8 Actors That Were So Bad They Had To Quit Movies
2. Kel O'Neill - Struggles To Give Paul Thomas Anderson What He Wants
It takes a rather brave and admirably honest actor to admit that they simply couldn't fulfil their end of the bargain when the time came to bring their work to the movie-making party. And that's precisely what went down when Kel O'Neill rocked up on set to begin work on Paul Thomas Anderson's deeply atmospheric There Will Be Blood as Eli Sunday.
Alluding to how the relationship between an actor and their director is so vital in producing captivating performances and features as a whole, O'Neill would recall to Vulture:
"For some reason, even though every other actor I know had a relationship with Paul that was super positive and where they did their best work, that just didn’t happen with me.”
Going further, the actor would reveal that “an actor should, with every ounce of their humanity, be attempting to give the director what he or she wants. And I recall going in and out on whether I could really do that.”
Eventually, O'Neill's struggles, contrary to the belief that he was actually intimidated by Daniel Day Lewis on set, would pave the way for Paul Dano being asked to play both Paul and Eli Sunday. Dano had actually only been cast as Paul before O'Neill's departure but still picked up a BAFTA nod for his stellar last-minute twin work all the same.