Topher Grace

Bonnie and Terry Turner cast him in That '70s Show after seeing him in a school play (their daughter was a classmate). He wasn't pursuing acting. He dropped out of USC to take the role, played Eric Forman for seven seasons, and reportedly cleared $300K per episode by the time the show ended. His pivot to film started with Steven Soderbergh's Traffic, which showed he could handle dramatic material beyond the sitcom kid typecast.

Spider-Man 3 was supposed to be his crossover moment. Playing Eddie Brock/Venom, he got the blockbuster slot that rewrites careers. It didn't work. The film got hammered critically and his Venom specifically drew heat for missing the character entirely. What followed was a deliberate pivot: Christopher Nolan's Interstellar, then Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman, where he played David Duke in 2018 and has said researching the role was 'the worst month of my life.' The character work improved as the budgets got smaller.

The best thing Topher Grace has ever made might be something almost no one has seen. In 2012, he spent months editing the Star Wars prequels into a single 85-minute film, cutting the politics, most of The Phantom Menace, and starting with the Darth Maul lightsaber fight instead. He screened it once, privately, for a room of Hollywood filmmakers. He's never released it. For a guy who got famous by accident, his most talked-about project is the one he refuses to share.