Released in 2007, Stardust was an epic fantasy adventure based on the 1999 novel by Sandman creator Neil Gaiman. The movie was directed by Matthew Vaughn, hot off the success of Layer Cake and before he moved into the superhero space with Kick-Ass and X-Men: First Class.
Rising stars Charlie Cox and Claire Danes led the cast, and they were surrounded by A-listers like Sienna Miller, Ricky Gervais, Peter O'Toole, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Robert De Niro.
While the movie was released to positive reviews (77% on Rotten Tomatoes), it struggled at the box office, grossing $137.5 million worldwide on a reported $70+ million budget. In the U.S., it grossed a mere $38.6 million.
Cox and Danes went on to find success in television, but Stardust wasn't the launching platform for their film careers that many expected. Cox has talked openly about the struggle of seeing longtime friends Andrew Garfield and Robert Pattinson achieve the success he also wanted, but as Daredevil: Born Again's lead star, he's no stranger to acclaim and has a sizeable fanbase.
In a lengthy interview with On Film… With Kevin McCarthy (via SFFGazette.com), the British actor reflected on the negative impact that Stardust's box office struggles had on his career. HBO's Boardwalk Empire ended up rescuing him, and the series was what ultimately led Cox to Netflix's Daredevil.
"I'd had this big movie. It had been nicely reviewed. People liked it. It had done well in the UK and abroad. But over here, it did not make any money. And back then, that was when people — the numbers people talked about were what did a movie make on the opening weekend? That was all anyone ever talked about. What was its opening weekend? Crazy. And this — it had a terrible opening weekend. It came out with Rush Hour 3, which completely eclipsed it. And suddenly I couldn't get a job. I could not get arrested."
"I had to leave LA because I ran out of money, and I was like, this acting thing might not work out. And when Boardwalk Empire came along, people now who saw that show or remember it will think I was a great character in that show. When I got that audition, it was three episodes, maybe, one scene per episode, no guarantees, no money. Like we were looking for a character, maybe for a couple of episodes. It just worked out for me that that character in that world, my proximity to Kelly Macdonald and Steve Buscemi meant that I was around a lot, and then they kept using me and they liked the character."
"It's almost like my second life as an actor started there because that led to Daredevil, obviously. So, I'd had this big moment. It hadn't worked out, and now this was like a second chance, and I wanted to milk it for everything it was worth. I knew how lucky I was to be an actor, even if I had almost no scenes while living in New York. I was like I'm going to love this every minute of it because it might be the last job."
Stardust remains a beloved cult classic, and it was an excellent early performance from Cox. Boardwalk Empire fully showed what he was capable of, though, and the hope among Marvel fans is that he might get a shot at big-screen glory in Avengers: Doomsday or Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
Cox has recently played down his possible involvement in Spider-Man: Brand New Day or Avengers: Doomsday, but last year he expressed optimism, saying, "I think it’s more possible than it’s ever been, yeah. "I would love to be in one of the Avengers films, or another Spider-Man, or something like that."
"For a couple of reasons. One, because over the years I have become a geeky fan of the character, and I weirdly, for the character’s sake, feel like it’d be really cool for him to get that kind of upgrade," he explained. "I would also just love it in terms of what it would do for my chances of getting other movie roles."
Check out the trailer for Stardust below.