What the Hell Happened to Cuba Gooding Jr.?
Academy Award winner, Cuba Gooding, Jr. used to be cast in movies to give them an air of prestige. His presence was a signal to the audience that the movie they were seeing was meant to be taken seriously, even if it was a Michael Bay movie. But then, Gooding’s image changed. After a string of critical drubbing and commercial disasters, Gooding went from Hollywood darling to direct-to-video pariah.
What the hell happened?
I love it when a celebrity’s humble beginnings have been preserved for posterity. In the case of Cuba Gooding Jr., he started off as a break dancer. In 1984, his dance troupe performed alongside Lionel Richie at the closing ceremonies of the Summer Olympics in LA.
That couldn’t be more 1984 if it was written by George Orwell. Side note: I learned via VH-1′s Pop Up Videos that Richie was a terrible dancer. His videos frequently featured him from the waist up. Even his hit song Dancing On the Ceiling features very little dancing from Richie. He relied heavily on back-up dancers and future Oscar winners to supply the ”karamu” for his “fiesta”.
In the late 80′s, Gooding paid his dues with guest spots on TV shows like Amen and MacGyver. His role on MacGyver was a recurring guest spot. He played Billy Colton on three episodes from 1988-1990.
In 1988, Gooding make his big screen debut in Coming to America opposite Eddie Murphy. As pictured above, he was a customer in the barbershop scene. The following year, he appeared in the musical, Sing. His role was similarly small.
Gooding’s big break came in 1991 when he landed the lead role in John Singleton’s directorial debut, Boyz N the Hood.
Gooding played Tre, a high school student in a bad neighborhood. Tre was at a point in his life where he could go either way. He could go on to college but he was in danger of getting dragged down by his violent surroundings.
Boyz was one of the first films to depict life in South Central LA. It tapped into the growing rap culture in a way no previous film had. Over time, its cultural impact has lessened thanks to the imitators Boyz spawned. But in 1991, Boyz N the Hood was a pop culture revelation.
Boyz N the Hood was screened at Cannes. It opened to rave reviews and was a smash at the box office. Singleton became the youngest director ever to be nominated for an Academy Award.
In short, it was a triumph. And Gooding was at the center of it with his leading man debut. Much like the character he played on-screen, Gooding’s career could have gone a number of ways. Anything was possible, but nothing was guaranteed.
The next year, Gooding followed up Boyz N the Hood with Gladiator. No, not the Russell Crowe/Ridley Scott hit from 2000. This Gladiator was a boxing movie which co-starred Brian Dennehy, Robert Loggia and James Marshall from TV’s Twin Peaks.
At the time, Gladiator was viewed as a test to see if either Gooding or Marshall had the star power to open a movie. But the movie was panned and bombed at the box office. It seemed both actors had failed the test.
Later that year, both Gooding and Marshall appeared in Rob Reiner’s military courtroom drama, A Few Good Men.
A Few Good Men starred Tom Cruise, Jack Nicholson and Demi Moore. The all-star cast included supporting roles by Kevin Pollak and Kevin Bacon. Point being, the movie was crowded with actors. Of the two, Marshall had the larger role as one of the defendants being tried by Cruise.
Men got great reviews and was nominated for several awards. It was also a commercial success. But Gooding’s role was too small to be of any great significance.
In 1993, Gooding starred opposite Emilio Estevez, Jeremy Piven, Dennis Leary and Stephen Dorff in the thriller, Judgment Night.
Leary played a drug dealer who pursues the other characters through town after they witness a murder. I don’t remember much about the movie except that at some point, Gooding’s character goes wild-eyed crazy. Also, it’s really silly which is a polite way of saying “stupid”.
At the time, Estevez was looking to break away from his Brat Pack image. And the rest of the cast were up-and-comers. Gooding, Piven, Dorf and Leary were all seen as tremendously promising actors. But Judgment Night failed them all. Reviews were bad and the movie bombed.
In 1994, Gooding appeared opposite Paul Hogan and Beverly D’Angelo in the Western comedy, Lightning Jack.
Hogan wrote and starred as an Australian bank robber in the US. Gooding played a mute whom Hogan takes hostage. Eventually, Hogan and Gooding’s characters team up. It was a long way from Boyz N the Hood, but also a sign of things to come for Gooding.
Like most of Hogan’s attempts to recapture the success of Crocodile Dundee, Lightning Jack got terrible reviews. While it did well in Hogan’s native Australia, it was not a hit in the US.
Gooding started off 1993 as part of an all-star ensemble in Wolfgang Petersen’s disaster movie, Outbreak.
Outbreak starred Dustin Hoffman, Rene Russo and Morgan Freeman. In addition to Gooding, Patrick Dempsey, Donald Sutherland and Kevin Spacey had supporting roles. Like A Few Good Men, it was a crowded cast. The monkey’s face appeared on the poster, but Gooding didn’t.
Outbreak opened to mixed reviews, but it was a hit at the box office. Gooding’s role was too small for it to matter very much.
Later that month, Gooding also appeared in Losing Isaiah opposite Jessica Lange and Halle Berry.
Isaiah was a melodrama about a white family that adopts a baby who is abandoned by her black, crack-addict mother. Halle Berry plays the crack addict, so you know she’s going to go to rehab and clean up real nice. Like, “most beautiful woman in the world nice”.
Naturally it ends with a courtroom drama in which hot button issues of the day are dramatized. Samuel L. Jackson plays Berry’s lawyer who I assume swears a lot because he is played by Samuel L. Jackson. And also that he is awesome for the same reason.
Gooding’s role was so small that I could find no reference to his character in any of the plot summaries I read. Which is probably a good thing since Losing Isaiah got bad reviews and flopped at the box office.
Later that year, Gooding also appeared in the HBO movie, The Tuskegee Airmen which starred Lawrence Fishburn. I mention this because he would eventually return to the same material on the big screen.
Gooding’s promising career had stalled out since his debut in Boyz in the Hood five years earlier. I’m sure many had written him off along with that Twin Peaks guy. But all that changed in 1996 with Cameron Crowe’s Jerry Maguire.
Tom Cruise played a sports agent with a crisis of conscience. Gooding played his only client, a promising athlete with a chip on his shoulder and a naked desire to see “the money”.
Given Cruise’s track record at the time, it’s no surprise the movie was a hit. But it surpassed any reasonable expectations. It became a cultural juggernaut. The catchphrases from Jerry Maguire were everywhere. If you’re like me, you still cringe a little when you hear “You complete me” or “Show me the money”.
Jerry Maguire got positive reviews and was a huge hit at the box office. It launched Rene Zellweger’s career, established Crowe as an A-list director and won Gooding an Academy Award.
When Gooding won Best Supporting Actor for Jerry Maguire, he gave one of the most memorable acceptance speeches in the Awards’ history. His enthusiasm was contagious. Audiences and Hollywood were smitten.
Watching that speech all these years later, I had a couple of thoughts.
1. Really? They cut him off after 60 seconds?
2. Mira Sorvino – So hot! Seriously, what the hell happened?
The next year, Gooding appeared in another Oscar-winning dramedy, James L. Brooks’s As Good As It Gets.
Jack Nicholson starred as an obsessive compulsive novelist who falls in love with a waitress played by Helen Hunt. Greg Kinnear played Nicholson’s neighbor, a gay artist whom Nicholson’s character verbally abuses. Gooding had a small role as Kinnear’s agent who turns the tables on his former A Few Good Men co-star.
Like Jerry Maguire, As Good As It Gets got positive reviews, was a hit at the box office, and won a lot of awards. But this time, the Oscars went to Nicholson and Hunt. Gooding’s role was practically a cameo appearance.
In 1998, Gooding co-starred opposite Robin Williams in the New Age drama, What Dreams May Come.
Williams played a man who died and actually passes on to the afterlife. Gooding played his spiritual advisor on the other side. Williams’ journeys take him through Heaven and Hell without being especially interesting.
What Dreams May Come got mixed reviews and disappointed at the box office.
In 1999, Gooding starred opposite Anthony Hopkins in Jon Turteltaub’s thriller, Instinct.
Instinct was marketed like a follow-up to Silence of the Lambs with Hopkins playing an anthropologist who has been living with gorillas. Gooding played the psychiatrist tasked with figuring out why Hopkins killed some rangers in Africa.
But Instinct was no Silence of the Lambs. It got terrible reviews and bombed at the box office.
Later that year, Gooding co-starred with Skeet Ulrich in the action/comedy Chill Factor.
Gooding plays an ice cream delivery man who is tasked with saving the world. The kid from Scream shows up. Hilarity fails to ensue. Reviews were scathing and the movie flopped at the box office.
That same year, Gooding used some of his Oscar clout to produce and star in the film, A Murder of Crows with his friend and business partner Derek Broes. That film marked the start of Gooding’s direct-to-video career.
Gooding bounced back in 2000 opposite Robert DeNiro in the military drama, Men of Honor.
Gooding played a Navy diver who is trained by a racist Master Chief played by DeNiro. Because this is a movie, Gooding and DeNiro eventually find common ground. Also, Charlize Theron shows up.
Despite mixed reviews, Men of Honor was a hit.
In 2001, Gooding had a small role in another military-themed drama. This time, it was Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor.
Pearl Harbor was a blatant attempt to recreate the success of Titanic. It featured a doomed romance set against a historical backdrop. But with all the explosions and patriotic jingoism one expects from auteur, Michael Bay.
The movie was supposed to cement Ben Affleck’s status as an A-list star while making stars out of Kate Beckinsale and Josh Hartnett. Instead, it contributed to Affleck’s career implosion and buried Hartnett in over-exposure.
Gooding was one of many cameos in the film. He played Dorie Miller, a ship cook who became the first African-American to be awarded the Navy Cross. All I remember is that he went absolutely ape shit with a big gun.
Pearl Harbor got bad reviews. It disappointed at the domestic box office, but turned a profit overseas.
Later that year, Gooding appeared as part of the star-studded ensemble in the comedy, Rat Race.
Rat Race aspired to be an update on It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. But it turned out to be closer to Cannonball Run. The plot had mostly C-list celebrities racing to win a cash prize.
Gooding was joined by fellow African-American Oscar-winner Whoopi Goldberg. Rat Race was the first film to feature two African-American Oscar winners. It also featured a crazy squirrel and a busload of Lucille Ball impersonators.
Reviews were mixed and the movie was a modest hit at the box office.
In 2002, Gooding starred in the Disney comedy, Snow Dogs.
Gooding played a Florida dentist who inherits a team of snow dogs. In short, it couldn’t be farther from Oscar territory. Actually it could as we will see soon. But at the time, it was surprising to see Gooding slumming it in a high concept Disney dog movie.
Reviews were negative, but Snow Dogs was a modest success. People love dogs.
In 2003, Gooding hit what had to be rock bottom with the supposed comedy, Boat Trip.
Gooding and SNL fat guy Horatio Sanz play a couple of buddies who discover to their horror that they have booked a vacation on a gay cruise. It’s a reprehensible premise which was poorly executed. Critics savaged Boat Trip and the movie bombed at the box office.
Audiences officially began asking, “What the hell happened?”
After Boat Trip, there is nowhere to go but up. So starring opposite Beyoncé Knowles in The Fighting Temptations was definitely a step up. The film got mixed reviews and disappointed at the box office – especially given Knowles’ popularity. But at least it wasn’t Boat Trip.
Gooding ended the year with the drama, Radio, in which he played a mentally challenged young man who befriends a football coach played by Ed Harris.
When A-list actors take on roles like this, there are two ways it can go. One, they can be heaped with praise and often awards for their brave performance. Two, everyone cringes. Radio was one of those movies where everyone cringed.
Radio got mostly negative reviews and disappointed at the box office. If it was intended to get Gooding back in Oscar’s good graces, it failed. But Gooding was nominated for a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actor for all three of his films in 2003.
After Radio, Gooding plunged into the abyss of direct-to-video releases. In 2004, he did voice work on Disney’s Home on the Range. That film’s failure caused Disney to shutter their feature animation division for years. Gooding came to specialize in gritty dramas like Dirty, Shadowboxer and End Game.
In 2007, Gooding had something of a comeback on the big screen. He started the year with a supporting role in Eddie Murphy’s comedy, Norbit.
Norbit played a skinny nerd and his outrageously fat and disgusting fiance. The movie was reviled by critics and many believe it cost Murphy his Oscar for Dreamgirls. In spite of that, Norbit was a hit at the box office.
Later that year, Gooding starred in Daddy Day Camp, the sequel to Murphy’s family comedy, Daddy Day Care.
Daddy Day Care was a surprise hit for Murphy in 2003. But when Murphy (who is not known for refusing to make sequels) refused to make a sequel, Oscar-winner Gooding (who is not known for refusing to make anything) stepped in.
Daddy Day Camp was even more critically reviled than the original (which was not well-liked by critics). Unlike the first film, the sequel failed at the box office.
Daddy Day Camp and Norbit won Gooding his second Golden Raspberry Nomination.
Gooding ended 2007 with a small role in Ridley Scott’s crime drama, American Gangster. American Gangster starred Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe. The reviews were mostly positive and the movie was a hit. But once again, Gooding’s role was very small.
After that, Gooding made a stream of direct-to-video movies that would make Val Kilmer choke. The two even starred together in 2009′s Hardwired. Gooding made two direct-to-video films with Christian Slater; Lies & Illusions in 2009 and Sacrifice in 2011.
In 2012, Gooding returned to the big screen for George Lucas’ take on the story of the Tuskegee Airmen, Red Tails. Gooding had already appeared in the HBO version of the story years earlier. But this time he was the star and it was a theatrical release.
Reviews for Red Tails were mostly negative. After spending years in production, Red Tails was a disappointment at the box office.
In 2013, Gooding will appear on the big screen again with a cameo in Robert Rodriguez exploitation satire, Machete Kills. The movie is loaded with stunt casting like Mel Gibson, Charlie Sheen, Lindsay Lohan and Lady Gaga. Appearing in Machete Kills is more or less an admission that your movie career is over.
So, what the hell happened?
Let’s face it, roles like Rod Tidwell in Jerry Maguire don’t come along very often. Gooding was exceptionally lucky to get cast in movies like Boyz N the Hood and Jerry Maguire to begin with. Even an Oscar winner can’t expect to keep scoring those kind of parts.
When those kinds of roles didn’t materialize, Gooding went for “the money” (sorry, couldn’t resist) in the most low brow comedies imaginable. Which was a bit of a strange career decision because he was not known as a comedic actor.
Gooding cashed a few fat paychecks at the expense of his Oscar prestige. Eventually, he settled for the regular paycheck of steady work in direct-to-video releases.
More “What the Hell Happened?”
Kim Basinger Thora Birch Matthew Broderick Nicolas Cage Chevy Chase Kevin Costner Geena Davis Bridget Fonda Brendan Fraser Mel Gibson Cuba Gooding Jr. Heather Graham Melanie Griffith Steve Guttenberg Daryl Hannah Helen Hunt Michael Keaton Nicole Kidman Val Kilmer Jude Law Jennifer Jason Leigh Penelope Ann Miller Demi Moore Rick Moranis Eddie Murphy Mike Myers Michelle Pfeiffer Molly Ringwald Meg Ryan Winona Ryder Arnold Schwarzenegger Steven Seagal Elisabeth Shue Alicia Silverstone Christian Slater Mira Sorvino Wesley Snipes Sharon Stone Mena Suvari Uma Thurman John Travolta Kathleen Turner Robin Williams Debra Winger Sean Young Renee Zellweger
Posted on January 26, 2013, in Movies, What the Hell Happened? and tagged a few good men, as good as it gets, boyz n the hood, cuba gooding jr, eddie murphy, entertainment, jack nicholson, jerry maguire, movies, Oscar, pearl harbor, rat race, tom cruise. Bookmark the permalink. 38 Comments.
Plenty of people who may have a WTHH on their own here
Robin Williams
Whoopi Goldberg
Renee Zellweger
Angela Bassett
I have only seen two of Goodiings’ films: As Good as It Gets and Jerry McGuire. The man has some serious talent, and it is odd that he wound up on your list. To go from the upper atmosphere of big budget Oscar films to direct-to-video is just weird!
You need to watch Boyz N the Hood! It won’t be as radical as it was back in the day, but it’s still a great movie.
I will check it out….BTW…Gooding is like a black version of Val Kilmer….and you really didn’t explain how he went from Oscar material to low-brow stuff. There’s got to be more to it, right?
I think his highs were largely good luck. Not to say he isn’t talented. But there are a lot of equally talented actors out there. He got the right parts at the right time. Which is true of most any successful actor.
But apart from those moments of extraordinarily good luck, there wasn’t a lot out there for Gooding. Making matters worse, he chose poorly. Radio being case in point.
Realizing that he wasn’t going to have a lot of great leading roles, Gooding went for the dough. I can’t really blame him. He has a family to support. Might as well cash in on the Oscar clout.
Still, Boat Trip and Norbit are hard to excuse. And Daddy Day Camp? He went from Oscar winner to a poor man’s version of post-success Eddie Murphy. That’s a pretty huge fall.
Basically, I think Gooding was faced with very few good choices and made the most profitable choice available.
I guess we all do what is best for us. I just bought an antique pick-up truck because I couldn’t say no to a good deal….kind of puts things into perspective.
2 more takeaways from that awesome Oscar speech video:
-what was Dennis Rodman doing at the Oscars ceremony?
-good for Steve Martin for helping to kick-start the standing O
It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World is one of my Dad’s favorite movies ever and I really enjoy some of it. The wide screen photography is beautiful, the stunt casting is delicious, and Phil Silvers is pure genius in it. It is, however, bloated, too long, and its supposed climax is not very funny.
So anytime it looks like they’re trying to recapture the magic that did exist in IAMMMMW, I am both queasy and unreasonably optimistic.
Rat Race actually turned out better than I had every right to expect. There are multiple scenes in it which are fall-down funny and the overall tone works. The climactic scene is also not particularly funny, which is a wash. On the downside, it fails in comparison largely due to casting. While IAMMMMW boasted an absolute embarrassment of comedy legends, Rat Race stars Breckin Meyer. Uh….yeah.
While a comedy which boasts Whoopi Goldberg, Jon Lovitz, Rowan Atkinson, and John Cleese certainly has some funny prestige, compare that to:
Milton Berle
Ethel Merman
Sid Ceasar
Buddy Hackett
Mickey Rooney
Phil Silvers
Jonathan Winters
Peter Falk
Don Knotts
etc
etc
etc
It just isn’t close. The above cast helps put IAMMMMW over the top, while Rat Race’s set of mostly second stringers leaves it as a real hit and miss proposition that is quickly forgotten.
I think you summed up the Rat Race IAMMMMW comparisson nicely. I remember watching IAMMMMW for the first time late one New Year’s Eve while babysitting. Since I was stuck there with nothing to do and the kids were asleep, I appreciated the movie’s bloat. But I don’t think I would ever sit through it all again.
That 2 minute Oscar clip really is a time capsule, isn’t it?
Paul Hogan (who strikes me as a classic “one hit wonder” actor or “two hit wonder” if you count the second “Crocodile Dundee” movie) and Josh Hartnett would make good “WTHHT” subjects. Had Ben Affleck not reinvented himself as an actor-director post-”Gigli” then maybe he would’ve been a strong (or stronger) candidate too:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HollywoodHypeMachine
Josh Hartnett rocketed to super-stardom in the late ’90s and early ’00s with roles in teen films like The Virgin Suicides, Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later, and The Faculty, and was voted several times by People Magazine as one of their top teen stars of the year. Gradually, however, his momentum died down — in spite of a starring turn in the critically acclaimed Black Hawk Down, Hartnett was in a long list of commercial flops including Town And Country, Pearl Harbor, and Hollywood Homicide. His last work of note, 2007′s 30 Days of Night, barely recouped its production budget, and he’s spent the late ’00s and early ’10s working on small indie projects.
Now as for the decline of Cuba Gooding, Jr.’s career, he apparently attributed this to the fact that the good roles stopped coming for him once Will Smith became Hollywood’s new favorite black actor:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StarDerailingRole
I don’t think I could write an entiire article about Hogan. I agree, he was a one-hit wonder. I don’t count CD2.
Hartnett, I will definitely write about. I have a soft spot for actors and actresses who were expected to top the A-list and never did. Hartnett was The Next Big Thing circa Pearl Harbor. But it never came to be.
I tried following your link, but I couldn’t find the Gooding/Smith quote. My daughter is warbling off key in the other room as I type this, so my concentration isn’t 100%. Nothing like hearing one line of a song over and over again for a half hour sung off key by a 7-year-old!
Anyway, I agree that the good roles stopped coming to Gooding. I’m not sure that Smith was taking roles that would have gone to Gooding. Smith was arguably the biggest action star in the world when Gooding was accepting his Oscar.
Somebody made an interesting comment that Josh Hartnett at the peak of his popularity was the Channing Tatum (both have been accused of not really being the most versatile of actors) about 10 years ago:
http://officialfan.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=offtopic&action=display&thread=466473&page=1
To an extent, I agree. But Tatum has already eclipsed Hartnett in terms of box office.
It seems I have not seen a single flick with this Gooding guys. But from the article it seems he starred in exactly two flicks that got good reviews and made money.
That’s true if you are talking about starring roles. As Good As It Gets was a critically acclaimed hit with Gooding in a supporting role. While he wasn’t the star, I don’t discount that.
One thing to point out is that lead roles in movies that are a hit with critics and audiences are relatively rare. I have written about actors and actresses who have not had a single lead role in a movie that was critically and commercially successful. Christian Slater and Steve Guttenberg come to mind.
So, two movies that were outrageously successful with critics and audiences alike is a pretty major success. Add in an Oscar win and you have a major career.
More importantly, you should really check out Boyz N the Hood and Jerry Maguire. Both are really good movies.
Ah, good ole Cuba Gooding. I’m afraid I will have to disagree with most of you on this one. WTH happened to him is that he just was never very good to begin with. I think he got lucky landing a couple sweet roles; three to be precise: Boyz, McGuire, and Men of Honor. He was decent in all three but it’s because he didn’t have to carry the movie. He played second fiddle to better actors who helped his performance shine a bit brighter. Now actually I kind of like the guy. I saw his Academy acceptance speech and he came across as genuinely humble and appreciative. I respect that. While I would have liked to see him become a big success, it was just never going to be. He is an over-actor. His delivery is almost always over the top and “hammy”. Just what was needed in McGuire, but doesn’t work in most other roles. Then all his attempts at comedy were very cheesy and cornball. And he isn’t heavy weight enough to pull off the tough guy, action hero. It was no surprise to me at all when he became a direct to video prince. Too bad. He really does seem like a nice guy.
For what it’s worth I feel pretty much the same way about a couple others mentioned in this entry: Hartnett, Zellweger and Hogan.
I agree with you to an extent. Gooding does overact sometimes. I remember watching Judgment Night and laughing at his big dramatic moment. But sometimes, I think he shows restraint. He does best in flashy roles like Jerry MacGuire where his big personality can shine. But there aren’t enough roles like that out there to support a career. And maybe he’s right that Will Smith started taking them. I do think he’s a talent. But he’s probably better suited to supporting roles than leading men.
Paul Hogan was an Aussie sensation who’s phenomenal success spilled over to America for a little bit. He was never an American movie star. He made a go at it, but it didn’t happen. You have to think he was satisfied being the King of the Australian Box Office and a minor celeb in the US. Hartnett was one of those annointed by the Hollywood press as the Next Big Thing that never came to pass. I always find that sort of thing fascinating. See also: Gretchen Moll.
But Zellweger is in a completely different class. She was legitimately A-list. We’ll talk more about her soon.
I almost spat coffee at my computer laughing at your quote:
“After that, Gooding made a stream of direct-to-video movies that would make Val Kilmer choke..”
Le Beau you are hilarious with these posts!
I’m glad you enjoyed it. If I can get just one person to do a spit-take, I feel like I’ve accomplished something.
Hey Lebeau, just a teensy correction… Outbreak was released in 1995, not 1993.. I remember seeing the trailers back then.
Everything I’m looking at says 95…
I freaking love Jerry Maguire – dont even know why, all my friends tease me about that – it had me at hello! But tbh, I love Regina King more than Cuba in that movie. She decided to choose the TV route, which is both good (she still has a good career and gets positive reviews from critics plus audiences still care) and bad (it is again a reflection of racism in Hollywood and a proof that such a funny & talented woman like her doesn’t get enough material). A big reason for black or Asian or Hispanic actors/actresses in Hollywood is that there aren’t simply not enough good roles for them. The roles mostly are supporting, so when Halle Berry or Cuba decides to jump on leading roles, they just come across such stinky material.
If Cuba decides to choose the supporting but showy route, he could find success in the long term like Morgan Freeman. (Octavia Spencer from The Help seems to be firmly choosing that Morgan route) At that time (and probably now but to a lesser degree), black actors simply dont have good leading material enough. (Will Smith is a different example – tbh, since he is in Scientology like Tom Cruise, I cant help but think of shady stuff)
Havent seen Boyz in the Hood in a long time, I forgot almost all the plot now tbh. I also havent seen Angela Bassett in anything in a very long time/
Good points. Lead roles for minorities are very limited. The Freeman/Jackson supporting roles are much more plentiful. But even there, competition is fierce. Morgan Freeman and Samuel L Jackson make a lot of movies between the two of them. Everyone else fights for what is left over.
Boyz in the Hood has to be a top ten movie of the past quarter century. Gooding was fantastic in it – even if he has chosen a career arc that appears more in line with Eddie Murphy than Denzel Washington.
When it came out, Boyz was a real game changer. If you would have told me then that Gooding would go on to win an Oscar, I would have believed it. If you told me he would then go on to settle for Eddie Murphy’s cast-off sequels, I would have been very sad.
Somebody on Cuba Gooding, Jr.’s IMDb message board made a lengthy post about his career trajectory:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000421/board/flat/134307586?p=1
It seems to me that he had a fantastic niche playing these manic supporting characters like in Jerry Maguire, As Good As It Gets and What Dreams May Come. Then, after the oscar win, he or his agent decided “you have an oscar, you’re young and attractive- you should be a leading man!” so then somebody says lawyer movies are safe, comfortable routes. So he does ‘A Murder of Crows’ and ‘Instinct’. Two projects which obviously looked great on paper. Then somebody says “Hey Skeet Ulrich, you, too, were in As Good As It Gets and you had a fairly recent hit movie in Scream- you two should do something together” and so “Chill Factor” was born. A depressingly awful movie that was inexplicably green lit by a major studio. So he F’d up, but it was his first attempt at action and he was forgiven.
Then someone in his circle got a bug up their ass and said ‘do war movies! those are hot right now!” and so he did. Being black, his choices were slightly limited, but he picked the good but not very good and nothing close to great ‘Men of Honor’, which is a good movie. It’s a middling drama in many ways, but it’s respectable. He puts in a good performance. He decided he really liked playing stoic characters.
But then he was probably offered relatively substantial paydays for what amounted to bit parts in all-star cast movies like Pearl Harbor and Rat Race. Those were understandable choices. Pearl Harbor was like the twenty-something version in Hollywood of the adult’s “The Thin Red Line” and ‘Rat Race’ was an update of the classic ‘It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World”.
Then somebody said “do a kids movie” and this was his first mis-step. The bread and butter is in voice work for kids films. If you do a live action kid film as someone in his position, you have to as a rule take a barely there part of a parent or some kind of parental/guardian figure and then you let the kids star. It’s just how its done. Instead, he decided to say ‘screw it, i’ll carry this bitch’. He did carry Snow Dogs and it was a complete screw up. Absolute failure. FUBAR’d.
Then he decided to do a crazy situational comedy with an up and coming SNL star- sometimes a good move, usually a terrible move. So he had ‘Snow Dogs’ and ‘Boat Trip’ back to back. I think that’s where he lost his credibility. So he had to take a small role in ‘The Fighting Temptations’ to pay the bills.
Then he made a minor correct decision in taking ‘Radio’. Family friendly, uplifting, the kind of movie with a lot of potential for ‘Lifetime’ but the studio system made it and it was good for Cuba. Then he made a smart move on a not-so-good movie by taking the voice-only work of ‘Home on the Range’. i think that’s the point that it all falls apart.
He had Shadowboxer, which, though it co-starred Helen Mirren, it starred her before she was a popular actress and thus got no traction. Then Dirty, which was his version of the indie-dark-material come back. I suppose it got okay marks, but didn’t make a splash. It was supposed to be his Training Day-meets-Leaving Las Vegas.
And then he thought ‘I could take Eddie Murphy’s family film mantle’ not realizing that Eddie Murphy’s family film era was dead and nobody wanted anybody to take the mantle.
Oh, still wanting desperately to be an action star he takes the indie action film ‘End Game’ starring 80′s box office sensation Burt Reynolds, cheese inducing ‘James Woods’ and former t.v. hottie Angie Harmon. After that he does the Eddie Murphy-wanna-be thing with ‘Norbit’ (a huge hit nobody will remember), ‘what love is’ (a cast filled with the who’s who of formerly hot supporting actors of the mid-90′s, so i suppose he fit right in with that one), ‘Daddy Day Camp’, another attempt to usurp Eddie Murphy’s faded crown. And then that’s where it ends.
He gets thrown a bone with the Nicky Barnes cameo in American Gangster and after that…nada. One crappy direct-to-video action film after another. Now, he has Red Tails waiting in the wings but that’s been in post-production forever and then some, so who knows when that sees the light of day and if it’ll be like ‘Agora’ or ‘Che’ with a massive budget with a highly regarded team behind it but no traction at the box office.
So that’s Cuba Gooding, Jr.’s career in a nutshell. I feel like every role he took seemed logical at the time but he could just never quite pick correctly. I think he also for a long time went out of his way to avoid ‘black’ roles, which made it harder for him in Hollywood. Oh well. I, too, think he’s capable of a real come back one of these days. He just needs a good combination of luck and sympathy from the right producer/director.
FRC’s Fallen Icon #6 – Cuba Gooding Jr.:
http://www.frontroomcinema.com/frcs-fallen-icon-6-cuba-gooding-jr/
After Jerry Maguire, it looked as though Cuba would be joining the ranks of acclaimed stars such as Tom Hanks, Jack Nicholson and Kevin Spacey. He made a smart move in selecting As Good As it Gets as his lead off from Maguire, sadly though that would be his only smart career decision for the remainder of the decade. What followed was a seemingly endless pile of flop after flop to close out the decade. What Dreams May Come would be the closest he would come to showcasing his talent and why he was an Oscar winner.A Murder of Crows, Instinct and Chill factor never really brought him back to form nor did they perform well in theater or on DVD/VHS.
Typically with the closing out of a decade you hope to accomplish better things in the next ten years, though there were glimmers of hope, Cuba still has not been able to break out and do something he is much more capable of doing. This new decade he started out strong in Men of Honor, which performed poorly despite the performances of the films two leads Robert DeNiro and Cuba. This was followed by the retelling of the attack on Pearl Harbor in Michael Bay’s long winded, explosion spectacle, Pearl Harbor.
After taking a stab at action and drama’s, Cuba decided to take a try at comedy. This was perhaps this biggest mistake because it led to some pretty bad comedies from 2001-2003. Rat Race, Snow Dogs, Boat Trip and the Fighting Temptations were all panned by critics and discarded just the same by viewing audiences. After this, he went back briefly to his dramatic roots and portrayed James Robert “Radio” Kennedy, a mentally challenged high school student, in 2003’s Radio. Cuba’s performance was praised, while the rest of the film was ripped apart by critics.
In 2004, Cuba did some voiceover work in the Disney feature Home on the Range, this would be the last Cub film released in theater until 2006, entering the straight to DVD realm with the releases of Dirty, Shadowboxer and End Game. He would show up on the big screen in Eddie Murphy’s crap fest, Norbit, which was not well received, to say the least. At the end of a dismal 2006 for Cuba, he starred in What love is, the film only made $19,000.00 in its theatrical run and only made it to forty-two theaters world-wide.
2007 would consist of the same choices, with the exception of a small role in Denzel Washington’s piece America Gangster. Daddy Day Camp and Land Before Time XIII: The Wisdom of Friends would be a low points in his already diminishing career. He returned to the straight DVD market with Hero Wanted, Harold and Linewatch all during 2008.
Recently he has been in a TV movie, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story as the title character.
In the end what it really boils down to is some poor choices. Had Cuba been more selective and persistent in getting those great roles he may not be in the void of obscurity. But in all fairness, even the greats make a terrible movie every now and then, no one is perfect. Here is hoping Cuba can bounce back and deliver something more than Land Before Time sequels.
We will have to wait and see if his latest film “Red Tails”, a re-telling of the Tuskegee Airmen is coming next year and may spark a comeback that Cuba deserves….if only he can stay away from the money grabbing easy choices in the future!!
25 A-List Hollywood Actors Who Fell the F Off:
http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2013/02/25-a-list-hollywood-actors-who-fell-the-f-off/cuba-gooding-jr
Cuba Gooding Jr.
Best Known For: Jerry Maguire (1996), As Good as it Gets (1997)
Most Recent Project: One in the Chamber (2012)
Cuba Gooding Jr.’s career looked to be on the up-and-up after his turn as “Show me the money!” football star Rod Tidwell in Jerry Maguire. Boy, everyone couldn’t have been more wrong.
His choice of roles between the bright spots of 1997′s As Good as it Gets and 2007′s American Gangster are as bad as they come. It’s a resume of pain and shame: dancing in heaven with Robin Williams for What Dreams May Come; existing in Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor; the damn snow dogs movie Snow Dogs; and Radio, of which nothing else need be said. That’s how you turn exciting promise into automatic Razzie nominations.
His role in American Gangster was a fake. “Direct-to-DVD” is a permanent part of his agent’s vocabulary.
Is it a safe comparison to say that Cuba Gooding, Jr. is kind of the “black Nicolas Cage”. Both kind of have reputations (for better or for worse) for sometimes being hammy actors. And after they one their respective Oscars, it seemed like, they no longer had much of an incentive to prove how “talented” they are and decided to go after the big paydays (although w/ Cage, he at least has the whole “I’m in debt!” excuse) regardless of quality.
9 of the worst Oscar winners ever:
http://guyism.com/entertainment/movies/worst-oscar-winners-ever.html#6-5-cuba-gooding-jr
Somewhere in the universe, at a mall or maybe a boat show or maybe at the line outside of a food pantry on Santa Monica Boulevard, Cuba Gooding, Jr. is wearily shouting “Show me the money!” for mild, half-embarrassed applause from people who just sort of wish he would go away. And then later, he’ll swing by his agent’s office where his agent will be hiding underneath his desk with the lights off and Cuba will mournfully cry “C’mon man, show me the money” before trudging home, muttering “Show me the money, show me the money” and wondering if tonight will be the night that Tom Cruise finally returns one of his phone calls.
The Cinefiles — Favorite and Least Favorite Oscar Movies:
At one point, the hosts argue that William H. Macy really should’ve won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar that year (for “Fargo”), not Cuba.
Cuba Gooding, Jr., The King of Redbox — A Study in Movie Posters:
http://www.pajiba.com/seriously_random_lists/cuba-gooding-jr-the-king-of-redbox-a-study-in-movie-posters.php
Standing in line at the grocery store yesterday (following proper grocery story etiquette), I noticed among the Redbox selections was a movie called Ticking Clock, starring Cuba Gooding, Jr. And I thought, “That’s where he’s been!”
But when I returned home and checked iMDB, I learned that Ticking Clock was only a tiny fraction of the truth. In fact, Cuba Gooding, Jr. is probably one of the most prolific actors in Hollywood right now. The difference between Gooding and Nic Cage, however, is that, while Cage continues to release moves on 3,000 screens, Cuba Gooding, Jr. has become something of the King of Redbox.
Since 2007, Cuba Gooding, Jr. has made 10 movies. You’ve probably never heard of a single one of them. I haven’t, even though along the way his co-stars have included Harvey Keitel, Val Kilmer, Christian Slater, Taryn Manning, Henry Rollins, Jason London, Lance Reddick, Ally Sheedy, Nicki Blonsky, and Ray Liotta, among many, many other recognizable names. My conclusion: There’s an entire universe of movies that most of us have no f***ing clue about. And the King of that Universe is Oscar winner Cuba Gooding, Jr., whose face on a movie poster is apparently enough to sway enough individuals to rent his movies and keep his career afloat.
When Star Power Becomes Too Much: 15 Celebrities Who Should Take A Break:
http://styleblazer.com/128284/when-star-power-becomes-too-much-15-celebrities-who-should-take-a-break/12/
Cuba Gooding Jr.’s Oscar win in 1996 for Jerry Maguire yielded the actor his pick of Hollywood’s best projects. What better response to have than saying yes to everything you’re offered? The actor has appeared in over forty films since then. This prolific period didn’t really kick off until 2007 when he appeared in an impressive total of five films. His batting average has continued since then, hurtling his career into the C-list and greatly detracting from the occasional big screen efforts like Red Tails.
10 Formally Respected Actors Who Have Probably Gone Insane:
http://whatculture.com/film/10-formally-respected-actors-who-have-probably-gone-insane.php/8
3. Cuba Gooding, Jr.
In the mid-90′s, this guy was on top of the world following his breakout performance in Boyz n the Hood, a supporting role in A Few Good Men, and then an award-winning performance as Rod in Jerry Maguire.
If you thought Adrien Brody was hit badly by the “Oscar Curse”, he’s got nothing on Cuba; following another supporting performance in As Good as It Gets, he has consistently churned out average performances in terrible movies of which there are literally too many to list here, but here is a few: Boat Trip, Daddy Day Camp and Norbit.
For a guy that was riding on such a high which culminated with Jerry Maguire, I have no idea what went so wrong that he ended up being a lesser Eddie Murphy.
COMMENTARY TRACKS OF THE DAMNED:
http://www.avclub.com/articles/shadowboxer-has-little-shadowboxing-but-plenty-of,84230/
Crimes:
Making a film so preposterous that the casting of baby-faced Joseph Gordon-Levitt (who looks to be about 12 years old) as a doctor and Mo’Nique as his lover/nurse (who is named Precious, strangely enough, the title of the Lee Daniels film that won her an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress four years later) qualifies as the 13th least-plausible element, just ahead of the equally surreal casting of Helen Mirren as a lover/mother surrogate to traumatized hitman Cuba Gooding Jr.
Achieving the pretension of a David Lynch film, the ambition of a Pedro Almodóvar film, and the aesthetic achievement of a super-long Red Shoe Diaries episode
Lingering on Gooding’s muscular posterior so obsessively that by the end of the film audiences will have seen it more than Gooding’s own proctologist
Squandering a one-of-a-kind cast that includes Helen Mirren, Cuba Gooding Jr., Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Mo’Nique, Macy Gray, and Stephen Dorff
Once They Were Stars, Now They’re All Too Easy Targets:15 Celebrities Whose Careers Have Become Punchlines:
http://styleblazer.com/132100/once-they-were-stars-now-theyre-all-too-easy-targets15-celebrities-whose-careers-have-become-punchlines/14/
Cuba Gooding Jr.’s performance in Jerry Maguire won him an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1996. The actor was among Hollywood’s biggest A-listers for a stint but a series of box office flops and bad career choice (see Boat Trip, Snow Dogs, or Norbit) led him down the drain of direct-to-video movies. Though the actor has managed to score a few substantial theatrical parts since his decline (in films like Red Tails or American Gangster), the actor has become a punchline among his contemporaries due to his “anything for a paycheck” attitude. Rumors of alcohol abuse have also hounded the actor, who was admitted to a rehab facility last August. Whatever the case, Cuba Gooding Jr. has become a testament to the fact that Oscar glory is a fleeting thing.
What would’ve happened had Cuba not turned down the lead role in Steven Spielberg’s “Amistad”:
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000421/board/flat/209975650?d=212838862&p=1#212838862
Cuba Gooding Jr. Regrets Turning Down Steven Spielberg
March 14th, 2006 9:43am EST
Cuba Gooding Jr. regrets turning down the chance to play a slave in Steven Spielberg’s epic Amistad, admitting he was too bigheaded after his Oscar win to accept certain roles. The star accepts his career suffered as a result of the choices he made directly following his Best Supporting Actor Oscar victory in 1996 because he decided he should wait for the very best offers, and turn down everything else.
He recalls, “Steven Spielberg came to me and said, ‘I want you to be in Amistad and I said, ‘It’s a slave role; show me the money. I’m so a big thing,’ and he goes, ‘I can direct you.’ and I said, ‘No, I have to pass.’”
He added, “To me, at the time, I remember this interview I read (with) Christopher Reeve talking about Superman. What other role could live up to being Superman; he was Superman. I bought into that. People were telling me (of Jerry Maguire), ‘You’re black, it’s a comedy role, you’re not gonna win this thing.’ So, when I won it, it was like I had all these things in my life – ‘This is what you are, this is what you’ve become… Now represent that. I have arrived and now I have to live up to this thing.’ (I didn’t know) the next day I should have rolled up my sleeves and said, ‘OK, now let’s continue on this journey.’ Creatively, I stopped myself.”
That pretty much sums it up. I had never heard Gooding speak so honestly on the subject. Great find.
Hollywood Career Killers: 15 Movies That Helped Do Away With Major Tinseltown Players:
http://styleblazer.com/141888/hollywood-career-killers-15-movies-that-helped-do-away-with-major-tinseltown-players/2/
Cuba Gooding Jr’s career has been on the direct-to-video skids for years now. Looking back, he has no one to blame but himself. Well, actually, he can also blame Boat Trip. The 2002 comedy co-starred Horatio Sanz and chronicled the plight of two buddies attempting to restart their love life with a singles’ cruise. Of course, things don’t go as planned and they’re placed on a homosexual-themed boat ride instead. What follows from there is a sustained, 94 minute gay joke as a Gooding and Sanz’s characters pretend to be homosexual to win favor with two female cruise employees. The film did not make its money back, Gooding was ripped apart by critics, and Sanz hasn’t headlined a film since.