10 Actors That You Never Knew Produced Horror Movies
3. Ben Stiller - The Ruins (2008)
Ben Stiller's Red Hour Films production company has mainly focused on producing comedy film, but one of the company's releases did not fit the usual model. Stiller executive produced the 2008 horror movie The Ruins about a group of tourists visiting an archaeological dig in Mexico who are slaughtered by the primitive natives.
Stiller became involved in the project because he had previously tried to adapt The Ruins writer Scott B. Smith's novel A Simple Plan as a movie in the mid 1990s. The movie was eventually made without Stiller's involvement and was released in 1998. Before Smith was even finished writing his follow-up novel, which became The Ruins, Stiller asked Smith to adapt it as a screenplay.
Despite mediocre reviews, The Ruins grossed $22.7 million at the worldwide box office plus another $15.7 million in U.S. DVD sales. Considering it only cost $8 million to make, The Ruins ended up becoming a smart investment for Stiller.