# Once promising actors who went off the rails later in their careers **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 21, 2020, 12:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237 "2020-05-21T12:54:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![LegendHasit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/legendhasit/32/8246_2.png) [@LegendHasit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LegendHasit)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2020, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/61 "2020-05-29T02:25:01Z")
Heather Locklear ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2020, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/62 "2020-06-01T20:05:41Z")
Jeremy Irons. When he makes movies to please the artsy-fartsy crowd (_Swann in Love, The Mission, Dead Ringers_) he is one of the best thespians in the business. When he makes movies to please his children and grandchildren (_Dungeons and Dragons, Eragon_), he can chew the scenery like a wood-chipper. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/63 "2020-06-02T01:29:14Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > Jeremy Irons. > > When he makes movies to please the artsy-fartsy crowd (_Swann in Love, The Mission, Dead Ringers_) he is one of the best thespians in the business. > > When he makes movies to please his children and grandchildren (_Dungeons and Dragons, Eragon_), he can chew the scenery like a wood-chipper. “Ooh, I QUIVER with fear!” ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/64 "2020-06-02T15:13:57Z")
I’m honestly surprised that no one has yet mentioned Brendan Fraser and Cuba Gooding jr. ---
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/65 "2020-06-02T15:26:43Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > He’s been working pretty steadily, but mostly in supporting roles. Good supporting roles, and he gets decent billing, but with one or two exceptions, he doesn’t have the lead. > > I wouldn’t say that his career has gone off the rails, though–he does have the lead in a drama movie (_Let Him Go_), to be released later this summer. > [@BigDfromLA](#): > > Kevin Costner was on top of the world after J.F.K., Dances With Wolves and The Bodyguard. What happened? Kevin Costner has definitely not gone-off-the-rails. Have you guys seen Yellowstone? I think it’s a pretty good series on the Paramount channel. It’s worth checking out. Kevin Costner is the lead of the show. It’s not movies, but personally I feel that doesn’t matter as movies are becoming more and more irrelevant with so many more good opportunities for actors to do something more meaningful than repeating the same superhero story on the big screen. ---
**Author:** ![gdave](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gdave/32/3683_2.png) [@gdave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gdave)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/66 "2020-06-02T16:07:50Z")
> [@Enright3](#): > > I’m honestly surprised that no one has yet mentioned Brendan Fraser and Cuba Gooding jr. Brendan Fraser’s _career_ went off the rails, but I don’t think he ever did as an actor. He’s currently doing (imho) a good job in DC Universe’s streaming _Doom Patrol_ series. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/67 "2020-06-02T16:33:55Z")
> [@Tusculan](#): > > Re Dwayne Johnson: I agree that he seems to have acting skills. I usually like his performance. However the topic is about going off the rails, not about talented actors choosing blockbuster movies in preference to critical darlings. Johnson is very charismatic and has excellent comedic chops. In comedies and lighthearted adventures he’s hilarious. His dramatic skills, however, are quite dreadful; if asked to do anything serious, you can see the man behind the curtain. In truth, he is really, really good at choosing the right movies. He’s PERFECT for stuff like Jumanji and this upcoming Jungle Cruise movie. > [@BigDfromLA](#): > > Remember the show Alias? Bradley Cooper was just a guy, probably the fifth lead. I wonder what his castmates like Jennifer Garner and Michael Vartan think when they see how huge his career has become? I mean, someone has to, and Cooper is the hardest working man in show business. Garner’s done pretty well for herself. I’m not sure a lot of actors would think their careers had gone off the rails if they’re still working. How their movies are accepted by critics is way less important to them than it is to pretty much anyone else. Not that some actors don’t care but many don’t, or don’t care all that much. What matters to them is getting steady work. Cuba Gooding Jr. may have been in a lot of bad movies since Jerry Maguire but he’s been getting roles and getting paid, and that’s what counts. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/68 "2020-06-02T18:02:34Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > You know for a two time Academy Award winner…wed don’t hear much from Kevin Costner. Costner’s a weird case, I think. He’s capable of being really good, but, for some reason, only in sports movies; _Bull Durham_ is one of the best sports movies ever made, and \*For the Love of the Game \*was a solid piece of storytelling. Never saw them, but _Field of Dreams_ and _Tin Cup_ are pretty well-regarded too, I understand. > [@Hampshire](#): > > I don’t know if anyone ever though of Dwayne Johnson as a “promising actor” but I think the guy knows exactly what kind of actor he is and is at the peak of his career right now. He’s getting the lead role in campy action blockbusters one after another that are making the studios rich and making him rich. Bit of a hijack, but I’ve noticed several wrestlers who have solid comedy chops – Dave Bautista was funny in the _Guardians of the Galaxy_ movies, and John Cena stole every scene he was in in _Trainwreck_ (from Amy Shumer!). There must be something about wrestling that hones comedic timing. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/69 "2020-06-02T18:17:29Z")
Given that professional wrestling is a performance, the ones who succeed presumably have some acting skills. ---
**Author:** ![dorvann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df705f/32.png) [@dorvann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorvann)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/70 "2020-06-02T23:18:27Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Given that professional wrestling is a performance, the ones who succeed presumably have some acting skills. As a counter-point I have seen most of Hulk Hogan’s movies and they were mostly horrible. Hogan is not a good actor at all—I wouldn’t even say he is a competent actor; he is just bad. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/71 "2020-06-02T23:20:13Z")
Wasn’t his wrestling career a long time ago? Perhaps standards have changed since then? ---
**Author:** ![dorvann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/df705f/32.png) [@dorvann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dorvann)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/72 "2020-06-02T23:28:03Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Wasn’t his wrestling career a long time ago? Perhaps standards have changed since then? That’s a fair point; Hogan’s act was based in the 80s. The Rock came along a generation after Hogan and Cena and Batista are from the generation after the Rock. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2020, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/73 "2020-06-02T23:28:57Z")
> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > Costner’s a weird case, I think. He’s capable of being really good, but, for some reason, only in sports movies Costner was quite good in **A Perfect World** playing an escaped convict. He’s hit or miss, but mainly suffers from a constricted range. He plays emotionally constipated characters constantly, but can come off as over-earnest and pretentious if not restrained by a decent director. Unlike so many fans I also think his early comic turn in **Silverado** was awful. But then I never got the love for **Silverado** in general - I liked John Cleese as a sheriff and that’s about it. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2020, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/74 "2020-06-03T00:14:41Z")
> [@gdave](#): > > Brendan Fraser’s _career_ went off the rails, but I don’t think he ever did as an actor. He’s currently doing (imho) a good job in DC Universe’s streaming _Doom Patrol_ series. His whole life went a bit off the rails, between the sexual assault and the major destruction of his body during the last Mummy film. But he was good in that Getty thing and he’s still got the acting chops even if he’s no longer playing action heroes and goofy boyfriends. > [@RickJay](#): > > Johnson is very charismatic and has excellent comedic chops. In comedies and lighthearted adventures he’s hilarious. His dramatic skills, however, are quite dreadful; if asked to do anything serious, you can see the man behind the curtain. I would agree except as noted he’s really good in Ballers. It probably helps that he’s playing a version of himself. > [@](#): > > I mean, someone has to, and Cooper is the hardest working man in show business. For a while that was actually Johnson, who has been cranking out a steady stream of bankable if not particularly noteworthy films for years and has become one of the highest paid actors in Hollywood for his pains. > [@](#): > > Cuba Gooding Jr. may have been in a lot of bad movies since Jerry Maguire but he’s been getting roles and getting paid, and that’s what counts. Gooding had a reverse Hollywood career path - he more or less started with the Oscar and went downhill rapidly after that, stuck in horrible films like “Kangaroo Jack”. It’s made him quite bitter and he blames the lack of roles on racism. I can’t say that he’s entirely wrong either. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2020, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/75 "2020-06-03T04:56:52Z")
Ray Liotta. ---
**Author:** ![LLCoolL](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/llcooll/32/3596_2.png) [@LLCoolL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LLCoolL)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 9:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/76 "2020-06-05T09:06:10Z")
Maybe he belongs in a different category: Haley Joel Osment. In **The Sixth Sense** , he gave possibly the best performance I’ve ever seen from a child actor. I thought he was really good in \*\*A.I. Artificial Intelligence \*\*as well. But since then… pfft. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/77 "2020-06-05T11:55:19Z")
> [@LLCoolL](#): > > Maybe he belongs in a different category: Haley Joel Osment. In **The Sixth Sense** , he gave possibly the best performance I’ve ever seen from a child actor. I thought he was really good in \*\*A.I. Artificial Intelligence \*\*as well. But since then… pfft. He’s been pretty steadily working, just not in any huge roles or stuff you watched. Most recently a nice cameo in What We Do in the Shadows, but more regularly in other programs. And voiced the main character in Kingdom Hearts. ---
**Author:** ![snowthx](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowthx/32/10660_2.png) [@snowthx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snowthx)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2020, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/78 "2020-06-05T18:24:07Z")
Corey Feldman. He seemed to be a young up-and-coming actor in the 1980s, but slipped by the wayside with substance abuse issues in the 90s, and has not had a highly visible acting profile since. He has been in the news due to child abuse revelations, but not for his acting career. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2020, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/79 "2020-06-06T05:16:13Z")
Gosh, I’d think child actors who fail as adults are more common than the reverse. Lindsay Lohan was a good child actress and fell apart as an adult. (In person, when she was about 21, I sat behind her - and next to her sister - on a flight. Lindsay Lohan was, in person, ludicrously, impossibly beautiful. Then the drugs happened.) Macaulay Culkin, what’s he done lately? Amanda Bynes really had terrible personal struggles. Corey Haim is dead. So is Dana Plato. It’s not impossible to make the transition; hell, Kurt Russell was a child actor. A number of Disney kids are doing okay, I guess. Selena Gomez seems pretty on the ball. ---
**Author:** ![LLCoolL](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/llcooll/32/3596_2.png) [@LLCoolL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LLCoolL)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2020, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237/80 "2020-06-06T10:19:11Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Gosh, I’d think child actors who fail as adults are more common than the reverse. > > … > > It’s not impossible to make the transition; hell, Kurt Russell was a child actor. A number of Disney kids are doing okay, I guess. Selena Gomez seems pretty on the ball. Jodie Foster is Exhibit A. Anna Paquin (The Piano). Saoirse Ronan (Atonement). Christian Bale (Empire of the Sun). So far so good for Elle Fanning. But I’d agree that the failures outnumber the success stories. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/once-promising-actors-who-went-off-the-rails-later-in-their-careers/854237.md?page=5)