Paul Rudd may be killing it as Brian Fantana in “Anchorman 2” — and just about everything else the 44-year-old comic actor has ever appeared in — but before he was famous, Rudd had to earn his money the hard way: As a bat mitzvah DJ, working for a company called You Should Be Dancing.
He recently described the damning video evidence, brought up in an interview, as akin to “watching myself in a porno.”
Blush not, Paul! Everyone has a past.
At least you never had to dress up as a banana, like Megan Fox (though your yellow blazer would have matched her get-up nicely).
Here are 10 other celebs who toiled in scrappy or downright seedy jobs before hitting the big time:
Bill Murray
Two years after he graduated from college, and before he started performing at Second City, Bill Murray, now 63, sold chestnuts on the sidewalk in front of a Chicago grocery store.
Amy Adams
When she was 17, Adams worked as a hostess at a Hooters restaurant, graduating briefly to waitress, at 18. Though her chest plays a prominent role in her new movie “American Hustle,” Adams, now 39, has said of her early gig, “Everyone would agree, if they could see me, Hooters isn’t necessarily the best way to describe me.”
Eva Mendes
The star, 39, worked at a Hot Dog on a Stick franchise at the Glendale Galleria in Glendale, Calif., where she has said she dreaded doing the hand-mashed lemonade.
“They are very strict about that; you have to rotate and dip the dog and do the lemonade and do the cash register — it’s a whole thing. They run that operation with an iron fist,” she said in a Wall Street Journal blog.
Chris Rock
The comic once worked as a busboy at a Red Lobster in New York, where, he has said, “If you work there, you can’t afford to eat there.” Rock, now 48, also told Oprah that he couldn’t pull it off now, as he’s allergic to shrimp.
Beyoncé
As a kid, Queen Bey, now 32, used to sweep up hair at her mom’s Houston hair salon, Headliners, and sang for tips to pay for a season pass to Six Flags.
Megan Fox
In Florida, Fox worked at a smoothie shop where she occasionally had to dress up as a banana and stand by the highway. When the 27-year-old actress told the story on “Ellen,” she was ambushed.
Kanye West
West worked at the Gap in Chicago before he made it big as a rapper and producer. West, now 36, referenced the job on his debut album, “College Dropout.” “Let’s go back, back to the Gap / Look at my check, wasn’t no scratch / So if I stole, wasn’t my fault / Yeah I stole, never got caught.”
Jon Hamm
As a struggling actor, Hamm took a job in set design on soft-core adult films in LA. “Essentially, I had to move furniture around sweaty, naked people. It wasn’t a great job, but the money was useful,” the 42-year-old “Madmen” star has said of the gig.
Ellen DeGeneres
The comedian, 55, held many odd jobs in her early years and once worked as an oyster shucker at New Orleans bar Desire. She was apparently fired for not shucking fast enough.
Evangeline Lilly
“The Hobbit” star, 34, briefly worked as a flight attendant for Canada-based Royal Airlines. She told David Letterman she wasn’t a fan: “That job has no redeeming qualities. I didn’t like the people. I didn’t like the destinations. I didn’t like the recycled air, the crappy food. [Or] the fact that they tell you, before you start your job, to buy your shoes two sizes too big because your feet swell.”
She once admitted to Jay Leno that she farted next to a passenger who was terrible to her.