Greatest Star Comebacks
The Enduring Dozen — arisen from movie career ash heaps
Ben Affleck in The Town (2010)
Whatever goodwill the Oscar-winning Boston boy toy had built up over the years was shattered after Gigli (2003), in which he starred with then-girlfriend Jennifer Lopez. Packaged so as to capitalize on Bennifer’s public real-life relationship and their supposed chemistry, Gigli accomplished neither and bombed, miserably. Affleck hung around in lower profile projects until he wrote, directed, starred in and buffed up for The Town, a sharply made and well-acted heist film that proudly shouted to Affleck’s critics, “How do you like them apples?”
Gloria Swanson in Sunset Blvd. (1950)
The advent of sound films is famous for bringing about the death of many silent stars’ careers. For a time, this was the fate of Gloria Swanson, the bejeweled and bedazzling beauty of the ’20s. Known only as a faded silent star by the late ’40s, Swanson seized on the role of Norma Desmond, an over-the-hill silent actress who has delusions of a comeback in Billy Wilder’s meta-Hollywood masterpiece. Swanson’s deranged and imperious performance garnered her an Oscar nomination and, in the words of Norma herself, proved that she was ready for her close-up.
Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler (2008)
This former boxer’s sleazy charm and considerable acting chops could not make up for his increasingly erratic behavior on and off the set. At rock bottom in 1992, Rourke returned to the boxing ring, where his career—and his face—took an even bigger beating. Dismissed by most as a freak show, the Diner star returned triumphantly to screen fame at the invitation of Darren Aronofsky, who cast him as washed-up Randy “The Ram” Robinson in The Wrestler. Rourke won virtually every acting award for his performance short of an Oscar (though he was nominated).
Robert Downey Jr. in Iron Man (2008)
Downey Jr. got his first lead opposite Molly Ringwald in the The Pick-up Artist (1987), before winning acclaim that same year in Less Than Zero as a young drug addict, a role he would later call “the ghost of Christmas future.” And so it was in 1996, when a five-year cycle of drug charges and stints in rehab began. Virtually un-insurable, Downey stuck with it through seven years of indie roles, then shocked the world in the spring of 2008 as eccentric billionaire Tony Stark in Iron Man. The movie was a global smash and Downey became a Marvel superstar.
John Travolta in Pulp Fiction (1994)
By the mid to late ’80s, after a string of critical drubbings, the Grease and Saturday Night Fever wunderkind’s career was just barely “staying alive,” sustained solely by the humiliating Look Who’s Talking franchise. Then career-defibrillator Quentin Tarantino cast him as the laconic and indifferent hitman, Vincent Vega, in his sly second feature, Pulp Fiction, at a bargain-bin price. The discount paid off big time for Travolta, who, after bantering with Samuel L. Jackson and twisting with Uma Thurman, was shot back to the top.
Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story (1940)
It’s hard to believe now, but at the age of 31, Hepburn’s career was almost over. After a series of flops famously rendered her “box-office poison,” Hepburn retreated to the stage, starring in The Philadelphia Story, a smash-hit comedy about a socialite whose wedding descends into chaos. She then acquired the film rights—gifted to her by Howard Hughes—and sold them to MGM under the condition that she star in the adaptation. Bolstered by two A-listers, Cary Grant and James Stewart, and with classy George Cukor at the helm, the movie became an instant classic and Hepburn, who got an Oscar nomination for the role, was back on track.
Julie Christie in Away From Her (2006)
This sexy British actress, who ruled the screen in the swinging ’60s and New Hollywood ’70s, virtually disappeared by the 1980s. Fans had no idea what she looked like as a middle-aged woman when she took a starring role in Away From Her, a small Canadian indie about a loving older couple whose bonds are tested when the wife comes down with Alzheimer’s. The film was well received and garnered Christie an Oscar nomination. She’s been threatening to retire ever since.
Marlon Brando in The Godfather (1972)
Many years and many pounds after he rocketed to fame as Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) and won an Oscar for On the Waterfront (1954), Brando was a mess. No longer bankable and branded as difficult on set, he was forced to film an audition for The Godfather—an insulting demand for an iconic star. Upon seeing Brando’s Don Corleone, Paramount honcho Charles Bludhorn exclaimed, “What are we watching? Who is this old guinea?” And the rest is box-office, Method-acting and modern-cinema history.
Jean Seberg in Breathless (1960)
Smalltown Iowa’s Jean Seberg was plucked out of nowhere by director Otto Preminger in a nationwide talent search in 1957 for Saint Joan. Despite the hype, her debut was a disaster, and this Cinderella stayed out past midnight when Preminger’s Bonjour Tristesse became her second consecutive bomb. Luckily, Seberg fled to Europe, where Jean-Luc Godard scooped her up to play opposite Jean-Paul Belmondo in Breathless. The two became international sensations, launching the New Wave, and Seberg was finally embraced by critics.
Pam Grier in Jackie Brown (1997)
Pam Grier was the queen of “blaxploitation” movies in the ’70s. But when this niche market fizzled—and it was the only consistent employment for strong black leads at the time—so did Grier’s career. Along came Quentin Tarantino decades later. Always into resuscitating careers, he cast the buxom beauty as the star of his heist movie, Jackie Brown, and she was transcendent.
Frank Sinatra in From Here to Eternity (1953)
After a hot onscreen start, a series of misfires brought the swoon-inducing singer’s film aspirations to a screeching halt. Desperate for a lifeline, Sinatra fiercely campaigned for a role in the Pearl Harbor drama From Here to Eternity (1953). His lobbying—which inspired a controversial Godfather subplot—paid off, and Sinatra won an Oscar for the part. Whether it was pressure from his mafia connections or from his wife, Ava Gardner, that won over Columbia studio chief Harry Cohn, it’s safe to say that no horses were harmed.
Diane Lane in A Walk on the Moon (1999)
When Time magazine anointed her “the new Grace Kelly” for co-starring with Laurence Olivier in A Little Romance at the ripe old age of 13, the bar was set impossibly high. The young prodigy navigated effectively from child actor to adolescent up-and-comer, but box-office disappointments kept her from transitioning to adult roles. Years later, another little romance set during Woodstock and the Summer of Love, Tony Goldwyn’s A Walk on the Moon, came along, and Lane was successfully rebranded as Hollwood’s go-to middle-aged hottie. Not quite Grace Kelly, but we’ll take it.
