John Cusack has played some of the most iconic roles of all time.
From Say Anything to High Fidelity, Bullets Over Broadway to Being John Malkovich, Cusack
has charmed audiences for decades.
But although the talented, versatile actor has been in the business over 30 years, his
career isn't what it used to be.
Why?
Let's take a look back and see why John Cusack hasn't graced our screens for a while.
He called Hollywood "a whorehouse"
In an interview with The Guardian about his role in the Hollywood satire Map to the Stars,
John Cusack came clean about his views on the strange world of Hollywood.
Cusack commented that the old ways of filmmaking are gone and now everything revolves around
franchises and huge stars...which isn't really all that off the mark.
As he puts it, "The culture just eats young actors up and spits them out.
It's a hard thing to survive without finding safe harbor."
It's easy to understand his seeming hesitation to fight for stardom in an industry he's lost
trust in considering his views on Hollywood.
He went on to describe it by saying, "[Hollywood is] a whorehouse and people go mad."
Writing films
Not content to be a just an actor, Cusack has co-written a few of his most popular films.
He co-wrote the screenplays for High Fidelity and Grosse Pointe Blank, proving that he knows
a few things about dark comedy and oddball characters.
"Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable?
Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?"
More recently, he co-wrote the political film War, Inc. as well as We Are Not Animals, which
is, fittingly, a film about an actor getting tired of Hollywood.
Though it doesn't look like he has any new screenplays in the works as of the making
of this video, he's still been writing quite a bit.
The only difference is he's turned his writing efforts to the political arena.
Politically active
John Cusack isn't your typical actor interested in the political world.
When Visa, Mastercard, and Paypal all stopped taking payments intended for Wikileaks in
2010, Cusack became a founding member of the Freedom of the Press Foundation in response.
The Foundation's main goal is to protect the privacy of the journalists willing to deal
with potentially dangerous subjects.
"It's an advocacy group just uh, try to protect the rights of journalists to do their job.
Protect their sources."
Through crowdfunding, they help different press organizations stay afloat regardless
of outside pressures.
Cusack has written many articles for the site and is clearly passionate about the issue
of freedom of speech.
Cusack has also written over 20 articles for the Huffington Post, and in 2014, he traveled
to Russia with Arundhati Roy and Daniel Ellsberg to meet with Edward Snowden.
Roy and Cusack wrote a series of essays about their conversations with Snowden which they
formed into the book Things That Can and Cannot Be Said.
Cusack is still devoted to activism and it's obvious he's not happy just resting on his
celebrity — he wants to make a real difference.
And with so much time spent in the political arena, it's no wonder he doesn't light up
the marquee as much anymore.
Aging out of the rom-com
Cusack started out as a teenage heartthrob, playing the sweet, slightly nerdy guy who'd
do anything for his girl.
"Gee, I'm real sorry your mom blew up Ricky."
But nobody can play the handsome leading man forever.
Though Cusack often branched out to do less mainstream work like Being John Malkovich
and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, he kept taking lead roles.
And those movies got worse and worse — at least according to critics...and box office
receipts.
Sure, he's got High Fidelity, but he also made Must Love Dogs, Serendipity, and America's
Sweethearts, and you didn't even realize those clips were out of order.
And he definitely wasn't in American Beauty.
"American Beauty?
What's funny about that?"
"You were in that"
"No I wasn't!"
American Beauty?"
It seems that mainstream Hollywood wants to put him in leading roles in dull action flicks
or rom-coms, whereas Cusack clearly wants to go in a different direction, like the killer
roles he played in The Frozen Ground and The Paperboy.
When Hollywood only wants to see you play the same thing over and over again, it's no
wonder Cusack is a little hesitant to keep taking on huge leads.
Straight to DVD
Cusack hasn't been in as many blockbusters as he used to.
But that doesn't mean he's given up acting.
In fact, Cusack's been making tons of movies.
Between 2012 and 2016, he made a whopping 17 films.
The reason you might not be aware of that insane productivity is that most of the films
wind up going straight to video-on-demand or DVD.
And they tend to be...well, unimpressive, like Reclaim or the fake-sounding Drive Hard.
Four of his films since 2014 got critics' ratings below 5% on Rotten Tomatoes.
That's full-blown Nicolas Cage territory.
"I'm gonna try and kill the man!"
Just kidding.
Nic Cage is in a league of his own.
Critically ignored
That's not to say that John Cusack's recent movies are all bad.
In 2015, he starred in Love & Mercy as an older Brian Wilson — frontman for The Beach
Boys — dealing with mental illness and a controlling manager.
The film received excellent reviews, with many praising Cusack's fine work in particular.
But the film only made $12 million domestically, and though there was some speculation about
a potential Oscar nomination, Cusack came up short.
He wasn't nominated for a single award the entire season, and the film itself was similarly
shut out.
Things to come
Though it may seem like Cusack's star has dimmed, all it's really done is split into
a constellation of different projects.
John Cusack won't be fading into the background any time soon.
His political writing and activism will surely keep him busy in the next few years, and he's
already got another film lined up.
With more than 30 years in the acting business, we're pretty sure he's got more than a few
more iconic parts up his sleeve.
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