Pacino would turn some heads when he appeared in the Adam Sandler comedy, Jack and Jill, but he admits he initially took it because he had nothing else.
While it may have looked like Al Pacino may have cynically made movies just for a paycheck at a certain point in the 2000s era, the Academy Award-winning star admits that it is what it seems. However, it was also out of desperation. You may be seeing Pacino making the promotional rounds lately. This is because the iconic Godfather and Scarface star is releasing an autobiography titled Sonny Boy (which is named after the nickname his mother would call him). In Sonny Boy, Pacino would be candid about falling prey to a crooked accountant who had lost all of his money in a Ponzi scheme, then eventually went to prison.
Pacino admits that he would do movies in his 70s like Jack and Jill because he was completely broke. Variety reports that he explains in his book, “I was broke. I had $50 million, and then I had nothing. I had property, but I didn’t have any money.” Pacino would go on to admit,
Jack and Jill was the first film I made after I lost my money. To be honest, I did it because I didn’t have anything else. Adam Sandler wanted me, and they paid me a lot for it. So I went out and did it, and it helped. I love Adam, he was wonderful to work with and has become a dear friend. He also just happens to be a great actor and a hell of a guy.”
The iconic star writes in his book, “I wasn’t a young buck, and I was not going to be making the kind of money from acting in films that I had made before. The big paydays that I was used to just weren’t coming around anymore. The pendulum had swung, and I found it harder to find parts for myself.” Fortunately, Pacino would find another venture to help him out, “My seminars were another big find for me. In the past, I used to go to colleges all the time and talk to the kids there, just to get out there and perform for them, in a sense. I’d tell them a little bit about my life and have them ask me questions. … I didn’t get paid for it. I just did it. Now that I was broke, I thought, ‘Why don’t we follow this up?’ There were more places I could go and do these seminars. Not necessarily universities. I knew there was a wider market for this. So I started traveling around. And I found that they worked. Audiences came because I still had popularity.”
