10 Movie Stars Who Should Never Promote Anything (Ever)

1. Oliver Reed

The iconic, always astonishing film and theatre actor Oliver Reed was a force of nature, on set and off, in person and on television.

Reed loved to get a reaction, especially an involuntary one: if he could make you laugh despite yourself, cause you to cringe, flinch or otherwise display shock or disgust, he was all for it.

Allegedly, Reed was frequently asked by talk show producers to exaggerate this charmingly lunatic hellraiser/alcoholic persona in order to sell the appearance. In most cases, this would lead him to seem charmingly lucid one moment, and utterly batsh*t the next, changing accent and personality at the drop of a hat; able to go from genial wit to intimidating fish-eyed crazy in seconds flat. Oliver Reed was a one-off: an amazing, gifted actor whose antics constantly upstaged his work.

There's no way of knowing how many of these kind of performances in interviews were real and how many were a put up; how many were just Reed utterly plastered, and how many were Reed well on his way, but acting far worse than he actually was. Regardless, anyone who knew anything about Reed knew that you didn't ask him to promote a movie. If you were fortunate, he'd appear on a chat show, he wouldn't assault anyone or soil himself, and the host would remember to mention the film at some point during the appearance.

Very often, that kind of good fortune would not find you.