Wednesday, May 19, 2010

"7 Famous People Who Were Unemployed Before They Got Their Break"

From Mental Floss:

If you’ve ever been unemployed, then you know how scary it can be as those checks start to dry up. Here are 7 people who went from those government checks to much BIGGER checks in the blink of an eye.

1. Quentin Tarantino

Before he was directing films like Pulp Fiction and Inglorious Basterds, Quentin Tarantino was just another unemployed actor in Hollywood. In 1988 the 25-year-old Tarantino would land a role as an Elvis impersonator on an episode of Golden Girls. Tarantino made $3000 over the course of year for his work on the sitcom and the money temporarily sustained him while he worked on the scripts for True Romance and his breakout hit, 1992’s Reservoir Dogs.

2. Larry King

In the mid-1950s Larry King moved to Miami, Florida, to start a career in radio. By 1957 he was making $55 a week as an AM Disc Jockey and by 1960 he was hosting a weekly issue-themed television show called Miami Undercover. Soon enough, King was penning weekly columns for the Miami Herald and served as a color commentator for the Miami Dolphins. A scandal broke in the early 70s when the Miami Herald fired King for writing too frequently about his friends. He lost his other radio and TV gigs as well. King suffered mounting debt and even claimed personal bankruptcy. King, however, worked a series of mediocre TV and radio gigs throughout the late 70s and early 80s to revive his fledgling career. Then in 1985 he started Larry King Live, an interview call-in show that consistently ranks as CNN’s most watched program....5 MORE