It must be difficult being a celebrity. Everyone says they love you, but when hard times take away your glow, people leave you in the gutter and forget your legacy. And while you're down there, rather than accept your fate, you do nothing but torture yourself over the possibility of a comeback. It's been done many times before. Your second chance is just around the corner. You just have to wait for it and do stupid Look Who's Talking sequels in the meantime. Here is our list of actors who made it back from the grave, career wise, and now sit atop the entertainment world.
Celebrity Comebacks
Your star may have fallen, but you're not out of the game until you're dead.
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By Evan Saathoff December 1, 2011 |
Credit: Paramount
| 11 | Robert Downey Jr. |
Robert Downey Jr. was always awesome. The problem was that he was also really, really high and unreliable. After one too many stories of Downey passing out in increasingly bizarre places, Hollywood finally decided the time had arrived for Robert Downey Jr. to cool it.
Downey suffered through many stints in rehab and eventually gained control of his really fun demons. He now plays fast talking, highly intelligent party animals in not one, but two successful franchises: Iron Man and Sherlock Holmes. We love him just as much as we used to, if not more. If anyone took their comeback and did something special with it, it was this guy.
Credit: Gary Land
| 10 | R. Kelly |
Quick, what's the first think you think about when someone says R. Kelly? If your answer is anything other than "Peed on an underage girl" than R. Kelly wins the Game of Life forever.
You just can't keep R. Kelly down. Most celebrities would be done after such a repulsive public scandal, but Kelly went on to distract the world with the utterly confusing and awesome Trapped in the Closet series. He's not done yet, either. Kelly recently had surgery on his throat and will soon see the release of his autobiography, Soula Coaster. This is R. Kelly's world; we just live in it. But watch out so he doesn't pee on you next.
Credit: Sony
| 9 | Drew Barrymore |
Until the 1990s we only knew Drew Barrymore as the cute little girl from E.T. We figured she'd fall into the child actor history books along with everyone else from that film. Instead, Barrymore rose like a phoenix into the hearts of Gen-Xers everywhere and is now one of the highest paid women in show business.
How did she do it? One, she got off drugs. Two, she flashed David Letterman. It's just that easy. Everyone should try it.
Credit: Lions Gate
| 8 | John Travolta |
John Travolta used to be one of the hottest guys in the business. After starring in classic films like Grease, Saturday Night Fever, and Blow Out, it seemed like Travolta would be on top forever.
But then the 1980s happened and Travolta found himself losing a decade to embarrassing roles in talking baby movies. Travolta found his comeback with 1994's Pulp Fiction, which finally gave him the box office clout to take embarrassing roles in his own movies. He's been embarrassing on an A-list level ever since.
Credit: Warner Home Video
| 7 | Mike Tyson |
Mike Tyson has had quite a career. He's been a boxer, a video game character, a rapist, a cannibal, an animal lover, a documentary subject, and a pretty decent comedic actor. Supposedly, people with facial tattoos have limited employment options, but Tyson proves that's not the case at all.
This comeback is probably more healthy than lucrative for Tyson as it's doubtful he's making heavyweight title-fight dough off his Funny or Die clips and The Hangover cameos. Still, he's probably happier making jokes than being the butt of them.
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