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15 Famous Actors Everyone Forgets Appeared In Horror Movies

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Before they were famous.

Nazarii Verbitskiy

Entertainment - October 9th 2026, 02:00 GMT+2

Jason Alexander The Burning — 15. Jason Alexander — The Burning (1981)
George Costanza spent a summer getting chased by a guy with garden shears before Jason Alexander ever set foot on a sitcom set. The Burning came out in 1981, four years before Seinfeld, and it's one of the earliest slasher cash-ins made after Friday the 13th proved the formula worked. Alexander plays a camp counselor named Dave, part of an ensemble that also included a very young Fisher Stevens. The film was produced by Harvey Weinstein's company Miramax, in one of its first releases ever. | © Filmways Pictures

Mila Kunis American Psycho 2 — 14. Mila Kunis — American Psycho 2 (2002)
Nobody asked for a sequel to American Psycho, and the result mostly proved why. Mila Kunis took the lead in 2002's American Psycho 2, playing a survivor of Patrick Bateman who grows up to become a serial killer herself. She was 19 during filming, already a few years into voicing Meg on Family Guy. Christian Bale wanted nothing to do with it, so the movie barely mentions Bateman by name. | © Lionsgate

Mischa Barton The Sixth Sense — 13. Mischa Barton — The Sixth Sense (1999)
Before she was Marissa Cooper, Mischa Barton was a kid standing in a tent with Bruce Willis. She played Kyra Collins in The Sixth Sense, the poisoned girl whose death becomes one of the film's quiet turning points. Barton was 13 when the film came out in 1999, four years before The O.C. made her a household name. The movie went on to earn six Oscar nominations, including one for M. Night Shyamalan's screenplay. | © Buena Vista Pictures

Idris Elba Prom Night — 12. Idris Elba — Prom Night (2008)
Prom Night got remade in 2008, and somewhere in the cast is Idris Elba playing a detective trying to catch a killer before graduation night. This was three years before his role in Thor and just as The Wire was ending its run on HBO. The original 1980 version starred Jamie Lee Curtis, but the remake ditched most of that plot for a straightforward stalker story. Elba's detective spends the whole film one step behind the body count. | © Screen Gems

Clint Eastwood Revenge of the Creature — 11. Clint Eastwood — Revenge of the Creature (1955)
Clint Eastwood's first screen credit was a lab technician with maybe one line, buried in a 1955 monster movie called Revenge of the Creature. It's the sequel to Creature from the Black Lagoon, shot in 3D and directed by Jack Arnold. Eastwood was 25 and still years from any kind of stardom, let alone a career behind the camera. He got the part through a contact at Universal, and it barely registers if you blink. | © Universal Pictures

John Travolta The Devils Rain — 10. John Travolta — The Devil's Rain (1975)
A young John Travolta spent part of 1975 melting on camera for The Devil's Rain, a satanic horror picture starring Ernest Borgnine and William Shatner. The film gave him one of his first screen credits, years before Saturday Night Fever. Its climax involves a room full of actors dissolving into wax under studio lights. Travolta has talked about it in interviews since, mostly amused that it exists at all. | © Bryanston Distributing Company

Eva Mendes Children of the Corn V Fields of Terror — 9. Eva Mendes — Children of the Corn V: Fields of Terror (1998)
Five sequels deep, Children of the Corn V: Fields of Terror is where you'll find a twenty-four-year-old Eva Mendes playing a college student stuck with murderous kids in a cornfield. It came out in 1998, straight to video, long before she had a name audiences recognized. Kelly, her character, spends most of the runtime trying to get everyone out alive. Mendes has rarely mentioned the role since, and the franchise kept going without her. | © Dimension Films

Amy Adams Psycho Beach Party — 8. Amy Adams — Psycho Beach Party (2000)
Before Enchanted or an Oscar nomination, Amy Adams played a surfer girl named Marvel Ann in Psycho Beach Party. The 2000 film is a parody of 1960s beach movies with a slasher plot stitched in. Charles Busch wrote and based it on his own stage play from years earlier. Adams was twenty-five at the time, doing broad comedy years before Hollywood took her seriously. | © Strand Releasing

Matthew Mc Conaughey Texas Chainsaw Massacre The Next Generation — 7. Matthew McConaughey — Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation (1994)
Matthew McConaughey plays a leg-braced maniac named Vilmer in Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation, and he is not holding back for a second. Renée Zellweger co-stars as the film's lead, two years before either of them became household names. The 1994 movie sat on a shelf for three years before Columbia gave it a limited release. McConaughey's performance is loud enough that some fans discovered it only after A Time to Kill made him famous. | © Columbia Pictures

Scarlett Johansson Eight Legged Freaks — 6. Scarlett Johansson — Eight Legged Freaks (2002)
Giant spiders overrun a small Arizona town in Eight Legged Freaks, and a teenage Scarlett Johansson is one of the people running from them. She plays the sheriff's daughter, a role she took at seventeen, two years before Lost in Translation changed her career. The effects relied heavily on CGI spiders scaled up to car size. Johansson rarely brings the film up now, but it was a wide theatrical release from a major studio. | © Warner Bros.

Paul Rudd Halloween The Curse of Michael Myers — 5. Paul Rudd — Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995)
Twenty-six years old and barely recognizable, Paul Rudd plays Tommy Doyle in Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers. It was 1995, his first real film role, released by Dimension Films. He spends most of it staring intensely at things, which is pretty much the whole performance. Rudd has since joked about how strange the wig looks.

George Clooney Return to Horror High — 4. George Clooney — Return to Horror High (1987)
Slasher spoofs rarely age well, but Return to Horror High is worth noting for one reason. George Clooney shows up as a doomed actor playing a cop, years before anyone thought to cast him as one seriously. The 1987 film came from New World Pictures and barely made a dent at the box office. Clooney gets killed off early, which in hindsight feels like foreshadowing for his career's quality control.

Tom Hanks He Knows Youre Alone — 3. Tom Hanks — He Knows You're Alone (1980)
A killer stalks a babysitter through a quiet Staten Island neighborhood, and somewhere in the cast is Tom Hanks. He Knows You're Alone came out in 1980 through MGM, a full two years before Splash made him a name. Hanks plays a minor character, a college student with barely ten minutes of screen time. He's been asked about it in interviews since, mostly with disbelief that anyone found the tape.

Johnny Depp A Nightmare on Elm Street — 2. Johnny Depp — A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)
Freddy Krueger needed a first victim, and Wes Craven picked an unknown named Johnny Depp for the role. A Nightmare on Elm Street hit theaters in 1984 through New Line Cinema, and Depp's character gets pulled into his bed and turned into a geyser of blood. He was twenty-one, cast partly because Craven's daughter thought he was good-looking. The scene remains one of the franchise's most quoted effects shots.

Leonardo Di Caprio Critters 3 — 1. Leonardo DiCaprio — Critters 3 (1991)
Before any Oscar nominations, there was a teenager in a rubber creature suit movie called Critters 3. Leonardo DiCaprio was seventeen when the film came out in 1991 through New Line Cinema, playing a tenant fighting off furry alien monsters. It was his first theatrical film role, shot while he was still largely unknown. DiCaprio has called it an embarrassment in later interviews, though it never stopped airing on cable.

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Long before the awards and the blockbusters, plenty of A-listers were getting chased through dark hallways in low-budget horror films. Here are 15 famous actors everyone forgets appeared in horror movies.

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Long before the awards and the blockbusters, plenty of A-listers were getting chased through dark hallways in low-budget horror films. Here are 15 famous actors everyone forgets appeared in horror movies.