One Wrong Turn
When making a movie, there are so many things that can go wrong for an actor between their first reading of the script and the release of the film. These actors thought they knew what they were getting into—but it turns out that they were in way over their heads.
Snow White And The Seven Dwarves
The original Snow White ushered in an era of massive success for Walt Disney films. For a while, it was the most successful sound film of all time, and it earned Disney an Oscar—full-sized, along with seven miniature ones, for obvious reasons. But somewhere, someone got lost in the shuffle.
Walt Disney, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
Adriana Caselotti, Snow White And The Seven Dwarves
When it comes to Snow White, one person got royally screwed—and that would be the voice actress who portrayed Snow White herself, Adriana Caselotti. When she beat out 150 hopefuls, she thought it was a dream come true—but she was so wrong.
Caselotti was uncredited, wasn’t allowed to attend the premiere (she snuck in), and wasn’t allowed to identify herself as having provided the voice. Even worse? Disney forbade her from ever doing voice work again, in an attempt to preserve the special nature of the performance.
SomedayMyLove, Wikimedia Commons
Ghostbusters
1984’s Ghostbusters was a smashing success on nearly every front. It raked in cash, made superstars out of already-popular actors like Bill Murray and Sigourney Weaver, and brought even more attention to hard-working performers like Harold Ramis, Dan Aykroyd, Rick Moranis, and Annie Potts. But one actor had to deal with some serious backlash.
William Atherton, Ghostbusters
William Atherton was a popular leading man in the 1970s, but appearing as EPA inspector Walter Peck in Ghostbusters nearly destroyed his career—and led to verbal attacks on the street from fans of the movie. Some even tried to start bar fights with him!
The Blair Witch Project
The Blair Witch Project was the first truly “viral” movie. It was marketed as being cobbled together from real found footage, and missing posters went out featuring the faces and names of the film’s stars. The internet was rife with questions about whether it was “real” or just a marketing stunt—and it didn’t stop when the movie premiered.
Summit, The Blair Witch Project (1999)
Heather Donahue, The Blair Witch Project
Before it became clear that The Blair Witch Project was just a movie—with incredible marketing—people would send star Heather Donahue’s mother condolences. But then, once it became clear what had really happened, the sympathy turned to vitriol—turned more at Donahue than either of her co-stars, of course.
The harassment got so bad that Donahue eventually quit acting.
Summit, The Blair Witch Project (1999)
Showgirls
Showgirls was the highly-anticipated follow-up to Basic Instinct, bringing together writer Joe Eszterhas and director Paul Verhoeven again. When Elizabeth Berkley was cast, it seemed like a slam dunk—and a way for her to shed her good-girl, teen star image. But, unfortunately, it flopped. It would take some 20 years for a critical re-evaluation—which left Berkley’s career hanging in the balance that whole time.
Elizabeth Berkley, Showgirls
When Showgirls came out, the critics ravaged it—and Berkley’s—performance. Though she did receive props from no less a source than Roger Ebert, even when other critics were nice, they often included back-handed compliments, like “Berkley’s acting debut is a joy, if you can call it acting”. This was talking about a person who’d been in more than 75 episodes of network TV!
The consequences were brutally. Berkley’s career trajectory went into freefall, and beyond that, she was bullied and mistreated by colleagues and strangers alike. Berkley later said she felt like a “pariah” for years afterward.
Roar
Tippi Hedren’s fraught professional relationship with Alfred Hitchcock nearly destroyed her career, but she survived—and went on to make Roar, which was one of the most dangerous films ever made. The craziest part? She put her daughter right in the line of fire.
Melanie Griffith, Roar
What started as a six-month shoot involving real lions turned into five long years of filmmaking on the infamous Roar, with some 70 to 100 injuries being reported by cast and crew, who were constantly attacked by the lions. Hedren’s daughter Melanie Griffith had it pretty bad—she almost lost one of her eyes and had to have facial reconstruction surgery. To add insult to injuries, the stress of the shoot destroyed her parents’ marriage, and they divorced.
Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace
No one is more die-hard than a Star Wars fan, and as a result, the hype over Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace was huge. Unfortunately, this one was a disaster for not just one, but two casts members.
Twentieth Century, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999)
Ahmed Best, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace
It all seemed so simple—add a little comic relief, the kind that Chewbacca, C-3PO, and R2-D2 had brought to the original. And thus, the character of Jar Jar Binks was born. Ahmed Best, who provided the voice for the character, was sure that this was his big start. He even moved to LA in anticipation. Well, when the film came out, both fans and critics hated the character—so much so that they basically wrote his out of the sequels.
Luigi Novi, CC BY 3.0, Wikimedia Commons
Jake Lloyd, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace
Child actor Jake Lloyd took on the part of Anakin Skywalker—but he was in way over his head. Doing promo for the film was incredibly taxing, and he had trouble with bullies at school. Just two years later, he quit actings—but his troubles didn’t end there. He’s had trouble with the law and has been hospitalized since suffering what was described as a “psychotic break” in 2023.
Twentieth Century, Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace (1999)
The Twlight Zone Movie
Sure, box office bombs can ruin a career, and on-set injuries can severely damage an actor’s future—and then there’s The Twilight Zone Movie, where severe negligence led to multiples deaths on set.
Warner Bros., Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983)
Vic Morrow, Myca Dinh Le, Renee Shin-Yi Chen, The Twilight Zone Movie
While filming a segment for The Twilight Zone Movie, a helicopter accident occurred, taking the lives of actors Vic Morrow, Myca Dinh Le, 7, and Renee Shin-Yi Chen, 6. According to California labor laws, the children shouldn’t have even been on set, meaning the film was in violation of protocol. In facts, producers fully hid them from firefighters and safety officers—and look what happened.
Director John Landis, along with others, was eventually brought up on charges of manslaughter—which he unfortunately was acquitted from.
ABC Television, Wikimedia Commons
Syriana
ER made a star out of George Clooney—and for five seasons, he anchored the hit TV show. Then, it was time to move on. First came Batman & Robin. And as we all know, that didn’t exactly work out as planned. Clooney walked away, determined to focus on more serious scripts. Then, he got the lead role in Syriana. This went wrong in a completely different way.
George Clooney, Syriana
Clooney suffered a debilitating spinal injury while making the drama—one that required multiple surgeries. During recovery, he was essentially unable to move. As if that wasn’t bad enough, there was the horrible pain. At first, he contemplated taking his own life—then, to numb those thoughts and the pain, he turned to alcohol. Were he not able to pull himself back from the edge of addiction, it’s possible he might not be here with us today.
The Great Dictator
Regarded by some as Charlie Chaplin’s magnum opus, The Great Dictator lampooned barbarous world leaders and ended with a message of peace and tolerance—all in the year 1940, which, as one would imagine, was quite tense. However, not everyone got the message.
United Artists, The Great Dictator (1940)
Charlie Chaplin, The Great Dictator
For Chaplin, The Great Dictator was the beginning of the end of his career. Why? Well, some geniuses thought his hopeful message reeked of—oh no!—communist sympathies. Amid investigations by the FBI and MI5, Chaplin ended up unofficially kicked out of his adopted home, the US—and by extension, Hollywood. He only came back to the US once after leaving.
United Artists, The Great Dictator (1940)
Abduction
Before the movie actually came out in 2008, it seemed like getting a role in the film adaptation of Twilight was a one-way ticket to stardom for the teen actors who made it through auditions. Before the film series was even finished, casting agents tried to capitalize on the casts’ budding popularity and each star ended up in a slew of movies. But not everyone made it out unscathed.
Lionsgate, Abduction (2011)Taylor Lautner, Abduction
After Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart, Taylor Lautner was the next Twilight cast member poised for stardom. He appeared in scores of teen mags and even caught the eye of Taylor Swift. Then, he was slated to appear in John Singleton’s Abduction. A beloved director, a young star, and high-octane action. What could go wrong? Everything.
The film’s plot was seriously lacking, and it was a huge flop—taking down Lautner’s chances of post-Twilight success with it.
Psycho
If you were an actress in the 1960s and really wanted to destroy your whole life, there was really no better way of doing it than hooking up with director Alfred Hitchcock—and Psycho is proof.
Janet Leigh, Psycho
Psycho’s infamous shower scene traumatized scores of audience members—but it also had a disturbing effect on star Janet Leigh. During filming, Leigh realized how vulnerable one is in the shower, and as a result, took baths for years afterward. On top of that, Psycho’s success ended with Leigh being typecast as a scream queen, even though she had little interest in pursuing a career in horror.
Snow White And The Huntsman
Huh. Is Snow White—all iterations—cursed? Considering what happened on the set of Snow White and the Huntsman, it’s entirely possible.
Universal, Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)
Kristen Stewart, Snow White And The Huntsman
Kristen Stewart survived the Twilight franchise mostly unscathed—which can’t be said for all of her castmates. While still dating Robert Pattinson, she went on to star in Snow White and the Huntsman…and then, an infamous series of paparazzi shots of her canoodling with the film’s director came out…
Universal, Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)
Rupert Sanders, Snow White And The Huntsman
The result? While it didn’t destroy her career, it certainly seemed like it would at the end. Ultimately, it was just a setback—although it was the end of her relationship with Pattinson, and the director’s wife ended up divorcing him. To add insult to injury, the incident also made her the target of a series of tweets from Apprentice host Donald Trump.
Eva Rinaldi, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons
Kill Bill Vol II
There are many films where directors put their actors through a living nightmare—and while Quentin Tarantino is known to push (at least for feet shots), he’s not usually cited as one of the problematic ones in that sense. But then, there was the making of Kill Bill Vol II.
Miramax, Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004)
Uma Thurman, Kill Bill Vol II
Tarantino insisted that he get a shot of Thurman driving her character’s blue convertible. Though Thurman was reluctant, she eventually agreed—only to skid and end up in a head-on with a palm tree. She bashed her head on the steering wheel and has permanent damage in her knees from the accident. Perhaps worse? The fact that producers actually tried to cover up the accident afterward.
Miramax, Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004)
Jackass Forever
There are films where you just might get injured where something goes wrong—and then there are films where you expect to get injured. Multiple times. In new, unheard-of ways. Jackass Forever is one of those films—but when you’re tempting fate, things can quickly spin out of control.
Johnny Knoxville, Jackass Forever
Anyone who has seen Jackass Forever will tell you there’s one hit that looks so much worse than the others. It’s when a bull goes straight for Johnny Knoxville, causing him to flip twice in the air before landing on his head. It caused a hemorrhage so severe, that Knoxville still deals with the damage to his cognitive abilities to this day.
The Conqueror
This 1956 action-adventure film starring John Wayne was set in the Mongol Empire—but filmed in St George, Utah, a site that would spell doom for scores of cast and crew members.
John Wayne & 46 Crew Members, The Conqueror
Though producers had acquired all the right permits, the filming location was just downwind from a nuclear testing site. Within weeks, a number of crew members developed cancer. In all, some 46 died due to radiation poisoning. While there was no direct correlation to star John Wayne’s eventual passing, many suspected that the lung cancer that took his life was related to his experience on The Conqueror, not just his smoking habit.
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