9. George Clooney Argo
When George Clooney took to the stage to collect the Best Picture Oscar for Argo, you can bet a lot of the audience were confused. Why was he up there; was it actually him underneath that beard? Well, obviously not, but in all the furore around Ben Afflecks directing, the other stars involvement had been for the most part overlooked. Clooney was one of the people who initially set up the project after reading an article in Wired about the recently declassified incident. He and fellow founder of production company Smoke House Grant Heslov commissioned a script and the magic developed from there. By the time Affleck joined the film had been developing for almost four years. Can you imagine having the power to commission an Oscar winner just because you read a good article? If you do, the film rights of this one are up for grabs.