How David Cross lost $150,000 because of hating on Alvin and the Chipmunks

Summary

• David Cross lost $150,000 due to public dislike of the Alvin and the Chipmunks movies.
• Cross needed a job, admitting that he only made movies for the money.
• Some disparaging comments about Conan O’Brien cost Cross a full contract bonus.

FILM CAPTION: David Cross lost $150,000 due to his public distaste for Alvin and the Chipmunks movies.

I recently did the movie Legends Revealed about how Whoopi Goldberg was basically “forced” by a judge to be in the movie, Theodore Rex, a buddy cop movie where she teams up with a talking dinosaur. This legend describes the dangers that can sometimes occur when actors sign contracts for projects they would really prefer not to work on. Generally speaking, no one can ever literally FORCE you to make a movie, which is why I used “force” earlier. However, you can still be hit with heavy financial penalties through lawsuits, which, depending on how much money you have to lose, can effectively “force” you to take a job you’d rather not do.

In Goldberg’s case, it was the film, Theodore Rexand speaking of “Theodore,” in the case of David Cross, it was Alvin and the Chipmunks (Theodore and Simon are the other two chipmunks) movies and specifically the third movie in the series, Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked. In Cross’s case, not only did the third film cause him difficulties in other areas of his career, and not only did he believe he was actively “punished” during the film, but Cross actually lost $150,000 due to his dislike of Alvin and the Chipmunks !

How did David Cross become a star in Alvin and the Chipmunks?

Rarely has a minor role received as much “how did that happen?” attention as David Cross’s portrayal of Ian, the slimy executive, in 2007 Alvin and the Chipmunks. You see, Patton Oswalt, in a post on his MySpace blog (hey, IT WAS 2007), joked, “Comedian Brian Potion and I both threw the script across the room in disgust. David Cross caught it.

Cross then responded with a lengthy response on his own blog, defending his choice to appear in the film, noting, “I’m not stupid or unobservant. I knew going into this movie that I was going to eat a lot of delicious s–t for it. Normally I wouldn’t give a damn about what everyone thinks about this, but I wasn’t prepared for the level or the amount, I would say, of vitriol being thrown around like so much monkey poop.” He later explained that, on practice he needed the work, “Until the ‘Alvin’ job. I hadn’t worked in six (SIX!) months. That’s an eternity if you’re an actor. Consider not working two months with no hope of something on the horizon. Now triple this.” He also pointed out that it was a lot of money (Oswalt later responded that his “and you got it” line was actually a repeat of a line Cross had told HIM a year earlier about Oswalt’s role in The Failed to launch).

Cross was quite vocal during the release of the films that he was only making them for the money. The third film was even worse though, as he explained on Justin Longan’s podcast Life is Short, he was in London doing pre-production on his TV show, Todd Margaret’s increasingly bad decisionsand he kept having his agent ask them if they wanted Cross to do the third movie (since he was contractually obligated to do the third movie) so he could start Todd Margaret, and they continued to ignore it until suddenly, just before Christmas, “They do the third. You’re in it and they want you in Hawaii in ten days. “I was in London at the time.” When he said he couldn’t make it in time, they told him they would sue him for breach of contract. Cross should have slowed down Todd Margaret (loss of locations and some casting options) and make the movie where he wore a pelican suit throughout the movie.

How Cross’s dislike of Alvin and the Chipmunks cost the actor $150,000?

However, as it turned out, Cross’ very public dislike of the movies also cost him $150,000.

As he explained to Justin Long, there was a bonus in his contract that was tied to certain promotions for the film, and apparently there was a non-disparagement clause in the contract tied to the bonus. The producers, naturally, believed that Cross violated that clause when he mocked the film on Conan O’Brien’s talk show (“All I wanted was to get the hell out of there as soon as possible … and buy a summer house with check out’ and specifically noting ‘Don’t watch this movie!’ when talking about Chipmunk) and as a result he did not receive the full bonus, losing $150,000.

Finally, though Chipmunk fulfilled his contract, so Cross noted, “I’m done with the contract. I was contractually obligated to do three, which is standard. That last movie was literally, hands down, the most unpleasant experience I’ve had in my professional life. It’s safe to say I will never work with some of these people again. Not the actors. And the director [Mike Mitchell] it was great. We agreed. There were a few people, but… it was a really horrible, unpleasant experience.”

However, Cross also admits that it’s cool that the film has such a wide reach: “I got recognition in China. I was recognized in a small town in Mozambique. In Zimbabwe. Botswana. That’s crazy.” And hey, he also got that summer house he was talking about on Conan O’Brien’s talk show… which is probably worth that $150,000.

The legend is…

STATUS: True

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