Nemesis Flop Made Tom Hardy Alcoholic Crack Addict

[Frontier]

http://www.trektoday.com/content/2009/10/star-trek-movie-failure-ruinous-for-hardy/



Wow.

And we all thought we had it bad as fans due to Nemesis sucking the big one?



I'm sorry, it's wrong to laugh about someone becoming an alcoholic -- and even worse, a crack addict -- but... D-A-M-N! I think that cements Nemesis as the word Trek movie ever, well surpassing Star Trek V's dismal failure.

I mean, last I heard, Laurence Luckinbill never become an alcoholic crack addict!

 

[Kirk1980]

What'd he say about his time on Nemesis?

I don't see it mentioned in the article linked here.

 

[Kegg]

What'd he say about his time on Nemesis?

First sentence:

Earlier this summer, Tom Hardy, who played Shinzon in 2002’s Star Trek: Nemesis, claimed that the movie’s poor performance led him into addiction.

Though this is puzzling:

It’s like living with a four-hundred-pound orangutan that wants to kill me.

The phrase is usually 'four-hundred-pound gorilla', why choose an animal that is, quite frankly, a lot goofier looking? I'm sure orangutans can be dangerous but even still...

Anyway, I can't blame the guy. Nobody seems to have taken Star Trek: Nemesis's failure well - it was Stuart Baird's third outing as a director, and not too coincidentally it was his last.

 

[Frontier]

The alcoholism, honestly, is so common, it's not much of a shock. Quite a few Trek actors have gone 'round with the bottle.

I've never heard of any of them becoming true drug addicts though. Let alone crack. It's astounding to think such occurred, let alone in our modern times. Especially considering how low on the totem pole crack is. Pot isn't blinked at, is even popular. Snorting coke is even, while not well regarded, more common. Injecting heroin is when it gets into the 'really bad shit' area, and then there's crack and meth, at the very bottom of the barrell... you've got to go a long way down the rabbit hole to get to crack in most cases. Which is why it's so shocking, I think.

 

[Michael]

Wow, that's really a shame, especially considering that personally I found Tom Hardy's performance to be easily the best thing about this horrible movie. I really hope he comes to grips with his addiction soon. I'd love to see him in other movies.

 

[CaptainStoner]

Wow, that's really a shame, especially considering that personally I found Tom Hardy's performance to be easily the best thing about this horrible movie. I really hope he comes to grips with his addiction soon. I'd love to see him in other movies.

It's true, he did fine. Lately I've been comparing his character to Nero and finding Shinzon far more interesting, or as interesting as "blow up the planet" bad guys with giant spaceships get.
His acting was definitely up to par, and though some didn't like his performance, most of the criticisms of NEM are beyond the scope of any individual actor.

As he cleans up, I think he'll still find he has a whole career in front of him.

 

[Christopher]

It's petty and in very poor taste to use this man's tragedy as nothing more than fodder for more juvenile Nemesis-bashing. At most, the movie's poor performance at the box office was a trigger that set off something already latent in the man. And besides, since when was there any correlation between how good a movie is and how financially successful it is?

I really hope Mr. Hardy can overcome his addiction issues. I think he was very good in the role of Shinzon and he deserves to have a good career, rather than being reduced to a punch line by immature geeks on the Internet.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

I'm genuinely sorry that Hardy has addiction problems, but I question the article's assertions that 1) Hardy was ever considered the "Next Big Thing" or 2) that his career has suffered because of Nemesis' poor box office showing. A look at Wikipedia and IMDB both show that he's worked fairly consistently since 2002, in both low-profile and high-profile projects. I think the TrekToday summary sensationalizes the original Guardian article.

 

[QuasarVM]

We've all had failures and disappointments in life, but I have never been tempted to pick up the bottle, drugs or crack pipe to soothe them.

I don't buy this garbage that the failure of Nemesis at the box-office "made" him turn to drugs...that's such complete rubbish.

It's always a tragedy when someone turns to drugs -- for any reason. But I suspect Hardy had a problem with these substances prior to his work in Nemesis.

Wouldn't be the first and won't be the last.

Still, I hope he will seek the proper help (he'll have to WANT the help) and overcome this addiction.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

It's petty and in very poor taste to use this man's tragedy as nothing more than fodder for more juvenile Nemesis-bashing. At most, the movie's poor performance at the box office was a trigger that set off something already latent in the man. And besides, since when was there any correlation between how good a movie is and how financially successful it is?

I really hope Mr. Hardy can overcome his addiction issues. I think he was very good in the role of Shinzon and he deserves to have a good career, rather than being reduced to a punch line by immature geeks on the Internet.

I had my novel picked up by a literary agent who promised me the moon. A year later, it still sits in the slush pile, after receiving a dozen very nicely worded rejections.

I totally understand Hardy's pain.

 

[Kegg]

It's true, he did fine. Lately I've been comparing his character to Nero and finding Shinzon far more interesting, or as interesting as "blow up the planet" bad guys with giant spaceships get.

That isn't too hard. Nero's not got much and Shinzon gets more screentime. I think one could make a case for Ru'afo or Sybok as well. I remember the first and highly negative reactions to Nero were ones comparing him to Shinzon, and in some respects they're right on the money (though Nero never really gets as much high camp as Hardy is given in the role.)

Even still, I remember Hardy being pretty good in Black Hawk Down and he acquitted himself fairly well in Nemesis (which, again, is truthfully more than I can say for Bana).

 

[MvRojo]

We've all had failures and disappointments in life, but I have never been tempted to pick up the bottle, drugs or crack pipe to soothe them.

I don't buy this garbage that the failure of Nemesis at the box-office "made" him turn to drugs...that's such complete rubbish.

It's always a tragedy when someone turns to drugs -- for any reason. But I suspect Hardy had a problem with these substances prior to his work in Nemesis.

Wouldn't be the first and won't be the last.

Still, I hope he will seek the proper help (he'll have to WANT the help) and overcome this addiction.

I agree with this completely.

I feel bad for him, but often people with addictions try to find an excuse or something else to blame for their problems when they can't overcome them.

 

[Kirks_Flying_Wig]

Considering the incredible work Hardy has done in the likes of Stuart: A Life Backwards and Bronson, hopefully he'll soon be looking back on Nemesis as nothing more than a small blip in his career.

 

[trevanian]

I had my novel picked up by a literary agent who promised me the moon. A year later, it still sits in the slush pile, after receiving a dozen very nicely worded rejections.

I totally understand Hardy's pain.

Was the agent a lady who had vacated L.A. for Colorado? just wondering, sounds like what happened with a spec script of mine a long while back. That agent managed to burn some bridges I already had up by re-sending the script to places that had already read it, which is one thing you don't ever do. That took me from Silver Pictures VP saying, 'keep us in mind for future writing' to 'we're closed to this kind of submission' in the span of 2 months.

Blew my mind that I got better results -- nice turndowns and a couple of pitch meetings -- on specs with releases attached than I ever did with any agent submitting stuff.

 

[trevanian]

And besides, since when was there any correlation between how good a movie is and how financially successful it is?

Guess you haven't been on the forum for this last STAR TREK movie often, have you? Every criticism is shouted down with a string of box office numbers, and when the mods get into it, the critics get warnings AFTER the thread closes.

 

[Plecostomus]

Nem wasn't that bad. Sounds like the dude is just using it as an excuse to justify his behavior.

Nem succeeded in entertaining me for a couple of hours and providing quite a pile of fodder for retroactive RPG retcon/repair rituals. In that it was a success.

 

[JarodRussell]

I don't understand why a flop would hit an actor so hard that it destroys his life. He gets paid regardless of how well the movie made at the box office. And his performance wasn't too bad. He was miscast, yes, the movie was crap, yes, but his delivery was good. So he didn't really lose anything.

 

[Kelso]

The trailer for Bronson was enough to convince me that Hardy's talents were wasted on Shinzon. I wish him nothing but the best.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMJ1c3qxOWc[/yt]

 

[Therin of Andor]

I don't understand why a flop would hit an actor so hard that it destroys his life. He gets paid regardless of how well the movie made at the box office. And his performance wasn't too bad. He was miscast, yes, the movie was crap, yes, but his delivery was good. So he didn't really lose anything.

Well, it hasn't destroyed his life. He's still working, and got rave reviews for "Bronson" and other appearances. He's hardly the first actor to dabble in mind-altering substances and end up dependent on them.

But nobody wants to be associated with a flop. There's a saying, "You are only as good as your last movie/book" for a reason.

This article is typical of celeb interviews. The journalist presses for an angle that hasn't been told before, or for confirmation of rumours, etc. The celeb might then chat about an incident for ten minutes, giving a coherent anecdote that puts the factoid into perspective but only one line ends up in the interview - and then fans are left wondering why the celeb would ever say that.

 

[Myasishchev]

I think one could make a case for Ru'afo or Sybok as well.

Of course one can. Sybok was the best Star Trek feature film antagonist there ever was, as well as the second-best acted.