‘Sad': John Travolta's journey from Hollywood great to Hollywood has been

News.com.au

11 hours ago

He was once one of the biggest actors in the world, having previously been nominated for not one but two Oscars, but in recent years, John Travolta has become somewhat of a Hollywood joke.
Despite numerous successes throughout his career, in movies like Grease and Saturday Night Fever, Travolta's filmography has been plagued with numerous box office bombs that have derailed his career time and time again.
Travolta's latest films, High Rollers and crime thriller Mob Land, failed to win over viewers, with the latter earning a paltry $171 at the Box Office following its UK release.
It's a tragic outcome for Travolta, who could once demand a whopping $20 million from studio execs for a movie.
A Disney executive who has worked with Travolta told the Mail that the actor had the chance to be considered one of the acting greats, but instead has long outstayed his welcome among Hollywood's elite.
'If Travolta had stopped after his Pulp Fiction comeback he would have gone down in Hollywood history as one of the all-time greats. A legend who came back for one last hurrah. But now he's like that sad guest who has overstayed his welcome at the party.'
Currently still unrated on Rotten Tomatoes, The Guardian said of High Rollers: 'A heart-slowing work of staggering stupidity and charmlessness, ineptly made and quite frankly dull except when its flaws become so egregious you can't help but guffaw.'
It's the first in a longline of flops. Back in 2018 he became one of the first actors to ever score not one, but two 0 per cent rated movies on Rotten Tomatoes in the same year; thriller Speed Kill and biopic, Gotti.
In recent years, Travolta has fallen into the trap of genre films referred to within the industry as 'geezer teezers', made most famous in recent times by Bruce Willis.
Willis, whose health was slowly deteriorating during the 2010s, starred in several films until his 2022 retirement; he typically only worked for one or two shooting days per film and was sometimes in the film for as little as seven minutes.
Having a big-name actor helps bring attention to films that are made on low budgets but usually later become profitable through rentals and sales.
Rumours about Travolta's personal life has also impacted his career, with it being revealed by Hollywood mogul Barry Diller that he refused to star in box office hit American Gigolo due to it's 'gay subtext'.
The film ultimately grossed 10 times its budget at the box office and was a big hit for eventual leading man Richard Gere.