“I’ll Never Forgive Myself”: 25 Little-Known Facts About Famous Movies, Revealed By Actors Themselves

Titanic catapulted Kate Winslet to global fame. However, years later, the English actress revealed that she disliked her performance and was embarrassed by her acting and American accent.

Despite earning an Oscar nomination for her role as Rose, Kate cannot watch the film without criticizing herself.

"Every single scene, I'm like 'Really, really? You did it like that? Oh my God.' Even my American accent, I can't listen to it. It's awful,” the actress told CNN in 2012.

She also said she took smaller roles after the hit film because “being famous was horrible” and she didn’t want to be stalked by paparazzi and “followed literally feeding the ducks.”

In 1993, Robin Williams played a man posing as an elderly nanny in Mrs. Doubtfire, one of the most iconic roles of his career.

The film earned the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy. Robbie was also awarded the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy.

What many fans of the beloved film don’t know is that the actor did a lot of improvising on set, sometimes making R-rated jokes that were unsuitable for a family audience.

In 2021, director Chris Columbus revealed that they had agreed to do two or three scripted takes, and then he’d let Robbie “play,” filming 15 to 22 additional unscripted takes. "He would sometimes go into territory that wouldn't be appropriate for a PG-13 movie, but certainly appropriate and hilariously funny for an R-rated film.”

In her book, Wishful Drinking, the late actress revealed that, if she had known that Star Wars was going to be so successful, she never would have signed on to play Princess Leia.

Carrie was offered the life-changing role at the age of 19.

“All I did when I was really famous was wait for it to end,” she confessed. 

Additionally, she expressed regret about signing away her likeness for free, saying she often felt like Minnie Mouse because the Princess Leia brand had eclipsed other aspects of her identity.

Halle revealed that she adopted a cat before filming Catwoman to study how felines move so she could do a better job for the lead role.

"His name was Playdough. I watched, studied, and learned how cats think,” she told Entertainment Weekly. 

“I didn’t have the responsibility of children and family; I was just a woman alone with a lot of idle time to focus on this.”

Halle took her role very seriously and stayed in character at home. “I was full-on cat, all the time. I’d crawl around my house, trying to jump on my counters, thinking, If I were a cat, how would I get up there? I was in it 24/7."

Emma has always been the biggest Harry Potter fan. True to her character, she was extremely responsible about her work. So much so that, during the first film of the franchise, she knew her costars’ lines by heart and mouthed them while filming.

The British star told Jimmy Kimmel that her dedication to the film “created issues” on set and that Chris Columbus, who directed the first two Harry Potter films, would often yell “Cut!” and call her out for mouthing Daniel Radcliffe’s lines.

Recalling the incident, Emma said, “I was such a loser. I really loved those books, I really wanted to do my job well, and I kind of overdid it.”

There are not many things that can make a director more angry than having an actor yell “Cut!” for them. And yet, that’s exactly what Ben Stiller did when shooting Empire of the Sun, directed by his hero, Steven Spielberg.

The actor told USA Today that he made the embarrassing faux pas after getting one of his lines wrong. This prompted the award-winning filmmaker to give him a lecture on set rules.

"I hear this huge silence. Steven Spielberg is in another building watching on the monitors, and he yells, 'What happened?' I'm like, 'I just yelled cut because I screwed up,' and he's yelling, 'No, no, you never cut!'”

Ben recalled that he turned white while Steven was yelling at him, but the two have since laughed about the incident.

The 1997 film Batman & Robin was both a critical and box office disappointment, even named as one of the worst movies of all time.

Though George Clooney reprised the role of Batman during a brief cameo in 2023’s The Flash, the actor said he has grown a disdain for the superhero and won’t even let his wife Amal or their twins watch Batman & Robin.

“I don't think there’s enough dr*gs in the world for me to go back there,” he joked about the possibility of playing Batman again in the future.

Keanu and Sandra Bullock actually hit vehicles while filming a bus scene in Speed.

“I remember we were a little under-informed,” the actor admitted. “We were all on the bus and then we were driving down by San Diego or something. We were set by the ocean, and all of a sudden, we’re actually hitting cars.”

“Someone was driving, and I was being careened into whatever [director] Jan [de Bont] felt I needed to smash into,” Sandra recalled, adding that she got her bus driver’s license for the film, despite not driving on camera.

Anne revealed that she unnecessarily stripped down to her birthday suit on set while working on Love and Other Dr*gs.

For one scene, she had to remove her trench coat and be in the buff underneath.

“I thought we were filming, but it turned out we were just rehearsing and I got unnecessarily n*ked in front of a lot of people. But hey, I just did my job,” the actress recalled.

Regarding the awkward scene, Anne said she did a good job hiding her nerves. "I didn't let anyone know that I was nervous. It was just an internal thing."

After the premiere of One Battle After Another, Leonardo DiCaprio was interviewed by director Paul Thomas Anderson for Esquire. During their conversation, the filmmaker asked the Hollywood star if he had any regrets. 

Leo didn’t have to think long before answering: his missed opportunity to star in Boogie Nights.

“It was a profound movie of my generation. I can’t imagine anyone but Mark [Wahlberg] in it. When I finally got to see that movie, I just thought it was a masterpiece,” Leo said.

“It’s ironic that you’re the person asking that question, but it’s true.”

Directed by Anderson in 1997, the film focuses on a young nightclub dishwasher who becomes a popular star of adult films in the 1970s.

In an interview with Vanity Fair, Chris took responsibility for the fourth installment of his Thor films, Love and Thunder, not receiving positive reviews like the previous Marvel movies.

Directed by Taika Waititi, the movie marked the comeback of Natalie Portman as Jane Foster, Thor’s ex-girlfriend. It also starred Christian Bale as the villainous Gorr the God Butcher.

“I got caught up in the improv and the wackiness, and I became a parody of myself,” Chris admitted. “I didn’t stick the landing.”

He also said he felt disconnected with the superhero character and that he would read his costars’ lines and think they were “cooler” than his.

In a previous interview with British GQ, the Australian star said he “cringed and laughed equally” at the film, saying his character's story had become “too silly.”

Kate is a strong believer that everything happens for a reason. Still, there’s a career-related “what if?” that hasn’t left her mind in over 20 years.

The actress turned down the lead role for The Devil Wears Prada, so it was Anne Hathaway who ended up starring opposite Meryl Streep as an aspiring journalist working at the prestigious Runway magazine.

"That was a bad call,” the 45-year-old admitted last February while speaking to Capital FM’s Capital Breakfast. “It was a timing thing, it was one of those things where I couldn’t do it, and I should’ve made it happen, and I didn’t. That was one where when I saw it I was like, ‘Ugh.’”

The 2006 film went on to gross $326 million at the worldwide box office. It also earned Meryl her 14th Oscar nomination.

Zoe starred in the 2003 film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, the first installment in the Pirates of the Caribbean series.

Directed by Gore Verbinski, the film was a massive box-office success and received generally positive reviews from critics.

Still, the Emilia Pérez star described the Disney adventure as a “really bad experience.” She said the cast and crew were “marvelous,” but the studio and director failed to “lead with kindness and awareness and consideration.”

Zoe also said that years later, producer Jerry Bruckheimer personally apologized to her for his behavior on set.

The Oscar-nominated actress said that filming Steven Spielberg’s The Terminal in 2004 restored her faith “that big can also be great.”