37 Actors Who Slammed — Or At Least Shaded — The Very Roles That Made Them Household Names
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It’s not a requirement for an actor to love the project they’re in, and let’s be honest — if you’re just starting out, you don’t exactly have your pick of roles. Despite the fame and fortune a first major role may bring, it may also make you cringe to look back at it. That was the case for these 37 stars, who reportedly had strong feelings about their character or the project that made them famous. Read on to see what they said!
1.
Jennifer Aniston looks back on her first major movie role — as Tory in the campy 1993 horror film Leprechaun — with more than a little embarrassment. In an interview with Howard Stern, he called it “the bane of [her] existence,” and let’s just say that she did not correct him. Aniston recalled her ex Justin Theroux forcing her to watch it, and her struggling to get the remote from him to turn it off…ultimately failing and “cringing” as she came in and out of the room.
Last year, when it was brought up while promoting The Morning Show, Aniston said she doesn’t understand why people love it. “It’s not my favorite, but it’s, uh…listen, whatever blows your hair back, you know?”
2.
One of Alec Baldwin’s first major films, Beetlejuice, was not *quite* his favorite — but this feeling came mostly while he was filming it. While making the film, he was worried it would end his career. “When we did Beetlejuice, I had no idea what it was about,” he said in a video with GQ. “I thought my, all of our, careers are going to end with the release of this film. Maybe we’re all going to be dead.” He also felt he didn’t have much to do in comparison with the other actors.
To make his role more interesting, he was considering changing his character to be modeled after 1950s Hollywood star Bob Cummings, but director Tim Burton shut the idea down. This was apparently the only direction he ever gave Baldwin. “I remember walking through that movie and thinking, ‘I got nothing.’ I was like a set piece. A prison sentence,” Baldwin later said. However, he also complimented Burton’s mad genius, calling him a “crazy professor,” and lauded Michael Keaton’s comedy chops, so it seems like there are no hard feelings.
3.
While Mark Wahlberg was already famous in the hip hop world, he cemented his role as a serious actor after starring in Boogie Nights in 1997. However, it’s not a role he looks back on fondly. He once said, “I just always hope that God is a movie fan and also forgiving, because I’ve made some poor choices in my past. Boogie Nights is up there at the top of the list.” Wahlberg was speaking at a church, and later clarified he was “just saying that I just hope he has a sense of humor because I maybe made some decisions that may not be okay with Him.”
The R-rated movie features Wahlberg as a famous porn actor, and it’s extremely explicit. He apparently got so into the role that he’d stroll around the set with a fake erection. Seems like he enjoyed it at the time, but his turn toward religion and fatherhood means he wouldn’t take a similar role today. “I don’t want to compromise my artistic integrity or choices based on my faith or my family, but I also have other things to consider, and being a little bit older and a little wiser, the idea of having to explain that movie and the reason behind it to my kids is another issue,” he said to People on a red carpet.
4.
John Cusack’s fame-making role was probably in The Sure Thing, but that same year, he further cemented his abilities as a leading man in Better Off Dead, a black comedy about a suicidal teenager. Cusack reportedly loathed the film. Apparently, the film’s director, Savage Steve Holland, claimed that Cusack once stormed out of a screening and told him the film “was the worst thing I have ever seen,” and said Holland had “used him, and made a fool out of him.” Cusack also reportedly said, “I will never trust you as a director ever again.” However, this may be a cinema legend; it’s hard to track down the original source, and even if Holland said it, there’s no guarantee it’s true — though costar Curtis Armstrong corroborated the story.
Many years later, in 2013, Cusack told a Reddit AMA that he didn’t hate it but “just thought it could have been better,” adding that he thinks that about most of his movies. “I have nothing against the film,” he finished. And in 2015, he said, “It was one of those things where I made it, and I didn’t really have a feel for it. But it was fine. It was good.” He stated his perceived frustration about the film came more from being sick of being asked about it during press tours for other movies.
He also said that he feels bad that Holland believes he hated it. “I never really thought about it. I was just on to the next thing. I was like 17 years old,” he stated. It seems the movie just wasn’t quite what he expected when he signed on. “The script had a lot of black comedy elements and surrealism that hasn’t been done in the genre. But I was looking at ‘Oh, I didn’t like the score,’ or ‘I thought the cinematography would be a little darker,’ but I was 17 years old, so, no. I don’t have anything against it.”
5.
Natalie Portman was only around 12 or 13 when she starred as a young orphan who accompanies a hitman in Léon: The Professional, and while she’s grateful for the future the film opened up for her, she has conflicting feelings looking back. “It gave me my career, but it is definitely, when you watch it now, it definitely has some cringey, to say the least, aspects to it,” she told the Hollywood Reporter. Even at the time, some were uncomfortable with Portman’s character’s age and personality. “Director Luc Besson dabbles with a kiddie porn sensibility in presenting the girl as a tart,” one critic wrote.
The film was notably directed by Luc Besson, who would go on to be accused of rape. (He strongly denied this, and the case was ultimately dismissed. There were also other sexual misconduct claims brought up in the trial, which Besson also denied and was not charged for.) Portman called the allegations “devastating” and said she had no idea: “I really didn’t know. I was a kid working. I was a kid. But I don’t want to say anything that would invalidate anyone’s experience.” This contributes to the film being “complicated” for Portman to look back on.
6.
Sean Connery famously hated playing James Bond, the role he is best known for, especially as the films went on. He said the movies “don’t tax one as an actor. All one really needs is the constitution of a rugby player to get through 18 weeks of swimming, slugging, and necking.” He also stated post-Thunderball, his fourth Bond film, “What is needed now is a change of course, more attention to character and better dialogue.” The part itself, he described as “a cross, a privilege, a joke, a challenge. And as bloody intrusive as a nightmare.” He at one point stated he hated James Bond and would “like to kill him.” Tell us how you really feel, Connery!
7.
Jacob Elordi has made a number of shockingly candid comments about The Kissing Booth films, his first major movie roles, including, “I didn’t want to make those movies before I made those movies.” He also called them “ridiculous” and “not universal. They’re an escape.” When asked if he had a “one for them, one for me” mentality, Elordi said, “My ‘one for them,’ I’ve done it. That one’s a trap as well. Because it can become 15 for them, none for you. You have no original ideas and you’re dead inside. So it’s a fine dance.” At least he was honest?
8.
Pretty Woman was not Richard Gere’s star-making role, but to many millennials, it’s what they know him for. Turns out, he despised it; Richard Gere called Pretty Woman “a silly romantic comedy” and his “least favorite thing.” He also criticized the film’s glorification of Wall Street types and corporate raiders. “It made those guys seem dashing, which was wrong,” he said. “Thankfully, today, we are all more skeptical of those guys.” I loved this movie growing up, but I can’t argue with that!
9.
Jonas helped catapult the Jonas Brothers into Disney superstars, but doing the show was not their fave. In fact, Nick called the series’ second season the band’s biggest regret: “We shouldn’t have done that. It really stunted our growth, you know? I feel like it was just a bad move. … It was just not the time. Literally, we couldn’t evolve because of it.” Joe also called the show “not good” and said that it felt too young for them, and Kevin agreed that the second season, especially, was not a fit for them, saying it fed into people seeing them as a joke.
10.
Jennette McCurdy similarly called her time on iCarly and Sam & Cat, which made her a household name for tweens, “cheesy [and] embarrassing.” She continued, “I did the shows that I was on from like 13 to 21, and by 15, I was already embarrassed.”
11.
Anya Taylor-Joy is also embarrassed by her first huge role, which was in 2015’s The Witch. However, this appears to have had little to do with the project itself. Taylor-Joy said she was “devastated” by her acting in the role, feeling like she let everyone down. She also seemed to suggest she didn’t feel confident in her acting even while filming, saying she never thought she’d even be cast and was perhaps not the best fit.
12.
Shia LaBeouf heavily criticized Transformers, which turned him from a child actor to an action star, calling the series “irrelevant” and “dated as f**k.” He continued, “You come up on these stories about Easy Rider and Raging Bull and De Niro and Scorsese and Hopper, and you find value in what they do. Meanwhile, you’re chasing energon crystals. It’s very hard to keep doing what you’re doing when you feel like it’s the antithesis of your purpose on this planet.”
He criticized the second film in particular, saying he “wasn’t impressed with what we did.” Promoting another film at Cannes, he stated, “There were some really wild stunts in it, but the heart was gone…we got lost. We tried to get bigger. Mike,” he continued, referencing the film’s director, Michael Bay, “went so big that it became too big, and I think you lost the anchor of the movie. You lost a bit of the relationships. Unless you have those relationships, then the movie doesn’t matter. Then it’s just a bunch of robots fighting each other.”
In another interview, he called the second film overly complicated and confusing, saying they were making a movie with no script, making it up as they went, just to hit a deadline. However, it seems that he, at some point, liked the first movie. Slamming producer Steven Spielberg, he said, “The only movie that I liked that we made together was Transformers one.” This came before he called the films “irrelevant,” however, so it looks like his mind changed.
13.
Megan Fox was not as critical of the films, which she said launched her movie career, but she knew they were not serious cinema. “I can’t shit on this movie because it did give me a career and open all these doors for me. But I don’t want to blow smoke up people’s ass,” she said. “People are well aware that this is not a movie about acting. And once you realize that, it becomes almost fun because you can be in the moment and go, ‘All right, I know that when he calls ‘Action!’ I’m either going to be running or screaming, or both.”
Fox famously clashed with director Michael Bay and was fired after comparing him to Hitler and saying he was a “nightmare to work for.” She also said he often gave her notes on set to “be hot” or “just be sexy,” which Fox said made her angry. “Then again, audiences don’t come to Transformers to see us. They’re there to see the devastation and the explosions. I don’t want to shit on the movie, it’s a fun movie. People tend to think that I hate it and I don’t, because clearly none of us should take it seriously.” Fair enough!
14.
Robert Pattinson has pretty famously bashed the Twilight series that made him a household name over the years. Once, he claimed that if he hadn’t been in the series, he’d probably “mindlessly hate it without having seen anything.” He also spoke about how strange the hype, fans, and series were, and when reflecting on photo shoots, he said it was weird, “kind of representing something you don’t particularly like.” He also joked that the only thing he’d stolen from the set was his dignity.
Rob took issue with his character Edward, saying he’d probably be an axe murderer in real life and didn’t understand why women would be attracted to a “weirdo” like him. “He’s the most ridiculous person who’s so amazing at everything. I think a lot of actors tried to play that aspect. I just couldn’t do that. And the more I read the script, the more I hated this guy, so that’s how I played him, as a manic-depressive who hates himself. Plus, he’s a 108-year-old virgin, so he’s obviously got some issues there.”
Oh, and he said that he thought the book’s writer, Stephenie Meyer, was “mad” and that Twilight felt “like it was a book that wasn’t supposed to be published” because it felt like Meyer’s “sexual fantasy.” He went on, “Sometimes you would feel uncomfortable reading this thing.” In particular, he called later storylines like Bella’s pregnancy “really weird,” adding, “a lot of stuff in the Twilight world doesn’t make any sense.”
15.
Kristen Stewart, who played Bella, has also criticized the pregnancy and ensuing storyline. “As soon as she becomes a vampire, they kind of ignore their duties. Instantly, they just wanna bone. It’s the most ridiculous situation,” she said of the final film in 2012. “Really? You just had a child. Really?!” She had actually initially not wanted to play Bella, telling MTV she didn’t “wanna be part of this very set, unrealistic ideological of love and push it on every little girl because they’re never gonna get that.”
16.
Alec Guinness famously openly criticized his character Obi-Wan’s dialogue in Star Wars: Episode IV — A New Hope. He even reportedly begged George Lucas to kill him off. “I just couldn’t go on speaking those bloody awful lines. I’d had enough of the mumbo jumbo,” he said. He also once recounted a story where a young boy who had seen Star Wars dozens of times asked for his autograph. Guinness said he’d give it on the condition that the boy never watched Star Wars again. Oof.
17.
Harrison Ford similarly made several comments suggesting he didn’t love playing Han Solo over the years, including referring to him as “Ham Yoyo” and claiming, “As a character, he was not so interesting to me.” Ford, too, took issue with his character’s dialogue. “I told George [Lucas]: ‘You can’t say that stuff. You can only type it.'” However, he ended up coming around: “I was wrong. It worked.”
After the second film, Ford strongly felt that Solo should be killed off. “I thought he ought to sacrifice himself for the other two characters [Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia Organa]. I said, ‘He’s got no mama, he’s got no papa, he’s got no future. He has no story responsibilities at this point so let’s allow him to commit self-sacrifice.'” He apparently told the saga’s creator, George Lucas, this, and Lucas told him there was no future in dead Han Solo toys. When promoting the third film, Ford famously said, “Three is enough for me. I was glad to see that costume for the last time.” He did reprise the role in The Force Awakens, but his character was finally killed.
18.
One of the stars of the sequel films also criticized the writing of the films. John Boyega, who played Finn, took issue with the way his character (and other BIPOC characters) were sidelined after The Force Awakens. “You get yourself involved in projects and you’re not necessarily going to like everything,” he told GQ. “What I would say to Disney is, do not bring out a Black character, market them to be much more important in the franchise than they are, and then have them pushed to the side. It’s not good. I’ll say it straight up.”
19.
Mark Hamill also criticized the writing in the sequel series. (Yes, he’d been famous for ages at this point, but it’s still the role that made him famous! I’m counting it.) He was unhappy with the version of Luke that The Last Jedi introduced, even telling director Rian Johnson, “I hate what you’ve done with my character.” He said after the film was released that this version of Luke was so different from the original trilogy that he had to think of Luke as another character: “Maybe he’s Jake Skywalker. He’s not my Luke Skywalker.” He later apologized for these comments.
20.
Adam Driver wasn’t so damning in his feedback, but he did highlight that the third film was not what he had expected or signed on for. He said the original plan, before the first film, was for his character Kylo Ren to become more evil and “committed to the dark side” as the films went on. However, this “changed while shooting,” Driver said, adding that he “tried to keep that arc in mind, regardless if that wound up not being the journey anyway. … I was still focused on that.” The second film veered off that path, then the third film took a massive detour.
“The last one, it changed into being, you know, about them and the dyad, and things like that. And evolving into Ben Solo. That was never a part of it,” Driver said. “He was Ben Solo from the beginning, but there was never a version where we’d see Ben Solo when I first signed up for it.” Ultimately, this reflected fan feedback; many were disappointed with Kylo Ren being a whiny, weak villain, and the forced hero change of heart/romantic subplot later in the series.
21.
Harold Perrineau didn’t hate playing Michael on Lost at first, as he felt the story “was really equitable” and allowed all the characters to shine. However, as the show went on, he became disillusioned with the show. Specifically, he began to feel that the white characters were getting more screen time and meatier storylines and that he was there to be the token Black character. In particular, he criticized a Season 2 storyline where Walt (Michael’s son) is kidnapped, and Michael only asks about him once. The script ended up being changed (into a storyline that kind of ruined Michael’s character, TBH), but Perrineau felt his relationship with the showrunners soured, and they actually ended up letting him go at the end of the season.
22.
Perrineau’s Lost costar, Evangeline Lilly, also struggled with the show as it went on. She told The Lost Boys podcast that she often disliked playing the character, especially as the seasons progressed: “I felt like she became more and more predictable and obnoxious. I felt like my character went from being autonomous — really having her own story and her own journey and her own agendas — to chasing two men around the island. And that irritated the shit out of me.” She admitted to throwing scripts across the room.
23.
Similarly, Katherine Heigl appeared to lose heart with Grey’s Anatomy as the show went on, naming particular storylines she wasn’t a fan of, including sleeping with ghost Denny. “I don’t really know Izzie very well right now. She’s changed a lot. I’m trying to figure her out and keep her real,” she told Vanity Fair about another storyline (which saw her sleeping with a married man), calling it “a ratings ploy” and adding, “It’s our fourth season; there’s not a lot of spontaneity left.”
She also pretty famously withdrew herself from Emmy consideration in 2008, saying, “I did not feel I was given the material this season to warrant a nomination,” although she’s since expressed regret over this, saying that it was between her and the writers, and a lot of it was about her own performance.
24.
Katherine Heigl also made waves for saying that Knocked Up, which catapulted her to movie stardom, was “a little sexist.” She continued, “It paints the women as shrews, as humorless and uptight, and it paints the men as lovable, goofy, fun-loving guys. It exaggerated the characters, and I had a hard time with it, on some days. I’m playing such a bitch; why is she being such a killjoy? Why is this how you’re portraying women? Ninety-eight percent of the time it was an amazing experience, but it was hard for me to love the movie.”
After backlash, Heigl clarified, “I liked the movie a lot. I just didn’t like me. She was kind of like, she was so judgmental and kind of uptight and controlling and all these things and I really went with it while we were doing it, and a lot of it, Judd allows everyone to be very free and improvise and whatever and afterwards, I was like, ‘Why is that where I went with this? What an a–hole she is!'” She also said she loved working with Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow, and “did not mean to s*** on them at all. I’ve thought about like, writing a note. I feel embarrassed. I don’t want it to feel insincere on any level.”
However, Heigl has spoken more recently about the backlash she received for this comment and her comments on Knocked Up. “I may have said a couple of things you didn’t like, but then that escalated to ‘she’s ungrateful,’ then that escalated to ‘she’s difficult,’ and that escalated to ‘she’s unprofessional,'” she said. “What is your definition of difficult? Somebody with an opinion that you don’t like? Now, I’m 42, and that shit pisses me off.”
25.
The Sound of Music made Christopher Plummer a household name, but that doesn’t mean he liked it. In fact, he called the film “so awful and sentimental and gooey.” He also said it was his most challenging role, as “You had to work terribly hard to try and infuse some minuscule bit of humor into it.” He even went further and claimed he was bored with the character: “Although we worked hard enough to make him interesting, it was a bit like flogging a dead horse. And the subject matter is not mine. I mean it can’t appeal to every person in the world. It’s not my cup of tea.”
26.
Michelle Pfeiffer reportedly hated her film Grease 2 (her first major film role) “with a vengeance” and “could not believe how bad it was,” saying she was “young and didn’t know any better” when she took the role.
27.
Angus T. Jones became one of the highest-paid child actors ever while starring in Two and a Half Men, but that doesn’t mean he enjoyed it. “It was difficult for me to be on the show and be part of something that was making light of topics in our world where there are really problems for a lot of people,” he said. “I was a paid hypocrite because I wasn’t OK with it and I was still doing it.” A year before, he had said his character “means nothing” and compared watching the show to “filling your head with filth.”
28.
Shailene Woodley was similarly not a fan of the message the writing was sending out when she starred in teen drama The Secret Life of the American Teenager. “Toward the end, morally, the things that we were preaching on that show weren’t really aligned with my own integrity. So, that was a bit hard to show up to work every day knowing that we were going to project all of these themes to thousands — millions — of young adults across the country, when, in fact, they weren’t what I would like to be sending out,” she said after her time on the show was done.
29.
Blake Lively also spoke out against the moral qualms involved in playing her character on Gossip Girl, which cemented her status as a star after making her Hollywood debut in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. Lively called playing Serena “personally compromising,” expressing concern about the message her character sent out, and listing some of the horrible things Serena did. “I would not be proud to be the person who gave someone the cocaine that made them overdose and then shot someone and slept with someone else’s boyfriend,” she said.
30.
Her costar Penn Badgley, who was a relative unknown before the show, also shaded the show and his character, Dan Humphrey, quite a few times. He once called Dan a “judgmental douchebag” and heavily critiqued the end reveal that Dan was Gossip Girl. While promoting a later project, he stated that it was nice to actually be proud of something he worked on, calling it a “new feeling.”
31.
Ian Harding was (rightfully) pretty judgmental of his character, Ezra, on Pretty Little Liars, considering his long-running relationship with a 16-year-old student. He once called Ezra “America’s most beloved pedophile,” though he said he tried to play it as a love story. When an advertiser dropped out early on, Harding believed it was because of his character’s illegal relationship — only to find out it was actually another character’s lesbian relationship. “So, I could be seen as a statutory rapist, and people are like, ‘I know, but love knows no bounds, as long as there is a penis and a vagina involved,'” he said dryly.
When an interviewer asked if he’d ever felt a PLL storyline went too far, Harding joked, “Always,” and said the show “jumped the shark” in Episode 2. He also said by the end of the show, he “wasn’t feeling creatively fulfilled.”
32.
I wouldn’t say Jenna Ortega hated Wednesday, which helped make her a household name, but she was definitely frustrated while starring in Season 1, namely due to scripts that kept trying to force a romance. “Her being in a love triangle made no sense,” she told Dax Shepard on his podcast. “Everything that [Wednesday] does, everything that I had to play, does not make sense for her character at all.” She ended up “putting her foot down” and changing lines from the script, saying she grew protective of the character and didn’t want her to be a lead with no emotional arc. Still, the bones of the love triangle remained.
33.
Kim’s Convenience was huge for Jean Yoon’s career, but she had issues with some of the storylines, calling them “overtly racist.” She says the cast came together to express their concerns, and most of the racist jokes and scenes were taken out. She also felt that her character getting multiple sclerosis was unrealistic, and said she was told she “doesn’t understand comedy” when she expressed concerns. Yikes — sounds like an awful experience for Yoon.
34.
Like Alec Baldwin earlier on this list, Denise Crosby, who played Tasha Yar on Star Trek: The Next Generation, felt her character had little to do. “I was struggling with not being able to do much with the character. I had all these ideas and couldn’t do them. I was just stage dressing. I chose to leave instead of just being satisfied with that,” she said. Her character was killed off at the end of the first season to accommodate her. “I couldn’t wait to get off that show,” she said in another interview. “I didn’t want to spend the next six years going, ‘Aye, aye, Captain,’ and standing there, in the same uniform, in the same position on the bridge.”
35.
On the YouTube show Dating Straight, Glee‘s Jenna Ushkowitz and Kevin McHale said that some of the cast hated being on the series, though they didn’t name names. McHale said he never hated it, adding that he was the last of the cast to “lose it,” but that he did hit a “boiling point” when they performed “What Does the Fox Say?” McHale stated that Season 5 was rough, and also exhibited clear discomfort with having to do the rap in “Gangnam Style.” Both Ushkowitz and McHale agreed with the interviewer’s sentiment that the show could be insensitive. So…not total regret, but definitely some cringing!
36.
Amber Riley also posted a TikTok showing a clip of herself on the show and suggesting she was doing Glee just as a job. She also once said that it was “not the most comfortable environment” as far as working with Lea Michele was concerned, following tweets from Samantha Ware that accused Michele of racist microaggressions and making the set “a living hell.”
37.
And finally, Johnny Depp compared starring on his show 21 Jump Street (the show that made him a major star) in later years to being “in a prison creatively,” saying, “It started to get a little showboat-y, you know what I mean? It just started to become false. It started to become this action-packed can of soup, you know? You just market it and send it out.”
What TV or movie roles do you remember hearing actors hated? Let us know in the comments!
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