Gerard Butler: the Career that defies Gravity

Intro One can easily recall superstars with  iconic roles who ended up stuck in a cycle   of questionable low-budget action films. Some got  trapped and couldn’t break free. Others turned   their endless action spree into a kinda sorta  trademark, even playing it up in a meta-modern   style. A few had even managed to earn a fortune on  it, creating a whole subgenre of geezer warriors   avenging a daughter, son, wife — or even a dog. But Gerard Butler is hard to place in any one   of these three categories. Even though over  the last 10 years, almost all Gerard Butler   movies were action ones and you’d need +10  glasses to find any different kind of role   during this period. Labeling Butler as just an  action star is B.S. as well, because his earlier   roles reveal a pretty broad range, making him  somewhat similar to Hugh Jackman in that sense.  But unlike Jackman, who’s had a role that’s  sustained him for years — allowing him to   take on different kinds of projects — Butler  doesn’t have a character as lucrative. He   has some ongoing franchises, but it still  doesn’t compare to Jackman’s Wolverine in   terms of recognition and impact. And profits. So, how did Butler become a prisoner of action?   Has he now abandoned attempts to land a different  type of role? And above all, why does he continue   to star in so many mediocre action films without  ever sinking to the level of outright trash?  Let’s try to unravel this by taking a  closer look at Gerard Butler’s career.  Early years Originally, Gerard — or Jerry, as he often  calls himself — was supposed to become a   lawyer. However, the booze crush he had during  his early years cost him his job. At some point,   Butler figured there must be a way to live  life as a goofy boozer, while still being   successful and famous. It didn’t take long for  Jerry to realize that acting might just be it.  At the beginning of his career, Butler performed  in theaters, including a stage adaptation of   Trainspotting, where he had a leading part. But  his movie roles were tiny, and spotting Butler on   screen was a challenge. For instance, he appeared  in the Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies and even had   a line there, which ended up being cut because  the director couldn’t understand his accent.  That same year, in 1997, Butler landed a role  in the Scottish film Mrs Brown. Something quite   notable happened during the filming of this  movie. Aside from the lack of on-set toilets,   which forced Butler to run to nearby bushes  to pee, he often hung out on the pretty cold   local beaches between shoots. During one of these  breaks, he suddenly heard screams and discovered   a young boy drowning. Butler quickly saved the boy  and later received an award for his bravery. Maybe   it was that moment Jerry got a taste for being  an action hero. But who knows for sure, huh?  First steps in Hollywood Butler’s first significant breakthrough was in  the movie Dracula 2000. The filming of this one   overlapped with another project he was involved  in: The Cherry Orchard, a cinematic adaptation   of the Russian writer Anton Chekhov’s play.  Initially, the creators didn’t want to let   Butler leave the set of The Cherry Orchard, but he  managed to negotiate and ride two horses at once.  Despite its kinda sick title, nobody wanted  to star in Dracula 2000. Scott Derrickson,   who later directed Doctor Strange, spent a lot of  time polishing the script, but it didn’t change   the situation. So most of the actors, apart  from the main ones, were hired almost randomly,   with promises of a pack of cookies as payments.  Butler, who wasn’t in high demand at the time,   accepted the cookies and participated. Dracula 2000 flopped at the box office and   wasn’t well-received by audiences. Same happened  to Butler’s next film, Reign of Fire. Dracula 2000   sucked a significant amount of blood from Johnny  Lee Miller’s career. Matthew McConaughey and   Christian Bale also took a hit from Reign of Fire.  But Butler somehow escaped major damage from both.   Instead, he gained more attention, which allowed  him to land roles in two bigger projects: the   Lara Croft sequel and Richard Donner’s Timeline. That’s incredible, but something similar happened   to these movies as well. In Tomb Raider The  Cradle of Life it was initially supposed that   Daniel Craig would participate, just like in the  first film. However, Craig was eager to play in a   smaller one, The Mother, which was being made  around the same time. After Craig ran away,   Butler stepped in. Tomb Raider sequel had a  $95 million budget and grossed 160 worldwide,   which we hope our audience quickly identified  as a flop. Neither Angelina Jolie nor Butler   seemed to notice that one though. But Jan de  Bont, the director of Tomb Raider and Speed   and producer of Minority Report and Equilibrium,  bravely absorbed the full damage of the failure   and his career immediately went south. Interestingly, a couple of years later,   when Pierce Brosnan was stepping down as James  Bond and the search for a new Agent 007 began both   Butler and Craig were among the main candidates.  Butler declined it however, not wanting to become   an actor known for just one role, a fate that many  Bond actors share. Following Butler Ewan McGregor   also turned down Bond for the same reason.  Daniel Craig was the one who didn’t freak   out and eventually agreed. What do you think about  Butler as James Bond? Let us know in the comments.  Anyway, Butler’s second major movie in 2003  was Timeline. It should’ve hit the big screen   somewhere in 2002, but there were so many re-edits  and patching ups that the movie was only released   two years later. When no-one actually wanted  it anymore. So it made only some miserable 43   million with a budget of 80. This marked Butler’s  fourth major flop in a row. So in order to avoid   flushing his career down the toilet, Jerry really  needed to choose the next project carefully.  But that’s not what actually happened. You on the other hand don't need to   choose carefully, like AND subscribe! Butler later admitted it felt quite strange   Not just an actor to be cast in a film where he had to sing,  especially since he didn’t have much vocal   experience. He had once performed in a small  Scottish rock band during his law school days,   yes. But being called up for a legendary musical  movie adaptation probably demands a bit more than   singing in some small local bar being beerdrunk.  Butler was aware of this, but when Joel Schumacher   called his agent and asked if Jerry could sing  because they needed a lead actor for the upcoming   film The Phantom of the Opera, Butler immediately  went for vocal lessons with a professor from the   Royal Academy of Music in London. Was it the lessons that paid off or   just his natural talent and charisma, but Jerry  impressed Andrew Lloyd Webber during the audition,   and the lead role in the project went to him.  By Butler’s own admission, his vocal skills   were average at best, but he tried to make up for  the lack of those with emotions and sincerity.  Audiences appreciated Butler’s effort, but critics  were unimpressed and rated the film pretty low.   Additionally, the movie didn’t perform as well at  the box office as Warner Bros. studio had hoped.   With a $70 million budget, it only managed to make  154 worldwide — a figure that’s not a disastrous   failure but still far from a success. This fail almost instantly finished off   the already shaky career of director Joel  Schumacher, who had been on thin ice since   the flop of Batman & Robin. The career of actress  Emmy Rossum also took a hit, and after Poseidon,   she disappeared from the spotlight for several  years, only making a strong comeback with   the success of the TV show Shameless. Was it the mask that hid Butler’s face   in the movie or some bizarre karmic pattern,  who knows, but Butler once again managed to   avoid the worst of the fallout. However, just  in a couple of years and a few more flops,   the established pattern was finally broken. When the pre-production of the project 300   started, Jerry immediately wanted the role of  Leonidas. Director Zack Snyder liked the idea,   Breakthrough though at first, he had planned on casting Brad  Pitt. But Brad ran off to embrace Angelina Jolie   in Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and after that, Zack figured  Butler would do just fine. The next challenge   was convincing Warner Bros. studio, especially  since Butler had recently participated in their   flopped movie The Phantom of the Opera. But Jerry is liked by many, as they say   in Hollywood — he’s the kind of guy everyone  thinks is just a good dude and a sweetie. So,   after charming the studio execs, he  enthusiastically threw himself into   preparing for the role of the Spartan king. Butler later said that the prep for 300 was   the hardest thing he’d ever done. For four  months, he practically lived in the gym. The   actors were trained in Sergeant Hartman style,  in order to pump their muscles to ridiculous   sizes. Spartans in the original graphic novel  by Frank Miller were mostly bare-chested and   ripped as hell, so the actors’ sixpacks  had to be top-tier. To keep spirits up,   Snyder joined the training sessions himself, but  unfortunately it’s unclear how his abs turned out.  No one really expected 300 to be a huge hit. The  assumption was it would pull in modest profits,   like the recent adaptation of Frank Miller’s Sin  City. Because of that, the studio tried to save   money wherever they could – like, most of the  weapons in the movie were leftovers from Troy   and Alexander. Warner’s not-so-serious attitude  toward the film also let Snyder change the rating   from PG-13 to mature one and add some of his own  ideas, which many would later call his trademark.  But interestingly, the movie’s cool visual style  wasn’t planned at first. The now-famous color   grading only appeared during post-production, when  they stumbled on the look while tweaking effects.   Everyone liked it so much that they decided  to use it for the entire footage. Something   similar would later happen to Mad Max Fury Road. 300 was released in March 2007 and grossed $70   million in its opening weekend with a budget of  65. In the end, it made 456 million worldwide.   After all the cuts, the studio’s profit  was about $200 million, something they   didn’t expect but were obviously happy about. The movie skyrocketed the careers of several   people, especially director Zack Snyder, who  started getting massive budgets to repeat   the success. Also Michael Fassbender, who got  his first big break in a major project. And,   of course, Butler, whose line “This is Sparta!”  became instantly iconic. According to Butler,   delivering the line in such a meme manner  wasn’t planned — it just happened during   one of the takes. The cast couldn’t help  but giggle at how over-the-top it sounded,   but Snyder loved it and decided that’s  exactly how it should be in the final cut.  That same year, another successful film starring  Butler hit theaters — the romantic drama P.S. I   Love You. With a budget of $30 million, it grossed  156 and was well-received by audiences. It seemed   like the streak of flops was finally over, and  Butler could chill a bit. Success in action,   success in romance — offers would flood  Butler’s mailbox, giving him the luxury   Ah... here we go again to pick the best ones. Well, yes. But no.  2008 wasn’t as sweet for Butler. He had two  films that year: the adventure movie Nim’s   Island and Guy Ritchie’s RocknRolla. The first  one was nothing special. Not great, not terrible   in terms of box office or audience ratings.  But RocknRolla was a hella different story. Things started off great for Butler. Jason  Statham was originally supposed to star but   had to drop out due to filming Death Race, leaving  the lead role open for Jerry. Guy Ritchie planned   for RocknRolla to be the first in a trilogy and  kept the budget modest to ensure movie’s profits.  Ironically, it was the marketing strategy that  sucked for good here. The idea was to release the   movie on a limited number of screens, hoping that  buzz would build and people would rush to theaters   when it went wide. Spoiler: that didn’t work out. In total, the film grossed only $26 million with a   budget of 18. 8 of those came from the UK alone.  The plans for a trilogy instantly vanished. A   couple of times Ritchie mentioned in interviews  that he has some amazing ideas for a sequel.   But since studios keep throwing big successful  projects like Sherlock Holmes at him, smaller   flopped films like RocknRolla aren’t a priority.  And that’s pretty logical if you think about it.  If the year ‘08 just smacked Butler  playfully, 2009 gave him a brutal nut   shot. It was a busy year for him, with  four high-budget projects: Watchmen,   The Ugly Truth, Gamer, and Law Abiding Citizen. Many people might not even know that Butler was   involved in Zack Snyder’s Watchmen. Snyder wanted  Jerry in the film pretty badly and initially   considered him for the role of The Comedian,  but the blood-stained smiley and a cigar fitted   Jeffrey Dean Morgan better. So, Butler ended up  voicing the lead character in the animated segment   Tales of the Black Freighter. This animation was  originally meant to be part of the theatrical cut.   But with this one the runtime of the movie was  over three hours, so Snyder had to eliminate it.   You can only hear Butler’s work in the Ultimate  director’s cut. So even if Watchmen had been a   success, it’s unlikely Butler would have gained  much from it. Although the film is currently a   cult classic now, it bombed at the box office  back then, seriously damaging Snyder’s career.  Watchmen is truly something else, so  if you want a separate video about it,   let’s get three thousand likes on this  video, and we’ll make it happen. Deal?  So, Jerry couldn’t become  The Comedian in Watchmen,   but he managed to do it in the romantic  comedy The Ugly Truth. It did real good   and also allowed Butler to step away from the  action. Unfortunately, most of the praise for   this one went to Katherine Heigl, not Jerry. Things might have turned out differently if   Butler’s third film that year succeeded.  Everyone expected Gamer to nail it. First,   it had Jerry, who was at the peak of his career.  Second, the directors Neveldine and Taylor,   who had previously delivered mindblowing movie  Crank with a budget of potato sack. This time,   they were given $50 million and full creative  control. With all that awesomeness Gamer grossed   just 40 million worldwide and received meh  reviews from critics and audiences alike.  And what’s about the fourth project that year, Law  Abiding Citizen? Well, it was actually the first   one Butler not only starred in but also produced.  Initially, Jerry wanted the role of Clyde Shelton,   but everyone advised him to portray a hero  instead and leave vigilante Clyde to Jamie   Foxx. Butler hesitated, but Foxx, when offered  the role, made it clear he didn’t want to play   Shelton and was more interested in being the  District Attorney. Butler, who was already   leaning in that direction, gladly agreed. Although audiences enjoyed the film,   its box office performance wasn’t spectacular.  It made $128 million costing 50 — not so bad,   but just about enough to break even. The studio  made profits from home media and TV rights sales,   which gave an extra 40 million over time, so  currently there are talks about its sequel.  Downward spiral The 2010 comedy The Bounty Hunter punched Butler  pretty hard. It seemed promising on paper:   directed by Andy Tennant, who previously made  the hit Hitch, co-starring Jennifer Aniston,   and a decent budget for a movie of its type.  The film wasn't a total flop, but it didn’t   meet financial expectations. Tennant’s  career pretty much ended with this movie,   and Butler earned his first Razzie nomination. A bright spot for Butler that year was How to   Train Your Dragon, where he voiced Stoick  the Vast. The movie was a huge hit,   spawning multiple sequels in which  Butler continues to voice the character.  Voice acting is nice, but Butler needed  live-action roles in good films to get   his career back on track. Machine Gun  Preacher seemed like it could do it,   possibly also charming the critics who were still  pissed at Jerry because of The Bounty Hunter.   During production, it was even seen as a potential  Oscar contender. But when it premiered at the   Toronto Film Festival in 2011, critics got pissed  even more, and distributors kept their distance.   As a result, the film barely hit theaters,  earning only $3 million with a budget of 30.  In 2012, Butler faced two more flops: Playing  for Keeps and Chasing Mavericks. On the set of   the latter, Butler nearly drowned and landed  in hospital, only to later end up in rehab.   Interestingly, the alcohol had nothing to do  with this rehab adventure. Although he was a   boozer in his younger days, Butler claims  he quit it in the early 2000s, saying that   running around the streets drunk and naked is  youngsters’ business. Instead, Jerry developed   a painkiller addiction during the filming of  300, as he kept injuring himself on action sets.  There was a rumor around this time, that Butler  and the director of Law Abiding Citizen were   planning a film adaptation of the videogame Kane &  Lynch, with Butler set to play Kane and Vin Diesel   offered the role of Lynch. However, the project  stalled, and nothing has been heard of it since.  It seemed like Butler's career was ready to  faceplant, but he was saved. By the film no   Successful franchise one expected much from: Olympus Has Fallen. Even  Butler, who also produced the film, didn't expect   it to launch an entire franchise. In fact, he  admitted that while he found the script amusing,   he was almost certain the movie would bomb,  leaving everyone laughing at him. But the film   made $170 million, having a budget of 70. Not  a blockbuster success, but there was a catch.  Millennium Films, which produced the  movie, followed a kinda smart strategy:   they sold the rights to the film in various  countries, covering the production budget   before the movie even hit theaters. They  distributed the film independently only   in the US and got solid earnings there  — $98 million. Smaller studios often use   this strategy to minimize risks. It limits the  potential earnings in case of a big hit, yes,   because the profits mostly go to those who bought  the rights. But if the film flops, they’re good.  The film became a franchise which followed  a careful strategy and did not inflate the   budget. On the contrary they even reduced it!  So for example in London Has Fallen the budget   was reduced to 60 million, and in the last part  of the trilogy Angel Has Fallen to 40 million,   which is almost half of the first film! Having a successful franchise under his   belt was awesome, but Butler needed more. Ideally,  another franchise. Gods of Egypt had the potential   to become one, and it had a similar vibe to 300,  the movie that originally made Butler a star. So   Jerry signed on and returned to the gym – to  "woo" audiences again with his pumped muscles.  However, Gods of Egypt faced major criticism.  Mostly it was for casting white actors as   Egyptians and gods. Overusing visual effects and  oversimplifying complex Egyptian mythology were   also among the main complaints. 300 had similar  issues but was a hit, perhaps because Gods of   Egypt was simply too late to the party. Despite  constant apologies from the director and the   studio, the film bombed at the box office, earning  $150 million against a massive budget of 140.  A similar fate befell Geostorm. Dean Devlin, the  writer of Godzilla and Independence Day, decided   to become a director of a big-budget disaster  film. In 2017. I mean, what could go wrong, huh?  Geostorm went through extensive reshoots after  poor test screenings, but that didn't help   in the box office, and the film flopped.  It was the final blow for Jim Sturgess's   already struggling career after Cloud Atlas. But Butler managed to hold on. He continued   Latest years starring in and producing action films, with much  smaller budgets though. Some of these tanked,   like Hunter Killer. But quite a few managed to  pay off, and Den of Thieves and Greenland even   got sequels. Greenland actually had quite an  interesting story. It was truly a movie that   suffered because of COVID – theatrical release in  the US was skipped and the film went straight to   HBO and Amazon streaming platforms. But even  with all that mess the movie still earned 52   million dollars with its postponed outside-US  theatrical release, so the sequel was announced.  Over the last decade, Butler has had only three  non-action roles: voicing How to Train Your Dragon   sequels, a part in the small indie film A Family  Man, and an attempt to join lighthouse keepers’   squad with The Vanishing. All his other roles  have been tough guys who solve problems with   punching someone. Looking at Jerry's recent  roles, one can't help but wonder if we'll ever   see him in some other setting again. Considering his upcoming projects,   there might be a chance. A drama called  Hand of Dante is in pre-production,   where Jerry will star alongside Al Pacino and  Martin Scorsese. Rumor has it that Ridley Scott   is also cooking up something with Gerard in  the lead role. The comedy All-star Weekend by   Jamie Fox is also on the way. But still, most  of Jerry’s upcoming projects are action films.  Butler himself claims that he'd  love to do something different,   but he mostly participates in these types of  movies. He says he sees something special in   each one and that they’re like snowflakes, each  so unique and different, and boo on someone who   thinks they are just generic action flicks. Well, maybe he's right. His films don't score   terribly with audiences and do make some money.  Or perhaps it's just Butler's charisma — audiences   love him even in a bad film, and with modest  budgets his fans will always bring enough money   for making the next action movie with Jerry in it. So, overall, things aren't too bad for Butler.   He’s got franchises, potential opportunities, and  the talent for different roles, like comedies or   even musicals. We would personally love to see  Jerry in some comedy action with RocknRolla vibes,   and Butler just needs a good script and some  luck to pull it off. But even if all that fails,   Jerry could always follow Liam Neeson’s  lead and become a geezer warrior,   avenging some relatives or trying to remember  who the hell he is while shooting suspicious   armed dudes. Nothing bad about that! Leave a like if you liked the video   and check out other videos on the channel. Thanks for watching and see you in the next one!