24 Roles That Made These Actors Hollywood Stars Again
According to an oft-misquoted line from author F. Scott Fitzgerald, “There are no second acts in American lives.”
Literary scholars have argued time and again that Fitzgerald never intended the line to live on as it has, given that it came from an unfinished novel called The Last Tycoon. But even without that context, film fans have seen time and again that Fitzgerald was wrong.
Throughout movie history, film stars have risen and faded, just to fly once again. Sometimes, these stars fizzle out after a short, second burst. In others, the star shines bright for several more years.
Whatever the tail they leave behind, here are some of the roles that gave actors their second acts.
1. Robert Downey Jr. – Iron Man (2008)
Motion Pictures.
These days, it’s impossible to remember when Robert Downey Jr. wasn’t Iron Man, let alone a major movie star. The son of an experimental filmmaker, Downey Jr. exploded on the scene as a member of the Brat Pack and even joined the cast of Saturday Night Live.
However, substance abuse problems brought RDJ so low that insurance companies wouldn’t cover him, even after getting clean. All of that changed when the brand new Marvel Studios took a chance on the actor, making him Tony Stark and making the MCU a Hollywood juggernaut.
2. John Travolta – Pulp Fiction (1994)
With the one-two punch of Grease and Saturday Night Fever, John Travolta ruled the 1970s as the king of cool and charisma. However, a series of flops and changing tastes made Travolta a joke and a loser.
This was exactly what Quentin Tarantino wanted when he cast the assassin Vincent Vega for Pulp Fiction. The years made Travolta more beaten down, but he still had the confidence and cool that made him a star, perfect for the retro appeal of Pulp Fiction.
3. Ke Huy Quan – Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022)
After starring in ‘80s kid classics Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and The Goonies, Ke Huy Quan found himself dissatisfied with the racist roles offered to him.
Audiences didn’t realize how much they missed Quan until he reappeared on screen as Waymond Wong in the mind-bending Everything Everywhere All At Once. Thanks to that Academy Award-winning performance, Quan has relaunched his career with parts equal to his talent.
4. Leslie Nielsen – Airplane! (1980)
Starting with the wacky comedy Airplane!, Leslie Nielsen established himself as the consummate straight man, an actor who could say the most absurd statements without cracking a smile.
Nielsen developed that skill in the 1950s and ‘60s when he played deep-voiced leading men in Forbidden Planet and on the Disney TV show Swamp Fox. While Nielsen enjoyed steady work, he didn’t become a proper star until Airplane!, which made him the comedy legend we know today.
5. Eddie Murphy – Dolemite Is My Name (2019)
Eddie Murphy joined the cast of Saturday Night Live at the age of 19. By 23, he starred in the massive hit Beverly Hills Cop. No one could match Murphy’s stardom in the 1980s, but a series of terrible choices in the 1990s and beyond cooled his reputation, stripping him of the energy and excitement of his heyday.
Although he had a brief resurgence with the musical Dreamgirls, Murphy’s current comeback began with Dolemite Is My Name, in which he played Blaxploitation auteur Rudy Ray Moore.
6. Gloria Swanson – Sunset Boulevard (1950)
Directed by Billy Wilder, who co-wrote with Charles Brackett and D. M. Marshman Jr., Sunset Boulevard tells the story of Norma Desmond, a former silent film star who lives on the glories of her past after she failed to make the transition to talkies.
In the role of Desmond, Wilder cast Gloria Swanson, an actress nominated for Academy Awards during the silent era but unable to maintain a career past the 1930s. Sunset Boulevard made Swanson a going concern again, albeit on television instead of movies.
7. Michael Keaton – BİRDMAN or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014)
Like Swanson, Michael Keaton revived his career by playing a version of himself. In director Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s BİRDMAN, Keaton plays an actor still haunted by the superhero he once portrayed.
Fans noticed more than a little resemblance between Birdman and Batman, and they were thrilled to see Keaton back on screen, whether as a hero or as anything else.
8. Natasha Lyonne – Orange is the New Black (2013 – 2019)
The Netflix series Orange is the New Black may have been about prison, but it freed actor Natasha Lyonne.
Lyonne became an indie movie favorite as a teenager, thanks to parts in Slums of Beverly Hills and But I’m a Cheerleader. After floundering for a few years, Orange is the New Black gave the adult Lyonne her ideal screen persona, playing rumpled and raspy characters with hearts of gold.
9. Jason Bateman – Arrested Development (2003 – 2019)
Thanks to parts in The Hogan Family and Teen Wolf Too, Jason Bateman was a teen heartthrob of the 1980s.
When he came back to screens in the 2000s with the experimental sitcom Arrested Development, Bateman proved that he could also be a gifted straight man. In the years since Arrested Development, Bateman has expanded his resume to include fantastic parts as a voice actor, a dramatic star, and even a director.
10. Rob Lowe – The West Wing (1999 – 2003)
Surprising as it might seem now, the first season of The West Wing billed Rob Lowe as the star, beginning and ending the pilot episode with his character Sam Seaborn.
Lowe came to the part after a fallow period in the 1990s, a come down from his 1980s hits The Outsiders, Class, and St. Elmo’s Fire. Thanks to The West Wing, Lowe has become a reliable television actor, building on his reputation with a delightful stint on Parks & Recreation.
11. Katharine Hepburn – Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? (1967)
The New Hollywood movement and its emphasis on naturalism didn’t suit theatrical actors such as Katharine Hepburn. Together with Spencer Tracy, Hepburn ruled the movies with her razor wit and stage presence.
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? finally found a place for Hepburn in the New Hollywood, casting her alongside Tracy as the parents of a young woman (Katharine Houghton) who brings home a Black boyfriend (Sidney Poitier). Hepburn made the most of her returned attention, tearing up the screen as the ferocious Eleanor of Aquitaine in The Lion in Winter.
12. Sidney Poitier – Sneakers (1992)
Hepburn’s Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? co-star Sidney Poitier didn’t so much find Hollywood trends leaving him behind as much as he turned his attention elsewhere. Spending more time as a director, Poitier took just occasional acting parts.
However, Poitier couldn’t resist the chance to act again alongside Robert Redford in Sneakers, a fun espionage caper. Sneakers brought Poitier back in front of the camera, and the world was better for it.
13. Keanu Reeves – John Wick (2014)
Even at the height of his first fame, Keanu Reeves didn’t command much respect. People saw him as less an actor and more a surfer bro who happened to get the right parts with Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and Point Blank.
However, with John Wick, Reeves proved himself not just a great physical actor, but also a commanding presence. When news of Reeves’s legendary kindness started to spread, fans welcomed Keanu back into theaters, one violent film at a time.
14. Jennifer Coolidge – White Lotus (2021 – 2022)
Like Reeves, Jennifer Coolidge made playing dumb look easy. People took Coolidge for granted in films such as American Pie and Legally Blonde, missing the comic skill she possessed.
That skill became impossible to ignore when Coolidge joined the cast of the HBO series White Lotus. As Tanya McQuoid, Coolidge updates her air-headed characters to add an element of privilege, perfect for the black comedy.
15. Matthew McConaughey – Dallas Buyers Club (2013)
With his effortless good looks and syrupy drawl, Matthew McConaughey felt designed in a lab for romantic comedies. He fit right in with movies such as How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days and Ghosts of Girlfriends Past.
But when the rom-com fell in popularity, McConaughey reinvented himself as a serious dramatic actor. The so-called “McConaissance” began with his playing an AIDS patient in Dallas Buyers Club and continued through Magic Mike, True Detective, and more.
16. Kiefer Sutherland – 24 (2001 – 2014)
The son of New Hollywood great Donald Sutherland, Kiefer Sutherland found his first success as a cool outsider in the 1980s Brat Pack. Films such as The Lost Boys and Stand By Me established him as a solid actor with star charisma.
As an adult, Sutherland found his voice on television, as the tough-as-nails federal agent Jack Bauer on 24. The exact opposite of cool, Bauer did whatever it took to stop terrorists, and Sutherland made viewers believe he could do it.
17. Keke Palmer – Nope (2022)
As a kid and a teen, Keke Palmer lived on screens. Whether starring alongside Angela Bassett in Akeelah and the Bee or playing a whip-smart exec on Nickelodeon’s True Jackson, VP, Palmer personified youth and energy.
As Palmer aged, the roles stopped coming, until Jordan Peele cast her opposite Daniel Kaluuya in Nope. As the enterprising younger sister to Kaluuya’s quiet O.J., Palmer proved that she could be just as engaging as she was a kid, blowing away audiences once again.
18. Brendan Fraser – The Whale (2022)
Even when he played almost all handsome buffoon roles in George of the Jungle and The Mummy, critics still recalled Fraser’s dramatic chops in Gods and Monsters.
So when Fraser started working again, audiences were happy to see him but hoped he would take on something with more depth. That part came with Darren Aronofsky’s controversial drama The Whale. Even if not everyone appreciated The Whale’s depiction of obese people, no one denied the vulnerability Fraser brought to the character.
19. Nicolas Cage – Mandy (2018)
Back in the 2000s and 2010s, people used to joke about the fact that Nicolas Cage had a Best Actor Oscar for Leaving Las Vegas. How could this serial over-actor, a guy who takes every offered bad movie part, win such major hardware?
Cage reminded everyone with Mandy, a surreal horror film that gives him room to go as big as possible. Thanks to Mandy, audiences learned to appreciate Cage for his strong choices, proving that he’s much more than an internet meme.
20. Christian Slater – Mr. Robot (2015 – 2019)
While audiences of the 1980s and ‘90s appreciated the ironic cool that Christian Slater brought to movies such as Heathers and True Romance, many dismissed him as nothing more than a low-rent Jack Nicholson.
Distance and nostalgia did wonders for Slater’s reputation as an actor. When he came back in the surreal television show Mr. Robot, fans cheered both for the actor and for the baggage he brought to the titular role.
21. Winona Ryder – Stranger Things (2016 – Present)
Given its heavy debt to all things 1980s, Stranger Things seems to have cast Winona Ryder less for her acting skills and more for her reputation as a cool kid from the era.
Whatever the reason, Stranger Things has given Ryder a whole new generation of fans. They’ve gone back to rewatch Beetlejuice, Heathers, and Edward Scissorhands, gaining a new appreciation for her part as harried mother Joyce Byers.
22. Sylvester Stallone – Creed (2015)
After exploding on the scene with the first Rocky in 1976, Sylvester Stallone never went away. However, where he began as a muscular actor who could play real drama and even write interesting parts, he chose instead to be an action star, taking parts that bored viewers after three decades.
In Creed, director Ryan Coogler and his co-writer Aaron Covington reminded the world why they fell in love with Stallone in the first place. Returning to play Rocky again, Stallone is funny, likable, and vulnerable, everything that made him a star.
23. Josh Hartnett – Oppenheimer (2023)
Oppenheimer has both a huge cast and a staggering lead performance from Cillian Murphy as the title character. So it’s all the more impressive that the breakout role belonged to Josh Hartnett, where he played scientist Ernest Lawrence.
Once a teen heartthrob whose career started to flag with Michael Bay’s dismal Pearl Harbor, Hartnett has a lightness in Oppenheimer missing from his previous roles, making him a compelling character actor instead of a generic handsome guy.
24. Jennifer Lopez – Hustlers (2019)
For as much as some people resented Jennifer Lopez’s sudden appearance on the pop charts and in Hollywood movies, no one could deny that she gave an all-time fantastic performance as U.S. Marshall Karen Sisco in the Steven Soderbergh film Out of Sight from 1998.
Lopez proved that Out of Sight wasn’t an anomaly when she played older exotic dancer Ramona in the crime movie Hustlers, written and directed by Lorene Scafaria. From her first scene, Lopez made everyone forget about all the bad films, making them happy to have her play complicated characters once again.
