Take note Halle Berry. Keep making the wrong choices and you’ll end up losing second billing in a creepy Robert De Niro movie to the tow-headed moppet of the moment.
Consider for a moment the career of Elisabeth Shue, the dirty blonde ingenue of 1980’s celluloid classics such as the Karate Kid (playing the beautiful unrealistic match for a truly hideous-looking Ralph Macchio) or the titular childcare provider in Adventures in Babysitting.
After an awkward transition from teen roles into more mature fair, Shue catapulted to respectability with an Oscar Nomination for her turn as the call-girl foil for the forever-twitchy Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas. Most actresses would take this new found success and parlay it into some additional meatier roles. Elisabeth instead chose to do an action movie with Val Kilmer. She’s never recovered. See if you can count on one hand the number of post-Leaving Las Vegas Elisabeth Shue movies you’ve seen:
- Mysterious Skin (2004)
- Leo (2002)
- Tuck Everlasting (2002)
- Hollow Man (2000)
- Molly (1999)
- Cousin Bette (1998)
- City of Angels (1998)
- Palmetto (1998)
- Deconstructing Harry (1997)
- The Saint (1997)
You’re still holding a clinched fist aren’t you? I think I saw a part of Palmetto on TBS once (The Superstation – Where Mediocre Movies Go To Die.)
To make matters worse, creepy “it” child actor Dakota Fanning (who should seriously have a sit-down with Macaulay Culkin on the topic of overexposure) has now passed her in marquee value. Judging from the publicity of the newly released creepfest Hide and Seek, Elisabeth has been relegated to “Hey it’s that girl,” status.
So Halle Berry, please file this away. Although you may have a slight edge over Miss Shue in that you took home an Oscar, there’s only so many Catwoman’s and Gothika’s the public will allow. You’re closer than you think to being a celebrity guest on The Pyramid because your agent thinks you need to get some face time with the public.
