the prayers that were on the page. But it was a real thing that really saved me.”

The actor, who achieved worldwide fame while playing protagonist Sam Witwicky in the Transformers series, went on to say that the transition was “wild”.

“You can’t identify unless you’re really going through it. It’s a full-blown exchange of heart, a surrender of control. And while there’s beauty to that, acting is all about control. So that was a wild thing to navigate.

“I had good people around me who helped me. Brad [Pitt] was really instrumental in guiding my head through this.”

Mr LaBeouf, 28, is a well-known method actor who reportedly had a tooth removed and refused to shower for weeks to empathise with his latest subject.