10 Actors Who Paid Terrible Prices For Movie Roles
4. Roberto Benigni Ended His Career With The Embarrassingly Bad Take On Pinocchio
You may recall Roberto Benigni as the Italian actor-director behind the 1997 tragicomedy Life is Beautiful who memorably clambered over chairs and audience members at the 71st Academy Awards to accept the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, one of three awards the film won that night.
After his Oscar success life was indeed looking beautiful for Benigni but that was short-lived when his next major acting and directorial effect – an Italian live-action adaptation of Pinocchio – flopped about as hard as a film can earning a shameful 0% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Although it fared better in its native Italy, the rest of the world wasn’t quite so taken with Benigni’s take on Pinocchio with critics concurring it was a truly awful movie. Unless watching a grown man creepily prance around in pyjamas in a terribly made two-hour long vanity project is your idea of entertainment, that is.
As both director and star, Benigni couldn’t really blame anybody but himself and ever since Pinocchio work has been remarkably thin on the ground for the formerly celebrated star.