Edward Norton

Two thousand actors auditioned for Primal Fear. Norton got the part because Leonardo DiCaprio passed on it, and his audition was so striking that Richard Gere, who'd been threatening to walk, agreed to stay. Before the film even opened, test screenings had already made Norton a commodity. That kind of pre-release heat doesn't usually follow a no-name in a supporting role. He gained roughly 25 pounds of muscle for American History X, picked up a second Oscar nomination, then made Fight Club with David Fincher. Three films in, he'd established the pattern that defines his career: performances nobody questions, a process everybody complains about.

Marvel dropped him from The Avengers with a public statement saying they wanted someone with more "creativity and collaborative spirit." He said nothing. Paramount once threatened to sue him into starring in The Italian Job. He did the film, then refused to promote it. Most actors with that track record disappear. Norton keeps getting Oscar nominations. His fourth nomination came for playing Pete Seeger in A Complete Unknown, where he learned banjo in two months and sang live on set. He spent 20 years developing Motherless Brooklyn, directed it himself, and it grossed $18.6 million on a $26 million budget. He treats filmmaking like a craft and Hollywood like it's optional.

He co-founded CrowdRise, which GoFundMe acquired in 2017 after it processed over $500 million in donations. The deal put him on GoFundMe's board. His grandfather James Rouse co-founded Enterprise Community Partners, one of the largest affordable housing nonprofits in the country, and Norton sits on that board too. He serves as the UN Goodwill Ambassador for Biodiversity and reportedly speaks fluent Japanese from a post-college stint in Osaka. The acting career sometimes looks like the side hustle.