6 Movie Roles That Got People Fired
5. Hulk Hogan Was Fired From The WWF Because Wrestlers Aren't Supposed To Be Movie Stars - Rocky III
While certainly in a far more fortunate position than anyone else on this list to weather the cost of lost employment, Hulk Hogan nevertheless found himself handed a pink slip while working for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in the early 1980s.
Hogan was offered the role of Thunderlips in Rocky III, a wrestling champion who fights Rocky (Sylvester Stallone) in an exhibition match early in the film.
When Hulk informed his WWF boss Vince McMahon Sr. that he'd been offered the part, McMahon responded by telling him he was fired if he accepted it, staunchly feeling that wrestlers should stay wrestlers and not branch off into other media forms.
Hogan ended up taking the part regardless, and was consequently pawned off to another wrestling territory, the AWA.
Only when Vince McMahon Jr. purchased the WWF a few years later was Hogan re-hired, as the younger Vince didn't share his father's rigid mindset about the singular role of wrestlers. In a recent interview with Stone Cold Steve Austin, Hogan said of his firing:
"The mindset back then wasn't like it is now... Back then... if you were a wrestler you didn't do TV, you didn't go do a movie, if you were a wrestler you were a wrestler... Vince Sr. fired me for doing the movie because you weren't supposed to do movies or TV shows back then."