Wildcatters are a passionate people – we love our work and more importantly, we love to play as hard as we work. Being passionate about your work is essential to meaningful happiness, but Wildcatter-levels of commitment can pervade all aspects of your life. Maintaining a healthy work-life balance is the key to making your passions work for you, however for some performers, their work is their life and vice versa. Some of the most truly committed performers in history have taken their passions to the next level:
Bela Lugosi was buried wearing his Dracula cape.
This Hungarian actor was made famous by his devoted portrayal of the Count Dracula in the first half of the 20th century. He truly embraced the horror genre and portrayed the famous vampire on Broadway, feature films, and even voice work. So committed was he to this character that his family had him buried wearing one of his famous Dracula capes upon his death in 1956.
Christian Bale has lost and gained over 140 pounds for various roles.
You may have heard of the famous “Christian Bale diet” – named for the actor who spent 4 months eating only one can of tuna or one apple a day to shed 63 pounds for his role in The Machinist. However, just weeks after shooting wrapped, he was on another extreme diet of fats and proteins to bulk up for his portrayal of the buff Bruce Wayne the following year.
Professional athletes spend their offseason using only their non-dominant hand.
The best players are versatile, and what’s more versatile than being ambidextrous? Many NBA players from Lebron James to Demar Derozan have spent entire off-seasons doing everything with their non-dominant hand in order to become more capable and unpredictable on the court. Can you imagine spending the entire year doing everything with your other hand – writing, eating, brushing your teeth?
Gilbert Gottfried’s Wild Persona
The squinting eyes, the voice that sounds like nails on a chalkboard…we all know Gilbert Gottfried’s trademark performance style because we’ve only ever seen him acting this way. But this, in fact, is NOT his ‘normal’ voice and he does, on occasion, rest his face. Many celebrities have very different public personas than who they are privately, but Gottfried is so committed to this persona that he is almost constantly performing.
Heath Ledger let the Joker’s madness consume him.
When filming The Dark Knight, Heath Ledger took his role so seriously that he locked himself in his apartment and refused to speak to anyone for a month. He thought about the role so obsessively that he only slept 2 hours a night and nearly succumbed to the madness himself. How convincing was he as the modern day Joker though?