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Few actors in Hollywood have had a career as insane and unpredictable as Nicolas Cage. From box office hits to cult classics, and from critically panned flops to underground indie gems, Cage has done it all. But what makes him so fascinating? With his wild acting choices, eccentric personality, and an uncanny ability to turn the most obscure scripts into gold, Nicolas Cage has become more than just an actor—he’s an entire genre of his own.
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Tell me
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Yes, I think it's... yeah. How to get burned. How to get burned
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How to get burned! How to get burned! Very few actors rise to the level of being an intergenerational icon
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Having a career that spans multiple decades and genres is a pursuit that all creatives
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aspire to, but Nicolas Cage? He's done something better. He's pushed the medium of film to the next level
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Nick Cage is the first actor to become his own genre. I love me
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I'm me. that meant me. Arguably the greatest character that Nick Cage has ever created was himself
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Nick Cage. Born Nicholas Coppola, his father August Coppola was a professor of literature
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and the brother of famed film director Francis Ford Coppola. Young Nicholas would eventually be bit
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by the entertainment bug, and here's where we enter the first era of Cage
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Nick Coppola's first acting work was the 1981 pilot The Best of Times
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which unfortunately failed to get picked up by ABC. However, it would be the next year that he would land a non-speaking part in Fast Times
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at Ridgemont High. While shooting his scene, he realized that his famous family's legacy was negatively
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impacting his career. Hollywood legend has it that everyone on set was endlessly quoting The Godfather and Apocalypse
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Now to him. You can act like a man! What's the matter with you
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So he took matters into his own hands and decided to change his surname to circumvent
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the issue entirely. He dubbed himself Nick Cage. His new last name taken from the comic book character Luke Cage that the young Nick had loved
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This was the first step toward inventing his new persona. In quick succession, Cage landed parts in Valley Girl, Rumblefish, and Racing with the Moon
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He had his foot in the door. He would spend the next decade having ups and downs in both critically acclaimed indie pictures
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like Vampire Kiss and cold classics like Wild at Heart and critical disappointments like Firebirds But through it all Cage proved one thing above all else He took the craft seriously and most important of all he had something a little extra an unpredictable quality that set
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him apart from his peers. These shining moments would appear from time to time
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smoldering embers of the brilliance that he had in store for audiences. Take, for example
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the improvisational reciting of the alphabet in Vampire's Kiss. R-S-T-U-V-W-X-Y-Z! Ha! That's all you have to do
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Big swings like this had two effects on Cage's early career. When they worked, they worked
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And when they failed, they failed spectacularly. You've got the wrong attitude about all this, Cyrus
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You've got to keep positive. However, as Nick Cage continued to build the public awareness of his persona
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he got a few solid breaks. During the mid-90s, Nick Cage transcends
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All the quirky choices and strange rhythms he'd been bringing to parts paid off
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From his Oscar win for Leaving Las Vegas, to his blockbuster action one-two punch of The Rock and Con Air
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to his campy, big-budget John Woo studio film. Face awful. Nick Cage took over Hollywood, starting roughly in 1995 to going to about 2003
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The man just could not be stopped, which leads us to what many thought would be the final chapter of Cage's career
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Following a period headlining franchises like Ghost Rider and National Treasure, Nick Cage and the IRS had a little disagreement
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You see, around the early 2010s, word hit the street that the beloved actor had spent all of his $150 million fortune
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and had a debt of $6.3 million owed to the IRS. Ever heard of a lie
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Hey, have you ever been dragged to the sidewalk and being told you're pissed? Blonde
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So what did Cage do? He turned to direct DVD movies and low-budget schlock
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to get him out of financial trouble. Initially, this seemed like an unthinkable move
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for one of the most famous people on the planet, but Cage told a GQ interviewer
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I've got all these creditors and the IRS and I'm spending $20,000 a month
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trying to keep my mother out of a mental institution It was just all happening at once Let just say that we all make choices in life and Cage felt he had no option but to star in films like USS Indianapolis Men of Courage Arsenal and Left Behind
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Just saying you could be a little more strategic, make more movie star choices
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And this right here would probably be where most people's careers would end
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They would have scuttled their legacy and reputation attempting to just stave off a
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prison sentence for back taxes. They would be Wesley Snipes, basically. a has-been relic from a bygone era of Hollywood
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But Nick Cage did something else. He reinvented himself, yet again. All right, we're gonna take a quick break from this video
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And I'll see you at the casino. And now, back to the video. In today's landscape, there's very little room for making films with a distinct point of view
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The films that Nick Cage was involved with when he first came up, all the way back in the 80s, just don't exist anymore
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Now that he's out of IRS work camp decision mode, he chooses weird, new things to do
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And because of his filmic ambitions, he's drawn to unique and off-kilter ideas
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Therefore Nick Cage is almost solely responsible for an indie and art house film renaissance He as much a patron of the arts now as he is the vessel that which that art is brought to the people Why If a big enough movie star is willing to sign on the dotted line these bizarre indie productions actually get financing Films like Pig and Color Out of Space
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would just not be made without Cage's involvement. Even less artistically ambitious films like
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Prisoners of the Ghostland or Willy's Wonderland just wouldn't see the light of day without Cage
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being there to be like, yes, I will make a movie where I don't say anything the whole time. That
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sounds fun. Mandy specifically is a perfect example of this phenomenon. It's an acid trip
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revenge movie that features a chainsaw sword fight. Director Panos Cosmatos was trying for
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years to get the film greenlit, and he even went to Nick Cage to play the villain. But when Cage
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said he wanted to play the protagonist, Cosmatos had no choice but to rewrite the picture in order
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to game financing. It's Cage's unhinged energy that propels these films, both in front of and
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behind the lens. In many ways, Nick Cage is the last bastion of an era in film where original
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stories were told. He's actively using his star power to push the art he wants to see in the world
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But here's the thing. Nick Cage is rapidly aging out of a leading man status. So what happens when
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Nick Cage retires? What stories will we have then? Start right before life begins on the planet
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All is lifeless. And then, like, life begins with organisms. It doesn't seem likely that there's going to be another generation of widely inventive filmmaking mavericks
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who are going to take the reins of the film world anytime soon. Most movie stars seem to have no real interest in attempting to foster this atmosphere
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Is it possible that Nick Cage is currently training the next generation of performers
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to make risky and exciting decisions in his Las Vegas acting dojo
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Sure, maybe, but in reality, unless Nick Cage trades his likeness to an army of AI clones
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in order for them to take over Hollywood after he's dead, we're probably screwed
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Open it! Open it! Open it! Open it! Open it! Open it