A list movie stars now acts in TV shows ?
 

So we all know that long long ago it was a stigma and no movie actor would act in TV shows. Later it became normal for movie actors to star in tv shows.
Now I am watching new tv show and I see that it has 2 A list movie stars that currently appears on A list/oscar level movies as main actors - Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson.
I think thats the highest level of movie star weight to ever act in series.

Don't forget Harrelson started on tv, Cheers.

Did you know his father was a professional hit man and is currently in prison for wacking a Federal Judge. (I'm full of useless information, lol)

.

In the past movie stars used to look down at television. Now.... not so much.

Many stars (eg Bruce Willis) went from TV to movie A list :)

What was slightly shocking to me that not just some A list movie stars (maybe in bad period of their careers) agreed to act in TV show, but very current (currently acting in A list Oscar type movies) top movie stars agreed.
I think that could be some milestone. I do not remember anything similar. And not just for the pilot or 1 episode, but talking about whole TV show.

Charlie Sheen went from movies to TV and made something like $3 million an episode for 2 1/2 Men. I wouldn't be surprised if he gets residuals too. So what's so bad about being a TV star?

Nothing bad, it is just new milestone that is interesting to note.

Charlie was not in Oscar level movies as the main star at that very moment when he decided to go TV. Different situation.

Robin Williams went back to TV because he lost so much money from his multiple divorces.

There was an interesting article about this several months ago. It basically said that right now we are in the middle of a golden age of television. The good stories are being told on TV (and cable and Netflix) and because these projects have good writing and production values they are able to attract bigger stars to them.

I just watched True Detective, and it's better quality than most movies I see. The line is pretty blurry these days when it comes to TV vs movies. I'm not talking about CSI or that kind of bullshit. There's been tons of TV series lately that rival the writing, directing and cinematography of the best movies.

I agree. There has been some great stuff on TV in the last handful of years. It looks like studios are starting to realize if they put something good out there people will watch it. they don't need to just make shitty reality shows.

Damn interesting, gonna look into that.

it's apples and oranges comparing a movie to a tv series though. A good tv series has over 100 episodes normally an hour long. A good movie is normally two and a half hours these days. How can you have as much depth and character development in such a small showing? The better actors emerging in these tv series are part of what is making things that much better. I couldn't imagine watching sons of anarchy with second rate tv actors they used in shows in the 80's and 90's.. would be horrible.. hehe

That. And the fact that most movies these days are just horrible remakes.

Over the Xmas period, i watched a few movies with my gf, and they all pretty much sucked.

Fuck knows when i will be back at the movie theatre...

lol I didn't knew that

House of Cards with Kevin Spacey is an excellent example ;)

The money shifted to TV because nobody can make money on movies that end up on illegal downloading sites.
The TV show makes all it's money before the uploaders have finished recording it off TV.

</end story>

Sure, the quality of the shows is attracting the higher quality actors. There used to be a stigma of sorts when movie stars did TV. It was like their career was on a slide because the quality of the TV show was often not that great. Now that is simply not the case. A movie star and get involved in a very high quality TV show and actually raise their profile.

Bullshit.

TV shows are as bad as ever.
Most movies theaters went out of biz in the late 1990's.
That's when everything shifted.

There is NO work in the movies!

You can't star in something that will never be filmed.

So next you are going to tell us that the reason we have celebrities making porn now is because the quality of porn has improved. :1orglaugh


Disclaimer : You are right about the stigma of the past; but that has nothing to do with the decisions actors make now.
It's all about the money and there is far less money in movies today because of piracy.

no, this is bullshit... they spend more money on movies now than they ever have before, especially for actors so how did you come to this conclusion?

According to Box Office Mojo there were more movies released in movie theaters last year than in any other year in history. 676 movies were released. I don't know where you live, but where I am there are still tons of movie theaters. My town (which is pretty small) just had one open up a few years ago and a there were recently two huge theaters built not too far from me. I will admit that it seems like some of the smaller, independent theaters are either going out of business or being swallowed up by the giants.

One thing that that seems to be true is that there is less money for many movie actors. It used to be that there was a huge list of stars that regularly got $15-$20 million per film. Those days seem to be gone, but there is still plenty of money. Not too long ago Jack Black was on Howard Stern and said he gets $6 million per movie.

I don't doubt that there is more money for some actors in TV than in movies. A guy like James Spader is likely getting paid nicely for his show Blacklist. He is likely going to make more working on that show than he would have if he did a movie and since the show is a hit it could help him get more for his next film.

As for TV shows being as bad as always. Sure, there is plenty of crap out there, but there are also plenty of good shows. I would argue that there are more good shows now than there were 5-7 years ago.

What celebs are doing porn?

I agree with post above, but call bullshit on jack Black getting 6 million a movie. Maybe he got lucky once or something, but I hardly imagine any list of producers giving him that much. He is like C list or something. Also IMDB says he is a producer, maybe he gets roles for himself? LOL

I was just going off of what he said. I wouldn't doubt that he might inflate it a bit. I just did a little digging around and fount out in 2002 he was getting around $2 million per film. This was before School of Rock, King Kong and Kung Fu Panda. I don't doubt there was a time he got $6 million for a movie, but it might not be now. Still. $2 million for 1-3 months of work is pretty freaking good money.

Wow, I spend more money on jelly now than ever before.......it's called inflation.
The jelly doesn't taste any better though.

Trust me, I worked in Hollywood in the 1990's; when the theaters started to close a slew of small time unknown actors were out of work because known actors had to accept these jobs.

Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson are EPs on that show....and dont forget Kevin Spacey in House of Cards. but I dont consider these to be television its not like they are Charlie Sheen in 2 1/2 Men....This is Made for Cable TV fare...way fewer rules, different format and way different distribution model.

Platoon, Wall Street, Young Guns, really?

You must be having reading comprehension issues.

Those movies were 15 YEARS before he went on 2 and a half men. His peak was gone.

In the case of Matthew McConaughey he is CURRENTLY STARRING AS MAIN STAR IN CURRENT OSCAR LEVEL MOVIES.

Not only I mentioned this "small" situation difference 2 or 3 times in the thread, but also in the very post you quote.

Those were decades before Charlie turned up in a TV series.

In the past there was a real class difference between movies and TV, a movie star would never consider a network TV series until their career was well on the way downhill. That's still true for megastars today but the impact of technology is changing things, these premium cable series have big budgets and the quality of writing and production is as good as theatrical released movies so 'A list' actors are becoming interested. You still won't see an 'A list' movie star at the peak of their careers doing a Game of Thrones or Breaking Bad. As home TV's become bigger and bigger the theaters will continue to decline and the line between theatrical and TV will blur further, both in the minds of the public and the acting community as the money gets bigger and bigger for actors on premium cable series.

TV people looked down on radio, until radio talent like Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern were making as much as the biggest movie stars.

Stars on TV
 

For years, "real movie stars" might be on TV for something special. But none would make a commercial. It was a huge event when John Wayne made an aspirin commercial. That was like the dam breaking and "real movie stars" went to the small screen for shows or commercials.
A lot of movie stars found great TV success even before The Duke's commercial.
Red Skelton, Jack Benny, Bob Cummings, Buddy Ebson, Andy Griffith and James Gardner to mention a few.
It was the same when movies first came out, actors shifted back and forth from Vaudeville to the movies. Several like the Marx Brothers did Vaudeville, movies, radio & TV.

To update on your useless (albeit interesting) information, Charles Harrelson died in 2007.

Acting
 

Actors act for 2 reasons, ego & money.
Money is to pay the bills.
Ego is when actors are unpaid in a movie. The restaurant scene in The Player by Robert Altman. All that A List got was a free lunch and a chance to be on the screen.

Thanks for another history lesson Sally. How old are you, 100?