Liam Neeson
How Bad Did Things Get And Why? Neeson had always been acting steadily, but it was his Oscar-nominated performance as Oskar Schindler in Steven Spielberg‘s “Schindler’s List” that really pushed him over into major stardom. After starring in a number of grand historical dramas like “Rob Roy” and “Michael Collins,” Neeson would finish out the decade with a performance that would weirdly define his career for a while: that of Jedi master Qui-Gon Jinn in George Lucas‘ unreasonably anticipated “Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace.” The film was one of the biggest hits in box office history but was miserably received by critics, and fans of the franchise have all but dismissed it. For almost a decade afterwards, nearly all of Neeson’s most notable roles would be defined by his ‘Star Wars’ performance—that of a patient, benevolent master or father figure, who guides another character through a series of obstacles while imparting wisdom about the world at large via deeply soulful monologues. His Golden Globe-nominated performance in “Kinsey” even follows this model to a degree, as does his roles in “K-19: The Widowmaker,” “Batman Begins,” “Kingdom of Heaven,” and even his voice role as the lion in the ‘Chronicles of Narnia‘ movies. So it wasn’t that Neeson wasn’t getting exposure or money, but you could feel a creative boredom start to settle in. More importantly, it seemed like he wasn’t having much fun.
What Turned It Around? Oddly enough, a low budget European thriller called “Taken.” Neeson’s rebirth trajectory is the reverse of many others—he had stately and well-respected thesp down pat, and changed it up by going down-and-dirty genre. This movie wasn’t on anybody’s radar when it opened in the U.S., almost a year after it had premiered overseas, but it turned out to be a surprise blockbuster, and the biggest hit Neeson had ever had on his own. (The professional victory was marred by personal tragedy, as Neeson’s wife Natasha Richardson, passed away after a freak skiing accident, around the time of the film’s release.) “Taken” proved that he could star in a hit movie by himself, without having to offer tutelage to a younger co-star, or intone anything more weighty than the now meme-ified “What I do have is a very particular set of skills…”
How Well Has He Fared Since? Since “Taken” took off, Neeson’s career has been remarkably steady. The actor has co-starred in a number of huge studio movies like “Clash of the Titans” (and its sequel “Wrath of the Titans“), “The A-Team,” and “Battleship,” that, if they aren’t the most challenging films in the world, at least maintain his presence in the cultural consciousness. Also, while he’s playing second fiddle in these bigger Hollywood movie, he’s able to outright star in smaller-scale hits like “Unknown” and the deeply under-appreciated “The Grey” (and, of course, “Taken 2“). He’s got a number of intriguing projects on the docket, including the airplane thriller “Non-Stop,” Seth MacFarlane‘s western comedy “A Million Ways to Die in the Way in the West” and a voice part in “The LEGO Movie.” Oh, and he’s about to get his biggest payday yet: $20 million, for “Taken 3.”
What Has He Got To Say About It? When AskMen.com asked Neeson to describe his career, around the time that “Unknown” was opening, Neeson shot back: “Lucky. Very lucky.”
Dennis Hopper
How Bad Did Things Get And Why? Hopper literally re-invented Hollywood when he starred in and directed “Easy Rider.” But his followup, “The Last Movie,” couldn’t even get the idiosyncratic multi-hyphenate arrested. Hopper continued to have a career of ups and downs, dropping off the grid to do European art films overseas in the seventies, though Francis Ford Coppola rescued him briefly for a pivotal role in “Apocalypse Now.” Still, Hopper’s drug abuse was an obstacle to him establishing a consistent presence, one that kept him out of major movies well into the 80’s despite the reputation of “Apocalypse Now.”
What Turned it Around? If it wasn’t for 1986, Hopper likely would not have made it. In a year where Hopper would mega-act his way through “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2,” he outdid even himself as the maniacal Frank Booth in David Lynch’s “Blue Velvet,” chewing the scenery with perverse relish as he provided the twisted moral compass for that unforgettably strange picture. In addition to that, Hopper earned an Academy Award nomination for his role in “Hoosiers,” finally getting him back in the good graces of the establishment.
How Well Has He Fared Since? Hopper’s ’86 only cemented his status as an undeniable onscreen talent, though he was slow to capitalize on the heat, working under the radar for a number of smaller filmmakers. By the time he was back working with major studios, it was as a stock villain in expensive films like “Super Mario Bros.,” “Waterworld” and “Speed,” pictures that represented the establishment Hopper had long ago fought. However, Hopper was healthier, more successful and older, and his political shift was also mirrored by a cleaned-up lifestyle. Hopper aged into a healthy career as a supporting player, and his last onscreen role was in 2008’s “Elegy” before he passed away at the age of 74.
What Has He Got To Say About It? “I should have been dead ten times over. I’ve thought about that a lot. I believe in miracles. It’s an absolute miracle that I’m still around.”
Marlon Brando
How Bad Did Things Get And Why? It’s hard to countenance now that Brando was ever less than a towering figure in Hollywood, but while he owned the 50s (Oscar nominated for his second-ever film “A Streetcar Named Desire,” and Oscar-winning three years later, in 1954 for “On the Waterfront”) by the early 60s, his cachet was eroding fast. He was blamed for ballooning budgets on both his first (and last) directorial outing “One-Eyed Jacks” and 1962’s “Mutiny on the Bounty,” (which also featured Brando affecting possibly the feyest British accent ever to grace a film). His erratic personal life started to make as many headlines as his acting (weird side note: he divorced the mother of his two children Movita, an actress who’d starred in the 1935 production of “Mutiny on the Bounty” to marry and have two children with Tarita, who starred in his version). Anyway, he began to get a reputation for unreliability and arrogance and also for a fluctuating waistline, none of which were appreciated as the cost of his particular genius by a studio system that wasn’t as embracing of his maverick style as the more independently-minded 70s would be. So while the rest of the 60s did find him working, and occasionally on pretty decent films, he also showed up in more tedious titles like “The Appaloosa” and “Reflections in a Golden Eye,” and had lost a lot of his firebrand relevance by the end of the decade.
What Turned it Around? “The Godfather,” simply put. As indelible and definitive as Brando’s appearance now feels, his status as “unbankable” at the time made his casting a hard sell for Coppola. But the director prevailed, and Brando, embracing middle age (playing older, in fact) and a “character” role, won his second Oscar and reestablished his claim to the Greatest Actor of All Time trophy in one fell swoop.
How Did He Fare After? That Brando’s resurrection brought him an entire new generation (or two) of fans, cemented his legacy and led to a couple of other iconic, brilliant roles is inarguable. But what he did with it outside of his Coppola collaborations (and we should remember that a huge amount of the stress and drama of the “Apocalypse Now” shoot was due to Brando) is a little more dubious. Showing his ambivalent, not to say contradictory attitude to fame, Brando took a ten-year break at the height of his comeback, and the ten-odd titles he made subsequent to “Apocalypse Now” and prior to his death in 2004 show vastly diminishing returns, with the nadir being “Christopher Columbus: The Discovery,” “Free Money” or “The Island of Dr. Moreau” depending on who you talk to. In fact, Free Money is an apt descriptor of this last period in Brando’s career—with many of these final titles seemingly more about a cash infusion than a love of the material. But perhaps if our laurels were as assured as his were by this point, we’d have phoned it in too.
What Did He Have To Say About It? “Acting is an illusion, a histrionic form of sleight of hand… it’s a bum’s life”
Diane Lane
How Bad Did Things Get And Why? Like most child stars, career troubles were a walk in the park for Lane, who struggled with combative parents at a young age to the point where she had to seek emancipation from the courts. Nevertheless, she appeared to be taking a step into the big-time in the eighties, racking up credits as an adult actress in Francis Ford Coppola’s “Rumble Fish” and “The Outsiders.” But a brief retirement followed the twin failures of “Streets Of Fire” and “The Cotton Club,” as the then-19 year old seemed burnt out on the industry. She would later return to the big screen after an Emmy nomination for her work on TV’s “Lonesome Dove,” though she was usually merely an accessory in thankless roles like the ones offered in “Judge Dredd” and another Coppola collaboration, “Jack.”
What Turned it Around? Lane found herself gravitating to the indie world, and in 1999 she received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for “A Walk On The Moon.” Not only did this place her back on the map, but it also established her as a sultry older woman, carving out an interesting and strangely underpopulated niche for herself as Hollywood’s go-to “woman approaching middle age who could still be sexy” (yes, we know she was 34 but this is Hollywood). While a showy role in mega-hit “The Perfect Storm” followed, Lane earned her strongest plaudits with an Academy Award-nominated turn in steamy thriller “Unfaithful,” a surprise given that the film was fairly soapy material that received mixed reviews from critics, but a mark of how popular she was becoming among her peers.
How Well Has She Fared Since? Lane continued to work steadily, though her age has relegated her to a very narrow field of roles for a lead actress, and she has often found herself in supporting turns instead. She was front-and-center for middling pictures like “Under The Tuscan Sun,” “Untraceable,” and “Secretariat,” but she was probably seen by more audiences as slightly more mature window dressing in blockbusters like “Jumper” and this year’s “Man of Steel.” Her failure to rise to the A-List says less about her talent and likability (she received Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for her 2011 cable movie “Cinema Verite”) and more about the cruelty of the industry towards women her age (Lane turns 49 in January).
What Has She Got To Say About It? “I think the secret to happiness is having a Teflon soul. Whatever comes your way, you either let it slide or you cook with it.”