Robert Downey — clean, sober and talented

In 2005, Carrie Morrow was a co-producer on the film, “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” a low-budget feature film best known for serving as the directorial debut of action movie scribe Shane Black. One of the stars was Robert Downey Jr., who had been released from a California prison and drug treatment facility in 2000, had appeared on “Ally McBeal” later that year, was fired from the show in April of 2001 because of a relapse and then spent another year in a rehab center.

Downey’s climb back into Hollywood’s good graces began in earnest with two films in 2003, “The Singing Detective,” a musical fantasy produced by Mel Gibson, and “Gothika,” a horror-thriller starring Halle Berry.

He managed to come through those without a hitch, although he reportedly had to pay for his own completion bond insurance, which protects a film in case something unforeseen happens — like the sudden flaking of a star.

And on “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” recalled Morrow, just about everybody on the set anticipated just such an occurrence.

“Everybody was watching him,” she said. “Everybody was waiting for the other shoe to drop, especially because it wasn’t necessarily a sober set. I had problems with other people there. They were all waiting for him to fall.

“The funny thing about Robert,” she added, “is that he has awkward mannerisms to begin with. He’s kind of a quirky dude. People assumed he was wasted even when he was sober. I actually had somebody come up to me and say, ‘I’m sure he’s wasted. He’s out of his mind.’ It was projected onto him, almost like he couldn’t escape it.”

‘He has absolutely turned things around’
Since those early days of his career renaissance, Downey has been working steadily. He stars in “Iron Man,” which opens Friday, but he has also played major roles in “Zodiac,” “The Shaggy Dog,” and the upcoming Ben Stiller-directed comedy, “Tropic Thunder.” Starting with “Kiss Kiss Bang Bang,” his presence on a film has not meant that extra insurance was necessary.

“They were just starting to trust him,” Morrow said of the studios. “They were willing to let the rope out enough to see if he would fall. And he didn’t.”

She described his behavior on that film this way: “He was punctual. He was professional. He was respectable.”

Video   'Iron Man' takes off Robert Downey, Jr. stars as Tony Stark in the big-screen adaptation of the comic book story. In this scene, Stark outruns missiles as Iron Man. Buena Vista Pictures

Although producer Jason Blumenthal has never worked with Downey, he had a meeting with him a few years back, during some of the actor’s worst times. Of that encounter, Blumenthal summed up Downey differently: “He was a mess. No way we would put him in a movie.”

And now? “He has absolutely turned things around,” said Blumenthal, who along with his Escape Artists production company counts films such as “The Pursuit of Happyness” with Will Smith and the upcoming remake of “The Taking of Pelham 123” with Denzel Washington among their credits.

It isn’t simply the fickle nature of Hollywood that causes a producer to avoid an actor one minute and embrace him the next. In a business where millions of dollars are riding on a film and a producer’s neck could be on the line if an actor implodes in a fit of drug- and/or alcohol-induced lunacy, one can never be too careful.

Downey is, of course, not the only current star with a notorious past.

Tom Sizemore has been in and out of trouble with the law over drug abuse and domestic violence charges involving former girlfriend Heidi Fleiss, the one-time Hollywood madam; he was released from prison in December after serving nine months on a drug charge. Lindsay Lohan has been a constant source of scrutiny over her partying and was chastised in a scathing memo by producer James G. Robinson over her irresponsible behavior on the film, “Georgia Rule,” an incident that went very public.

In a culture rife with insecurity and pressure, many stars over the years have made headlines for the wrong reasons, and had their careers placed in jeopardy. Fatty Arbuckle’s movie career was never the same after he was charged with manslaughter in the death of a woman at a party in 1921, even though he was ultimately acquitted. Robert Mitchum hit a bump when he was arrested for marijuana possession in 1948, although he eventually rebounded. Ingrid Bergman’s career was seriously wounded after she became pregnant out of wedlock by director Roberto Rossellini in 1949.

But the essential element to any Hollywood comeback, Blumenthal pointed out, is talent.

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