Kevin Bacon is learning how to "survive" fame.
Kevin Bacon
The 'Footloose' star has been an actor for a number of years but he admits he "can't imagine life without fame".
He shared: "In America, we seem to want fame and celebrity more than anything. I've had it for so long now that I can't imagine life without it. I'll admit that's a strange way to exist.
"You've got to learn how to survive with it because there's a lot of roadkill: I've seen a lot of people whose lives have been lost to the trappings of fame, drugs, alcohol, scandal ... People tend to say actors are 'born with talent' or 'the camera loves them'. Nobody is born with talent. You have to work at anything that you want. I'm a testament to that. Those statements don't give enough credit to the fact that you can start out not so good and work really hard to get a lot better."
And the 61-year-old actor insists success shouldn't be "measured by box office sales" and instead thinks it is important to take roles that will help "create opportunities" for him.
Speaking to The Times magazine, he added: "Success isn't measured by box office sales. I kind of have to say that. I have probably made close to 100 movies and only a small percentage of them are successful, either financially or critically. Yet I've been able to keep working. If my career was really reliant on box-office success, I wouldn't be. All that stuff is important to me only to the extent that I know it creates opportunities to continue to do what I love to do. For me, the space in between 'Action!' and 'Cut!' is still a magical time."
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