The Strangest Ways Actors Made Money

Thanks to the capitalist hellscape most people in the world have been living in for the past 70 years or so, there’s often no shortage of things that anyone would do for money. Many people subscribe to the idea that anything that can be commodified should be commodified and that there is very little room for ethical consideration in the pursuit of capital. People who already have a fair bit of money or assets are often advised to diversify their portfolios and pursue multiple income streams, and it is usually this strategy that has lead to some of the silliest attempts by famous actors to make their money into more money.

Some actors created alcohol brands, while others run candy shops, farms, or mobile companies. Other actors do far more unpleasant things for money, like gigs for uncouth people. Some actors did strange or unpleasant things to stay afloat long enough to get their big breaks in Hollywood. Still others have found ways to turn personal issues and obsessions into lucrative opportunities. Actors don’t build careers and resumes like many other professionals, and often their success is far more tenuous. Because of their natural skills in charm and gregariousness and the limited financial security to be found in their field, it makes sense that actors have some of the most interesting tales of unconventionally pursuing capital. These are the weirdest things actors have done for money.

Since his rise to the highest position of power in the Chechen Republic, Ramzan Kadyrov has been linked to numerous human rights violations and suspicious deaths and has shown himself to be an angry, violent, sexist, homophobic man entirely at the beck and call of Vladimir Putin. In 2011, when Hilary Swank was paid to attend a “city day” celebration for Kadyrov, most of the Chechen dictator’s unsavory acts and qualities were well-known to the world. At the event (Which was also attended by singer Seal and fellow actor Jean-Claude Van Damme, among others), Swank gave a positive speech at the event in which she acknowledged that “city day” is also Kadyrov’s birthday, adding that she knew this because “I read. I do my research.”

Though apparently she didn’t do enough research to know that getting paid to celebrate Kadyrov is the kind of thing that might get a famous actress in trouble. After receiving major criticism for being paid to attend the Chechen event, Swank apologized to Jay Leno on “The Tonight Show,” fired her CAA manager, donated her appearance fee to charity (though she never provided proof of this despite a request from the exiled Chechen prime minister), and was dropped by her publicists at 42 West. The incident affected her reputation in Hollywood and likely contributed to her career fizzling out this past decade. Swank has never admitted how much money she made for attending the Chechen event, but it’s likely to have been about six figures.

If you’ve ever wondered whether an ad where Tom Hiddleston pretends to be an elderly woman’s thoughtful husband might be effective in selling Centrum Silver to consumers in China, then you’re not alone. In the Centrum ad that Hiddleston actually did film, he cooks and serves breakfast— an over-easy egg on salad, to be specific — to … someone. The camera seems to be from the perspective of a woman (the Centrum vitamins in the commercial are labelled “for women”) who is important to Hiddleston, most likely a wife or elderly relative. Hiddleston gives over the breakfast and apologizes for needing to be away so much, but promises that he’ll “make it up to you.”

The ad ran in 2019 for Centrum’s East Asian marketing campaign and did quite well there according to the ad’s response from consumers on China’s social media platform, Weibo. There was a less-than-positive response from folks in the United States and Britain who also saw the ad, many calling it “creepy” and “uncomfortable.” Luckily for Centrum and Hiddleston, the ad isn’t meant for Western audiences, and many audiences in China, especially women, appreciated the novelty of being served food by a famous handsome actor.

Hugh Jackman is multitalented. Not only has Jackman enjoyed international fame as the star of Fox’s “X-Men” film franchise, but he’s also won a Tony, an Emmy, and a Grammy — thanks in large part to his impeccable singing and dancing skills on display in projects like “The Greatest Showman” and “Les Misérables.” He’s even been acknowledged by many as one of the nicest people in show-business. But he came a long way from humble beginnings, and Jackman’s road to blockbuster success with Wolverine is paved with a lot of cruddy jobs.

On “The Howard Stern Show,” Jackman once talked about how he used his many talents to make money before he found success as an actor and performer — as a birthday clown. Was he a good clown? “[I was] good up until the age of 3,” Jackman said. “You could climb on my head. I could juggle three things. I could juggle kind of anything. … But nothing more. No balloon animals, no magic tricks, nothing.” He was realistic about the job’s requirements: “You’re being hired so the parents can just drink for an hour.” The last clowning gig he had, he said, was a party for an 8-year-old. The kid was so unenthused about Jackman’s clown act that the only way for Jackman satisfy his audience was to allow the children to throw eggs at him and physically beat him for over 10 minutes.

“Citizen Kane” filmmaker Orson Welles had long since retired from most of his professional pursuits by the time he was 70 in 1985, but he still occasionally took a gig or two in order to make a paycheck. One of the most surprising gigs he did just for the money came in the 1980s as the voice of the antagonist, Unicron, in the film “Transformers: The Movie.”

Talking about his role in the animated film, Welles reportedly said (via Slate), “I menace somebody called Something-or-other. Then I’m destroyed. My plan to destroy Whoever-it-is is then thwarted and I tear myself apart on the screen.” It’s clear that the veteran actor found Unicron to be a far less stimulating role than say, Othello or Falstaff, and unfortunately he didn’t even have time to enjoy the fruits of his labor. Welles died five days after finishing his work for “Transformers: The Movie.”

Kevin Costner has never shied away from political issues despite his lack of expertise in anything other than acting. It makes sense, then, that a wealthy, outspoken artist like Costner might try to combine his political views with his desire to make money, and that’s exactly what he did with Ocean Therapy Solutions.

With an excess of wealth and inspired both by his certified box-office bomb “Waterworld” and his dismay upon witnessing the ineffective ocean clean-up efforts following the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster of 1989, Costner pursued the development of a new technology to separate oil from ocean water with a company called Ocean Therapy Solutions (OTS). He pumped $24 million of his own fortune into the company. The machines that OTS produced were basically centrifuge generators that, after an ocean-based oil spill, would cleanse the water of crude oil while maintaining the usability of said oil. It sounded great and everyone from big oil companies to locals living near ocean-based oil rigs were excited to see the tech in action.

Unfortunately for Costner and his OTS partners, their opportunity to swoop in with their MacGuffin-esque technology came too soon in the development stage after the BP oil spill in 2010. BP reached out and purchased a number of OTS’ centrifuge devices for clean-up, but between a lack of successful testing and adequate transport logistics, the technology ultimately proved expensive and unusable.

Not too many non-dictator, non-war criminals can say they’ve been personally called out by the Human Rights Foundation (HRF), but actor, performer, and entrepreneur Jennifer Lopez is not like many other people. According to the HRF via HuffPost, Lopez has made more than $10 million dollars performing for various dictators around the world. In 2013 Lopez performed for the dictator of Turkmenistan — Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov — at his birthday celebration, despite Turkmenistan’s reputation for being, as the Human Rights Watch summed up, “one of the world’s most repressive countries”