Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt has been a major contributor to the film industry with several notable movies to his name. But Gordon-Levitt believed the industry he was a part of wouldn’t be around much longer thanks to significant changes within its culture.
Why Joseph Gordon-Levitt took a couple of breaks from acting
Gordon-Levitt started acting from an early age. He was first seen in small roles in television shows and films like A River Runs Through It. Perhaps one of his most popular roles was as Tommy Solomon in the hit comedy program 3rd Rock From the Sun. Gordon-Levitt would later make the transition over to a successful film career, but not before briefly questioning his place in the film industry.
He once took a noticeable break from acting to enroll in university. But in doing so, Gordon-Levitt discovered that he preferred to be in the film industry all along.
“I started acting when I was a kid, but I quit for a few years and went to college to figure out if a film career was what I really wanted. For my 21st birthday, I bought video-editing software, and as I stayed up all night playing around with it, I realized there’s nothing I enjoy more than making movies. Every second isn’t a blast—there are plenty of long days—but I love it,” Gordon-Levitt once told Oprah.
Gordon-Levitt took another long break from acting several years later in his mid-to-late 30s. But this was due to the actor’s familial obligations.
“I took a couple years off when I had kids,” he explained to Yahoo.
Why Joseph Gordon-Levitt didn’t think the entertainment industry would be around much longer
Gordon-Levitt once shared that the film industry as people know it may be on the verge of a significant shift. The Dark Knight Rises star theorized that the internet was playing a big role in how entertainment and art were being distributed. The actor believed there was a possibility that the growth of this technology might make other jobs in Hollywood obsolete.
“The entertainment business as it has been is not going to be around that much longer,” he told GQ in 2012. “The way it’s going is, there’s going to be artists, and they’ll make their s***, and they’ll connect to their audience, and you don’t need any of the middlemen – the studios or the agents.”
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Gordon-Levitt was adamant that the internet is “ushering us into a cultural golden age.”
Joseph Gordon-Levitt found celebrity culture degrading
Gordon-Levitt had an issue with some of the attention paid to celebrity culture. At times, the Lincoln actor wondered if too much importance was put on the opinions and images of stars. Which, he felt, risked sending the wrong message to its intended audience.
“I really don’t like this notion that some people are more important than other people,” Gordon-Levitt said. “These stories about these elevated people called ‘celebrities’ teaches you that what you have to say doesn’t matter. It’s degrading.”
Although Levitt is a celebrity himself, it’s a status he’s sometimes had difficulty adjusting to.
“I always found it uncomfortable when people would come up to me and say, ‘Oh, I saw you on TV. You’re on TV.’ That just really felt awkward to me,” he once told ABC News.
If the actor had it his way, he’d erase all footage of him acting, despite the passion in his craft.
“I privately wished that we could go on set and do the work that I loved, but then burn the film afterward so that people wouldn’t see it or recognize,” Gordon-Levitt said.
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