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With Die HardBruce Willis became, almost overnight, one of the biggest action stars on the planet. But if you take a look at his career, you'll see that the actor, now 69, didn't exactly play it safe after his breakthrough as John McClane.
Instead of making the most obvious career decision and taking action roles after John McTiernan's blockbuster, Willis simply did what he wanted to do. The same goes for the first three films he made after Die Hard : A hero like so many others, The Bonfire of the Vanities et Hello mom, here baby.
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Even after cementing his superstar status with 58 Minutes to Live (Die Hard 2) et The Last SamaritanBruce Willis took on smaller projects that rarely brought him much money.
Bruce Willis accepts actors' union minimum wage for role
Among them, the drama Billy Bathgate with director Robert Benton, which was a box office failure, but which was one of the actor's favorite films. Robert Benton would have contacted him to An almost perfect man with the following words, reported by Espinof: “It's not like 'Billy Bathgate', we have no money. We're all making this movie on the lowest budget possible“. Willis' response: “Don't worry about money. We're going to have fun“.
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At the time, the actorArmageddon earned an average of $15 million per film, while Robert Benton only had $20 million for the entire project. Bruce Willis therefore agreed to work on An almost perfect man for a weekly salary of $1,400, or the minimum salary of the actors' union at the time.
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In this comedy, Bruce Willis plays construction contractor Carl Roebuck, who regularly clashes with his employee Sully, played by Paul Newman. In the eyes of many critics, the chemistry between the two great actors contributed greatly to the appeal of this comedy, which was nominated for an Oscar in the best screenplay category and grossed approximately $30 million.
In an interview with Playboy a few years later, Bruce Willis returned to his meeting with Paul Newman and praised the actor who died in 2008: “Paul Newman is incredible. He's 70 years old and he continues to try new things with every take. A guy like him wouldn't need to do that. He could just show up and be the star. But he wasn't like that for a minute. We spent a lot of time laughing and making fun of each other“.
Article written in collaboration with our colleagues from Sensacine.
