- 6/24/2024
## Actors Who Made a Comeback with One Movie
We always knew they had it in them! For this list, we’ll be looking at actors who largely turned their careers around with one movie. Our countdown includes:
1. **Liam Neeson**: Revitalized his career with "Taken," showcasing his action star prowess.
2. **Robert Downey Jr.**: Achieved a major comeback with "Iron Man," launching the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
3. **Chris Evans**: Solidified his leading man status with "Captain America: The First Avenger."
4. **Johnny Depp**: Reinvented his career with "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl."
5. **Jennifer Lopez**: Experienced a resurgence with "Out of Sight," establishing herself as a serious actress.
Did YOUR favorite actor make the list? Let us know in the comments!
We always knew they had it in them! For this list, we’ll be looking at actors who largely turned their careers around with one movie. Our countdown includes:
1. **Liam Neeson**: Revitalized his career with "Taken," showcasing his action star prowess.
2. **Robert Downey Jr.**: Achieved a major comeback with "Iron Man," launching the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
3. **Chris Evans**: Solidified his leading man status with "Captain America: The First Avenger."
4. **Johnny Depp**: Reinvented his career with "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl."
5. **Jennifer Lopez**: Experienced a resurgence with "Out of Sight," establishing herself as a serious actress.
Did YOUR favorite actor make the list? Let us know in the comments!
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PeopleTranscript
00:00What the hell's going on here? Two good men are dead, and you guys are fighting over who's gonna be the next hotshot, huh?
00:08Is that what's happening? Yes, that's exactly what's happening!
00:10Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the top 20 actors who saved their career with one performance.
00:18This is how I win.
00:19People keep asking if I'm back, and I haven't really had an answer. But now, yeah, I'm thinking I'm back!
00:28I was not expecting that.
00:30But I was expecting not to expect something, so it doesn't count.
00:33For this list, we'll be looking at actors who largely turned their careers around with one movie.
00:38We'll be taking into account the state of their respective careers both before and after, as well as the popularity of the role itself.
00:45Whether the actor eventually returned to infamy is irrelevant, so long as there was a noticeable uptick in their output after the performance is in question.
00:53Be sure to let us know your favorite comeback roles in the comments.
00:5820. Adam Sandler – Howard Ratner – Uncut Gems
01:02This is how I win, alright?
01:04We've known for a long time that Adam Sandler could act, whether it be from his grounded performance in Punch Drunk Love or the surprisingly serious Funny People.
01:13However, he's developed a reputation for seeming much more comfortable screwing around on screen, through, let's just say, eccentric characters.
01:21I'm so sick of that. Why are you so afraid to admit that we are connected?
01:26Faces! We shared mom's womb. We were roommates.
01:31Oh, that is just disgusting.
01:33Yet in 2019, he blew everyone out of the water with his manic energy in Uncut Gems.
01:39I can't figure it out. I can't figure out what I'm supposed to do.
01:43Everything I do is not going right. Everything I do is not going right. I don't know what to do. I really don't.
01:50It's too soon to tell where his career will take him from here, though he did threaten to make a movie that is so bad on purpose if he wasn't nominated for an Oscar, which he wasn't.
01:59Well, then bring on Grown Ups 3. We deserve it.
02:0319. Johnny Depp – Captain Jack Sparrow – Pirates of the Caribbean – The Curse of the Black Pearl
02:10No one ever really doubted Johnny Depp's abilities as an actor prior to 2003.
02:14But aside from Sleepy Hollow, he hadn't really starred in anything that had mass appeal, seeming to prefer off-kilter fare like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
02:23Though it's easy to forget now, the prospect of Depp headlining an adaptation of Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean ride didn't sound all too appealing.
02:31You are without doubt the worst pirate I've ever heard of.
02:35But you have heard of me.
02:37However, when the first installment in the franchise was released, it was a massive success, and legions of fans popped up overnight to support Depp, who would even earn an Oscar nomination for his work.
02:47If you were waiting for the opportune moment, that was it.
02:52From there, he went on to become one of the biggest stars in Hollywood for the better part of 15 years.
02:5818. Jim Carrey – Dr. Robotnik – Sonic the Hedgehog
03:03Back in the 90s, Jim Carrey rose to fame portraying wacky characters like Ace Ventura, The Mask, Lloyd Christmas, and The Riddler, just to name a few.
03:12However, his typical schtick became more and more seldom in the decades to come, with his 2004 turn as Count Olaf in a series of unfortunate events being arguably the last true Carrey performance.
03:23Throw in some personal troubles, and it seemed like the Carrey we knew and loved was gone.
03:29Enter Sonic the Hedgehog, where his zany portrayal of classic video game baddie Dr. Robotnik was praised for harkening back to his previous work.
03:49Though the film was plagued with post-production issues, Carrey is certainly one of the reasons the sequel was greenlit.
04:0417. Paul Bettany – Vision – Avengers Age of Ultron
04:09Though Paul Bettany was technically a member of the Marvel Cinematic Universe from the beginning, voicing Jarvis in 2008's Iron Man, he had to wait to get his real shot.
04:18In those intervening years, he starred in a slew of critical and commercial failures, be it movies he headlined like Legion and Priest, or those where he acted as a supporting player like The Tourist and Transcendence.
04:33Just when it seemed like he didn't know how to pick them, Bettany's MCU investment paid off with the advent of Vision in Avengers Age of Ultron.
04:48A bright spot in a decent enough sequel, Bettany was perfectly cast to play the android, and will be doing so again in the Disney Plus series WandaVision.
05:0716. Chris Evans – Captain America – The First Avenger
05:12From one MCU cast member to another, Chris Evans got his first chance to play a superhero in the first two Fantastic Four movies as Johnny Storm, also known as Human Torch.
05:22However, that franchise fizzled out early, and his later attempts to participate in superhero comic book adaptations like Push and The Losers also failed.
05:31Proving that the fourth time's the charm, Evans finally landed the perfect role in that of Steve Rogers and the titular hero in Captain America – The First Avenger.
05:41His popularity as the character growing with each subsequent appearance, Evans rounded out his time in the MCU by making fans everywhere weep.
05:58Now let's see what he does outside the comic sphere.
06:0515. Kristen Stewart – Valentine – Clouds of Sils Maria
06:10Not the last actor to be marred by the Twilight saga that we'll talk about on this list, Kristen Stewart found herself one of the most disliked actors in Hollywood by the series' end in 2012.
06:25Her affair with Snow White and The Huntsman director Rupert Sanders, and subsequent breakup with Twilight co-star Robert Pattinson, didn't help matters.
06:33Moving somewhat out of the limelight, Stewart built her career back up with a string of indie movies, but the one that made doubters prove she could act came in 2014 with Clouds of Sils Maria.
06:44At 20, you saw Sigrid's ambition and you saw her violence because you felt it in yourself.
06:50So?
06:51So that's what I'm saying. The text is like an object. It's gonna change perspective based on where you're standing.
06:58She more than held her own working against veteran actor Juliette Binoche, and has since returned to the blockbuster scene with 2019's iteration of Charlie's Angels.
07:0714. Jennifer Lopez, Ramona Vega – Hustlers
07:12Much like another entry on this list, Jennifer Lopez couldn't be mentioned without evoking the string of romantic comedies she made throughout the 2000s.
07:19Though some are popular among a certain demographic like Maiden Manhattan and The Wedding Planner, few were positively received from a critical standpoint, with the worst of the bunch coming in the form of Gigli.
07:30It's turkey time.
07:33Huh?
07:35Gobble, gobble.
07:37Another surprise 2019 performance, her role in Hustlers as Ramona Vega reminded people why she was such a magnetic star to begin with, receiving a bulk of the praise for the film.
07:48Though she wasn't nominated for an Oscar like many had hoped, it did show that J.Lo still got it.
07:54You know, we used to say, if only we had known each other back then, you know?
08:02Maybe we could've looked out for one another.
08:0613. Nicolas Cage, Red Miller – Mandy
08:11Even during his critical heyday around the turn of the 21st century, Nicolas Cage could still be described as an unorthodox and mesmerizingly manic screen presence.
08:20It's a little obvious, don't you think?
08:22Okay, but here's the twist. We find out that the killer really suffers from multiple personality disorder, right?
08:29See, he's actually really the cop and the girl. All of them are him.
08:34Exacerbated by a slew of financial troubles, it started to seem as if Cage accepted every offer that came his way to make ends meet, greasing us with such esteemed classics such as Knowing and Season of the Witch, whereby his eccentricities turned into overacting.
08:50Just when the world began to get nostalgic for him, we were graced with the perfect combination of manic Cage with actual quality in Mandy.
09:12It remains to be seen what kind of career renaissance may be over the horizon, but if it's anything like Mandy, we're here for it.
09:1912. Chris Pratt – Star-Lord – Guardians of the Galaxy
09:23Beginning in 2009, Chris Pratt showed the world just how funny he could be on the NBC sitcom Parks and Recreation as fan-favorite Andy Dwyer.
09:32Leslie, I typed your symptoms into the thing up here and it says you could have network connectivity problems.
09:38However, his presence in film remained rather limited for several years, inhabiting only small roles in good movies like Zero Dark Thirty and roles that were memorable for the wrong reasons like his turn in Movie 43.
09:50Yet Pratt shocked the world in 2014 when he ditched his schlubby, slacker persona and bulked up for Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy, proving he could be funny and kick-ass.
10:03This led him to being one of the most bankable stars in Hollywood, following up with more blockbusters like Jurassic World.
10:1111. Michael Keaton – Regan Thompson – Birdman
10:15And the next time you screech, it'll explode into millions of eardrums. You'll glimmer on thousands of screens around the globe.
10:28Back in the day, people were skeptical of Keaton's casting as the caped crusader in Tim Burton's Batman movie, though many were silenced when they saw him don the cape and cowl on the big screen.
10:38After a single sequel, Keaton stepped away from the franchise, which got significantly worse while Keaton did, well, Jack Frost.
10:46Keaton stayed relatively quiet for much of the 2000s, but we're sure the meta-commentary on his career in 2014's Birdman was too good to pass up.
10:59The film was a critical sensation, ultimately winning Best Picture and making Keaton an Oscar nominee.
11:17Since then, Keaton has been in a slew of big movies, in addition to being another Bird-themed character in a superhero movie as the MCU's Vulture.
11:2510. Matthew McConaughey – Ron Woodruff – Dallas Buyers Club
11:37For much of his career, Matthew McConaughey was ridiculed for making a throng of lazy romantic comedies, from Failure to Launch to Ghosts of Girlfriends Past.
11:54Then a little thing called the McConnaissance happened, which started slow with movies like The Lincoln Lawyer and Mud, allowing McConaughey to reveal his acting chops in a big way.
12:06It crested it in 2013 when he gave an absolutely transformative performance in Dallas Buyers Club, which saw him pick up numerous critic accolades, culminating in an Oscar for Best Actor.
12:18Now we live in a world where McConaughey starring in serious projects like Interstellar and True Detective isn't taken as jokes but as good marketing ploys, to which we can only say…
12:289. Mickey Rourke – Marv – Sin City
12:41While you could argue that his Oscar-nominated turn in 2008's The Wrestler put Mickey Rourke back in the winner's circle, we maintain that came a little earlier in 2005 with Frank Miller's Sin City.
12:53In the neo-noir thriller, he plays Marv, a hard-hitting brute out for revenge and to clear his name for the death of his lover.
13:00Though the ensemble film has plenty of memorable characters, he was especially so, as he adopted the tough-guy persona we'd know him for then on.
13:09In typical career resurgence fashion, he then joined a superhero movie in Iron Man 2 and even reprised his role as Marv in 2014's Sin City a Dame to Kill For.
13:208. Liam Neeson – Brian Mills – Taken
13:31Believe it or not, there was a time when Liam Neeson was better known as a dramatic actor, with only limited action set pieces in movies like The Phantom Menace and Batman Begins.
13:40Though he wasn't exactly starved for work, his career took a turn for the badass in 2008 with a little movie called Taken, in which he single-handedly takes down a procession of scumbags as he rescues his daughter from a sex trafficking ring.
13:54Opening the floodgates for other middle-aged actors to become action stars, virtually everything Neeson made afterward was an action romp of sorts, from The A-Team to The Grey to Nonstop to The Commuter.
14:21Seriously, the list goes on and on.
14:307. Ryan Reynolds – Deadpool – Deadpool
14:46Despite being one of the most likable movie stars in the business, Ryan Reynolds was hit with a barrage of box office bombs in the early 2010s.
14:54As he'll gladly tell you now, 2011's Green Lantern was far from the crowd-pleaser DC had in mind for their iconic hero's first feature.
15:03We knew he was right for the Merc with a Mouth, but the studio's botching of the character in X-Men Origins' Wolverine hardly inspired confidence.
15:15Fortunately, he got the comics-accurate solo film we'd been dreaming of in 2016, and it did not disappoint.
15:30We just have to thank whoever released the test footage that got the ball rolling, whether or not that person's name rhymes with Shmayan Shmendald's.
15:466. Keanu Reeves – John Wick – John Wick
16:07We've known for a long time that Keanu Reeves can kick ass on film, as is evidenced by the first Matrix movie.
16:13However, the poor reception to that film's two sequels, and later duds like The Day the Earth Stood Still and 47 Ronin,
16:20signaled that perhaps the action star's best days were behind him, as expressed in the sad Keanu memes.
16:26Though we never thought of him as a powerhouse actor, ardent fans of his hoped the perfect role for him would come around.
16:32Someone must have been listening, as the John Wick movie slowly evolved from sleeper hits to blockbuster sensations.
16:44Reeves' mania has gotten so big, in fact, that A Matrix 4 practically went from being a long shot to a done deal.
16:54People keep asking if I'm back, and I haven't really had an answer. But now, yeah, I'm thinking I'm back!
17:025. Robert Pattinson – Connie Nikas – Good Time
17:14For much of his early career, Robert Pattinson couldn't be mentioned without someone groaning at his identification with the Twilight Saga.
17:21Though many defend his involvement citing poor source material, Pattinson spent the better part of five years trying to clear his name.
17:28Earning consistently decent marks for several lesser-known indies, it was inevitable that one would put him over the top.
17:34And that came in 2017 with Good Time.
17:37I think I was a dog in a previous life. In fact, I know I was. That's why they love me so much.
17:45Pattinson gave a commandingly manic performance as a criminal evading capture all throughout New York City.
17:51Along with The Lighthouse, this gave Pattinson the freedom to basically do whatever he wanted.
17:56And apparently what he wants is to be the next on-screen Batman. There's that role again.
18:01You don't know what I'm talking about. At all.
18:044. Marlon Brando – Vito Corleone – The Godfather
18:12Everyone knew Brando was a heavyweight actor from the get-go with his early work in movies like A Streetcar Named Desire and On the Waterfront,
18:19the latter of which he won an Oscar for in 1955.
18:22You don't understand. I could have had class. I could have been a contender.
18:27However, the 60s saw Brando grow increasingly cynical towards the craft as an uncharacteristic multi-picture studio signing led to a string of disappointing flops.
18:37Despite his infamy for being difficult to work with, Brando transcended all criticisms in 1972 with his embodiment of Mafia don Vito Corleone in The Godfather.
18:47Look how they masked my boy.
18:50Brando commanded the screen yet again, winning his second Oscar and later proved that some of his best work was still ahead with Apocalypse Now.
18:58Though the less said about the island of Dr. Moreau, the better.
19:02This is the most outrageous spectacle I have ever witnessed. Look at yourself.
19:09I understand that I must be shocking to you.
19:123. Drew Barrymore – Casey Becker – Scream
19:16Wait, wait, don't hang up.
19:18What?
19:19I want to talk to you for a second.
19:21Long referred to as America's sweetheart, then-child actress Drew Barrymore fell out of fashion in her adolescence due to issues attributed to a troubled upbringing.
19:30By the time Scream came out in 1996, people were intrigued to see what she would do in her 20s as the star of a meta satirical slasher movie.
19:39You never told me your name.
19:41Why do you want to know my name?
19:42Because I want to know who I'm looking at.
19:45They were in for a huge surprise as the movie's biggest draw was killed off in the opening scene.
19:50Naturally, it was a small part, but boy was it the shocking, memorable one she was looking for.
19:56She springboarded off that into a career as a romantic comedy lead in films like The Wedding Singer and Never Been Kissed.
20:02Suffice it to say, Drew's still got us screaming.
20:132. John Travolta – Vincent Vega – Pulp Fiction
20:17But you saying a foot massage don't mean nothing. I'm saying it does.
20:20And look, I've given a million ladies a million foot massages, and they all meant something.
20:25Back in the 70s, John Travolta could do nothing wrong with back-to-back hits in Saturday Night Fever and Grease.
20:31However, the 80s were not so kind, as his sequel to the former Staying Alive was panned by critics.
20:37Well, in case you don't know this, I used to be pretty incredible myself when I lived in Brooklyn.
20:41Really? And what happened?
20:43I moved to Manhattan.
20:44Director Quentin Tarantino has made a career building back up the careers of former stars.
20:49It all started with John Travolta as the alliteratively named Vincent Vega in 1994's Pulp Fiction.
20:55Without this, we probably wouldn't have gotten another fan-favorite performance of his in Face Off.
21:00Of course, Travolta would soon re-tarnish his image in the year 2000 with Battlefield Earth,
21:05from which his career has never fully recovered.
21:08But that doesn't take away from this entry's impact.
21:15Before we unveil our number one pick, here are some honorable mentions.
21:18Shia LaBeouf, James Lord, Honey Boy
21:34Sylvester Stallone, Rocky Balboa, Rocky Balboa
21:48Renée Zellweger, Judy Garland, Judy
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22:23Number 1. Robert Downey Jr., Tony Stark, Iron Man
22:27Could it really have been anyone else?
22:30As is now public knowledge, Robert Downey Jr. went through a severe dark period in the late 90s and early 2000s
22:36that saw him battle numerous drug addictions.
22:40You have a lot of nerve showing up here tonight.
22:42Can I at least get a reaction from you?
22:44Panic. I would say panic.
22:46This took a huge toll on his career, and people were genuinely shocked by his casting as Marvel's Iron Man
22:51despite his recently sustained sobriety.
22:54I'm just not the hero type, clearly.
22:57With this laundry list of character defects, all the mistakes I made, largely public.
23:03All reservations evaporated when the film was released,
23:05as Downey rode a wave of critical acclaim as the star of one of the best superhero movies of all time.
23:11From this, the highest-grossing movie franchise was shaped in the form of the Marvel Cinematic Universe,
23:16which employed Downey for an additional 11 years and made him one of the highest-paid stars on the planet.
23:23I am Iron Man.
23:31Do you agree with our picks?
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