Music to Movies

05 December 2008

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It seems that today's musicians are not content with just having a musical career choosing instead to be a double threat by taking up acting, and this week Alicia Keys joins that list as she stars in The Secret Life of Bees. For some this has worked out rather well but for other it's been nothing short of a disaster.

We have the Beatles and Elvis Presley to blame and a string of others have followed behind so FemaleFirst decided to take a look at some of the great music to movie transitions and some that didn't work out so well.

Leading the Way

Will Smith has mixed music and movies for most of his career rising to fame as a rapper under the name the Fresh Prince in the late 1980s before cementing that fame in the Fresh Prince of Bel Air television show.

But with sci-fi movies Men in Black and Independence Day Will Smith has arrived as a big screen movie star.Since then he has become one of the most popular and successful film stars.

He is the only actor in history to have eight consecutive films gross over $100 million in the domestic box office. He also has had two Oscar nominations for Best Actor for his role in Ali and In The Pursuit of Happiness and could land a third for his new movie Seven Pounds.

Mark Wahlberg began his career as one of the original member of New Kids on the Block but not wanting to be part of their squeaky clean image left the band and began to record as Marky mark and the Funky Bunch.

After a stint modelling he moved into movies finding major success with Boogie Nights, Three Kings and The Italian Job.

But it was the role as the foul mouthed Massachusetts State Police detective that earnt him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination.

Cher has also made a successful transition from her music career into movies winning an Oscar for her role in Moonstruck as well as a Best Supporting Actress nomination for Silkwood.

Made a Good Attempt

Queen Latifah has perhaps been the most successful musician to thespian working in television and movies.

After finding fame as a rapper Queen Latifah now finds herself focused on her acting projects and was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress for her role as Matron "Mama" Morton in Chicago in 2002.

A Second musical Hairspray also brought her success and Life Support, where she portrayed an HIV-positive woman earned her a first Golden Globe and Screen Actor Guild Award.

Despite this there have been a couple of stinkers Taxi and Barbershop 2: Back in Business honey what were you thinking?

Similarly Beyonce has found success as well as failure as she moved away from her music career. Her first couple of movies, The Pink Panther and Austin Powers in Goldmember, looked like things were not going to work out to well.

But she managed to turn it around with the release of Dreamgirls in 2006, based on the history and evolution of American R&B music during the eras of doo-wop, soul, the Motown Sound, funk, and disco.

For her role as The Dreams band member Deena Jones she secured a Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical nomination at the Golden Globes. The film went on to be nominated for eight Oscars, but was left out of Best Picture.

Her latest movie Cadillac Records sees her take on the role of soul legend Etta James in a film that follows the life of the influential Chicago-based record-company executive Leonard Chess.

Shouldn't Have Bothered

Madonna's dabble with the movie industry was nothing short of a disaster with only her role in Evita gaining any real critical praise.

How can you forget the awful Body of Evidence? but she did one worse with Swept Away, what was Guy Ritchie thinking?

But that hasn't put our Madge off as she steps behind the camera for the first time for Filth and Wisdom which has been universally panned, give it up love.

Justin Timberlake's acting career hasn't really gone as expected with many of his movies either being panned or going completely under the radar.

Southland Tales was a complete disaster as was Edison and The Love Guru has just been named the worst film of 2008, nice work! A piece of advice... stick to singing.

FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw