10 Actors Who Saved Their Careers By Starring In Horror Movies

The late, great Sid Haig had a career spanning almost 60 years prior to his death last year, serving as a regular supporting player on countless TV shows throughout the '60s, '70s, and '80s, as well as appearing in several of Jack Hill's blaxploitation films.

But Haig was always a cult figure at best, and in 1992 informally retired from acting after becoming fed up of being offered variations on the same part - the intimidating big guy.

After almost being coaxed out of retirement to play Marsellus Wallace in Pulp Fiction, he played a judge in Quentin Tarantino's 1997 follow-up Jackie Brown, though once again returned to obscurity until 2003, when he played the psychopathic murderer Captain Spaulding in Rob Zombie's House of 1000 Corpses.

Despite the film's generally mixed reception, Haig received strong praise for his menacing performance, leading to him reprising the role in two sequels and re-teaming with Zombie on several other projects.

Haig was reinvented as a horror icon overnight, and for the remainder of his life and career appeared in almost two-dozen horror movies.