6 Actors Who Did The Same Crimes Their Characters Did
At the beginning of every episode of Jackass, the show has to practically beg you not to try any of what you're about to see at home, which seems a bit redundant when the guys start stapling their own testicles to an enraged bull. But it's necessary. Some people truly can't help doing whatever they see onscreen, no matter how bloody, stupid, or painful the results. Sometimes that even goes for the actors pretending to do it ...
A Sopranos Actor Was Implicated In A Real Mob Execution
Michael "Big Mike" Squicciarini was typecast as, well, himself, and his role as "Big Frank" on The Sopranos was no exception. Though it seems impossible for a guy who has played everyone from "Thug Joey" to "Henchman #2," his real-life rap sheet had more mob stereotypes than his IMDb page. While he worked for the DiMeo crime family on the show, he worked for the family they were based on, the DeCavalcantes, in reality.
Big Mike served five years for aggravated assault before officially graduating to murder in 1992, when he lured rival drug dealer Ralph Hernandez to a nightclub owned by mob capo "Joe Pitts" Conigliaro. Pitts was in a wheelchair because he and his partner failed so hard at shaking a dude down that they accidentally shot each other at the same time, but he didn't let that hold him back. Someone (we don't know for sure if it was Big Mike, but it, uh ... it was probably Big Mike) locked Hernandez in a room with Joe, but didn't stick around to see Pitts shoot the man in the forehead.
That would have been the end of it, had Big Mike not gotten stars in his eyes. Police were still investigating the crime, but all they had was a nickname, and you'd be surprised at the number of Big Mikes residing in that part of the country. Then they noticed that this Sopranos guy seemed suspiciously good at gangstering ...
Witnesses were shown a few episodes of the show, and confirmed that it was an entertainment thrill ride (and also that Big Mike totally helped kill that guy). By then, Big Mike had turned his life around, but his crimes came back to haunt him. He passed away before he could stand trial, and Joe Pitts himself was eventually knocked off in a mob hit. Scorsese himself couldn't have done better.
The Actor Who Played Young Ricky Bobby Really Did Like to Go Fast
In Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby, there's a flashback to a ten-year-old Ricky, played by Luke Bigham. Bigham's career soon fizzled out, meaning that Talladega Nights was somebody's acting high point, and dammit if he wasn't intent on reliving it.
Eight years later in Alabama, Bigham caused a five-car pileup after crashing his sedan going 80 mph in a 35 mph zone. It wasn't Bigham's last brush with the law. Later that year, after recovering from his minor injuries, he was arrested on domestic violence charges for pushing his mother down the stairs. In the film, Ricky Bobby's kids are awful to their parents, and Bigham had apparently decided to method act for the rest of his life.
Louis C.K. Has Been Warning Us That He's A Sexual Predator For A Long Time
For years, Louis C.K. dismissed accusations of sexual misconduct -- specifically, that he's forced women to watch while he masturbates -- only to of course later admit the stories were true. But if we had been paying attention, we would have seen him trying to confess in slow motion over the course of his career.
In one scene of his FX series, Louis appears on a talk show to defend the merits of masturbation. He's introduced as an "aficionado of masturbation" who "even brags about it," which came across as a silly bit at the time, but obviously did not age well. After apparently winning the debate, Louis turns to his pretty, young evangelical opponent and says, "You know what, I'm going to jerk off to you later and there's nothing you can do about it."
He may as well have signed that confession note.
O.J. Simpson Attacks A Woman With A Knife In An Unaired TV Pilot
Before O.J. Simpson was a professional murderer, he was an actor (before that, he did something with football, which certainly sounds like a real sport). But shortly before being arrested and put on trial for the murders of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown in 1994, O.J. had appeared in an unaired pilot for a TV series called Frogmen.
Simpson starred as John "Bullfrog" Burke, a Navy SEAL on a mission to rescue an old friend who has since married his ex-wife. At one point in the pilot, Burke is surprised by his daughter, whom he believes to be an intruder, and briefly holds a knife to her throat. Of course, Nicole Brown famously died of multiple knife wounds, mostly to her throat. We can't help but wonder if O.J. had some "creative input" on the scene.
NBC had already declined to pick up the show by the time the murders occurred a few months later, and the pilot remains unaired, sealed in a vault at Warner Bros. When asked if they would ever consider releasing it, executives reportedly burst into laughter and then said "no" 17 times with 17 different inflections.
The Guy Who Played Ricky's Killer In Boyz N The Hood Became A Murderous Gangster
Lloyd Avery II was a nice young man who grew up in a middle-class neighborhood, attended Beverly Hills High School, and played water polo. He was basically Carlton Banks. Then, everything changed when he met John Singleton, who cast him as the gang member who kills Ricky Baker in Boyz N The Hood. Because movie roles for young black men in the '90s generally ranged from "Dead Thug #1" to "Dead Thug #2," Avery continued to be cast as gang members until he apparently decided to cut out the middleman and become one. He moved to a crime-ridden neighborhood un-affectionately called "The Jungle," got the word "Junglez" tattooed above his eyebrow, and eventually ended up sentenced to life in prison for double homicide, for which face tattoos are a notorious gateway.
Sadly, life in prison wound up being a short sentence. While Avery did attempt to reform behind bars, he met way badder dudes than he could have ever hoped to be. Specifically, his Satanist cellmate, who killed him, created a pentagram with his blood, and performed a Satanic ritual over his body after an argument about -- surprise! -- religion.
An Actor In Rosemary's Baby Went On To Start A Cult
Remember this guy from the party scene in Rosemary's Baby?
That's Michel Rostand. This is his only notable film appearance, and he apparently took it for an instructional video, because he soon founded a horrifying sex cult. The Buddhafield was ostensibly all about hippy enlightenment, and it began innocently enough, with a yoga class and some nature hikes. But as time went on, the focus shifted from personal enlightenment to worshiping Michel himself ... literally. One follower carved sculptures out of fruit salads to give Michel every morning, while others carried his folding lawn chair around like a Roman emperor's throne.
Now, the kind of power implied by human transportation and fruit art is notoriously corrupting, and things soon took a sinister turn. Michel started raping all the young men in his group. He had brainwashed them to the point where if any of them objected, he convinced them that they weren't mad at him, they were mad at themselves, and this obviously meant they should continue having sex. Ah yes, the old "Why are you hitting yourself?" method of mind control.
When the group began to draw unwelcome attention from the normies, they bounced from California to Texas, then ultimately to Hawaii, where he's still operating and presumably having sex of dubious consent to this day. That's right: Somehow, impossibly, Roman Polanski was not the biggest creep involved in making Rosemary's Baby.
Support Cracked's journalism with a visit to our Contribution Page. Please and thank you.
For more examples of life imitating art, check out 8 Bizarre Movie Scenes You Didn't Know Really Happened and 5 Absurd Action Movie Scenes That Happened in Real Life.
It's not a crime to follow us on Facebook.
