What happened to Nicolas Cage, the actor who won an Oscar for ‘Leaving Las Vegas’ and ended up ruined.

Thousands of actors have passed through the Hollywood industry. Some of them have left their mark on history and others are forgotten. Then there are the actors that disappear for a certain period of time from the big screen and then return, as is the case of Nicolas Cage.

Cage has worked with some of the most important directors, such as Francis Ford Coppola (his uncle), David Lynch, the Coen brothers, Ridley Scott, Martin Scorsese and Brian De Palma. In addition, he has been nominated and honoured at various award ceremonies. He won an Oscar, a Golden Globe and a SAG award for his performance in ‘Leaving Las Vegas’ (1995).

He earned his second Oscar nomination for his performance in ‘Adaptation’ (2002). However, his life and career have been full of ups and downs since.

Cage’s career post ‘Adaptation’

Cage has appeared in a wide variety of films, both mainstream and offbeat, big budget and more independent. After his Oscar win and second Oscar nomination, Cage began to dabble in all sorts of films in the 2000s. However, these films did not always succeed at the box office.

He made his directorial debut with ‘Sonny’ in 2002, a low-budget drama starring James Franco. The film received negative reviews.

In 2004, he starred in ‘National Treasure’, his second highest grossing film to date. In 2007, he starred in the much-criticized ‘Ghost Rider’. Then in 2009, Cage starred in ‘Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans’, directed by acclaimed German director Werner Herzog.

In 2010, he participated in ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’, which received mixed reviews, but was a box office flop. Cage reprised his role in 2012′s ‘Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance’, nominated at the Razzie awards for the worst of cinema.

After an extended period of time out of the limelight, he co-starred in ‘The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent’ opposite Pedro Pascal in 2022, in which he plays a fictionalized version of himself. While it received generally positive reviews from critics, with praise for Cage and Pascal’s performances and chemistry, it performed poorly at the box office.

“I went back to my own interests in indie drama. Those have always been my roots, and I kept working,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “If you look at everything I’ve grossed at the worldwide box office after a 43-year career, I’m approaching something like $6 billion. Three flops won’t completely eradicate me from Hollywood studios.”

The tax problems faced by Nicolas Cage

In addition to some of the problems he suffered at the box office, Cage was involved in tax problems. In 2009, several media reported that the actor owed more than $6 million to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in reference to the 2007 tax year, as well as another $350,000 in unpaid taxes between 2002 and 2004. Cage also faced separate lawsuits from East West Bank and Red Curb Investments for unpaid loans of several million dollars.

In 2022, Cage confirmed that he had finally finished paying his debts and intended to be more selective with his film roles in the future, starring in many to escape his financial turmoil.