There's no denying Travolta's importance in Hollywood. His Tony and Danny, of '77 and '78 respectively, defined musical cinema as you know it today. He proved he still had it twenty years later in 2007's musical hit, Hairspray. Those worthy achievements aside, Travolta's career has been marred by some real stinkers. Indeed, after the epic Look Who's Talking trilogy, nobody expected Travolta to do anything of note for the remainder of his on-screen career. And he shocked everyone, with Pulp Fiction. Smooth, stunning and right on the Tarantino mark, Travolta contributed in no small way to one of modern cinema's greatest achievements. Travolta's character in Pulp Fiction was by turns effortlessly comic and achingly stylish, and his dance scene with Uma Thurman would become one of the most iconic in cinema history. Incredibly, it was a fluke that Travolta was cast in the role of Vincent Vega at all; Tarantino had been hoping for Michael Madsen of Reservoir Dogs fame, but Madsen chose instead to film Wyatt Earp that year. A few flares of possibility shot into the dark skies of Travolta's career after this defining moment in 1994, Get Shorty and Face/Off being two noteworthy critical successes. Still, it's impossible to think of Travolta as anything other than a wasted acting talent given the dizzying heights to which his resume has too infrequently climbed - and the painful lows to which he has regularly fallen.
