10 Stars Everyone Thought Would Be Successful for Years. But Something Went Wrong

Thousands of people dream of becoming famous. However, those who actually become famous quickly realize that staying popular is every bit as hard as becoming popular. So, even if you become really successful, it doesn’t mean your career will prosper in the future. And unfortunately, the examples of some stars only prove this to be true.

We at Bright Side learn from other people’s mistakes. This time, we found celebrities that were able to become popular but were quickly forgotten and we identified the reasons why this happened.

1. Neve Campbell

Neve Campbell became famous after she played the main role in Scream, an iconic horror movie of the ’90s. This was the biggest role for the young actress for several years to come: Neve portrayed the main character in all 3 parts of the franchise. However, after the end of the shooting process of the last installment in 2000, her career was in a slump. She never got any big roles in any popular movies. Neve appeared on the big screen only in 2011 when she portrayed Sidney Prescot yet again: the franchise’s creators decided to release another part of Scream. Maybe the actress just got into this character a little too deeply.

2. Vanilla Ice

Vanilla Ice became the first rap singer whose single was at the top of the music chart. His song, Ice Ice Baby became iconic right away and the sales of his album were extremely impressive. But despite his incredible popularity, his stage image quickly became boring for the artist himself. As a result, he terminated the contract with his label and became an independent singer. Today, Vanilla Ice still sings and also stars in movies as an actor and works as a music producer. Of course, he is not as famous as he once was but the ability to decide what he wants to look like and what songs he wants to sing makes him quite happy.

3. PSY

In 2012, the video for Gangnam Style became the most watched video in YouTube history. After the video was released, the entire world talked about the South Korean musician, PSY. In European countries, the song was at the top of the music charts for months even though it was in Korean. While he was still popular, PSY performed numerous concerts all around the world. Today, 7 years later, he still goes on tours, but there have been no similar big hits in his career. PSY himself called Gangnam Style one of the biggest achievements of his life.

4. Robert Englund

Robert Englund is also a man of one role. Freddy Kruger became his biggest achievement and the role he appeared as more often than any other. At the end of the ’80s, he was the most popular character and he portrayed Freddy from 1984 to 2003. On the one hand, this role made Englund incredibly popular but on the other, it didn’t let him demonstrate his actual acting abilities because the complicated makeup covered his real face. To this day, few people can actually recognize him for the same reason.

5. Rick Moranis

In the ’80s, Rick Moranis was one of the most popular comedic actors in the US and Canada. The movies he appeared in became popular right away: he played the main roles in Ghost Busters, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, and other famous family comedies of the time. There was no danger to his career but at the beginning of the ’90s, his wife died of cancer. After that, the actor made the decision to leave the world of acting to raise his children.

6. Crazy Town

The Crazy Town band was formed in 1995 and didn’t seem promising until they released the single called Butterfly in 1999. The song appeared at the top of world music charts and 1.5 million copies of the album were sold. However, all the following works of the band were way less successful — the singles never even appeared on any charts. The members of the band said that it was because of the pressure from labels. At the beginning of the 2000s, they took a big break and their new album was released only in 2015. Even though Crazy Town still exists as a band, they haven’t had any other outstanding songs.

7. Hayden Christensen

Hayden Christensen has been doing movies since he was a child but his most famous role up until now is Anakin Skywalker. Christensen portrayed this character in 2 parts of the Star Wars franchise. There were different opinions about his work as the actor was nominated for both a Golden Globe and a Saturn Award as well as a Golden Raspberry for the worst role. Today Hayden Christensen rarely appears in movies and when he does, it’s usually in supporting roles.

8. Bomfunk MC’s

Bomfunk MC’s was formed by 2 DJs in 1998 and in 2000, they released Freestyler. Up until today, this is probably the only song by this band that almost every person who lived in the 2000s must have heard. The musician received a few awards for the song but all of their next albums were less successful. The members of the band changed several times, and the musicians took breaks and did their own solo projects. But in 2019, they released a new Freestyler video to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the song and said that they were working on a new release.

9. Shelley Duvall

Shelley Duvall was a very promising actress: she received a Cannes Film Festival Award for her main role in 3 Women. After that, she had very successful parts in The Shining, Annie Hall and other movies. However, in the ’90s, Duvall started taking on a lot of supporting roles and in 2002 she stopped her movie career altogether. In 2016 she appeared on the show, Dr. Phil and admitted that she had a psychological disorder.

10. Rupert Grint

The actors who played the main roles in Harry Potter were the highest paid actors before they were teenagers. They appeared not only in movies and TV shows but also on the covers of notebooks, backpacks, and other products. The last episode of the franchise was released in 2011, and at that moment, Rupert Grint was a very popular actor. However, he had a series of roles in really bad movies and the industry’s interest in him disappeared. He continues to do movies and TV shows but apparently, it’s hard to do something as big as Harry Potter.

Not only is an absence of talent a good way to ruin a successful career, but unfortunate circumstances, health issues, and thousands of other unexpected things can have the same effect. Have you ever met people who were really promising at what they did but for some reason something went wrong?