You Will Never Look At These Hollywood Stars The Same Way After Seeing Their Old Commercials

Before streaming shows, blockbuster movies, hit albums, and awards campaigns, many celebrities were simply trying to book any screen job they could get.

For some, that meant commercials.

A fast-food ad, soda spot, toy commercial, snack campaign, or local restaurant promo may not sound glamorous. But commercials can teach young performers how to work with cameras, hit marks, memorize lines, and sell a moment quickly.

Here are celebrities who got early fame or career momentum through commercials.

Leonardo DiCaprio

Leonardo DiCaprio’s first paid acting work came from commercials, long before Titanic, The Revenant, or The Wolf of Wall Street.

At the 2016 SAG Awards, DiCaprio recalled that his first acting role was an 1980s Matchbox cars commercial. He said he played a “little gangster with slicked-back hair” and remembered learning a simple but important lesson: know your lines.

That early ad work was not the role that made him famous, but it was the start of a career that moved through commercials, sitcoms, child-actor work, prestige drama, and eventually global stardom.

Sarah Michelle Gellar

Sarah Michelle Gellar’s commercial career started very early, and one ad even made legal history.

When she was a child, Gellar appeared in a Burger King commercial that directly compared the chain to McDonald’s. Years later, she recalled that McDonald’s sued the advertising agency, Burger King, and even named her in the lawsuit when she was only 5 years old.

Ben Affleck

Ben Affleck’s early career included a memorable Burger King commercial.

In the 1989 ad, a teenage Affleck played a young man named Jeff who answers a car phone and gets pulled into a fast-food meet-cute.

The ad is now funny because viewers know what happened later. Affleck went on to co-write and star in Good Will Hunting, win Academy Awards, direct major films, and play Batman.

Jennifer Lawrence

Jennifer Lawrence’s first commercial job was not exactly glamorous.

She revealed that her first commercial was a promo for MTV’s My Super Sweet 16, where she played a fictional rich girl being carried on a chaise lounge before being dropped.

That commercial helped her get her SAG card, which was a practical early step in her acting career. GQ also reported that the MTV commercial was the job that earned her SAG membership.

Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt’s pre-fame work included commercials before he became one of Hollywood’s defining movie stars.

Pitt’s true breakout came from his small but unforgettable role in Thelma & Louise. Still, his commercial work belongs in the earlier chapter: the young actor taking screen jobs, building confidence, and waiting for a bigger chance.

Bryan Cranston

Before Breaking Bad, Malcolm in the Middle, and Seinfeld, Bryan Cranston appeared in commercials.

One of his most famous pre-fame ads was for Preparation H. The New York Post reported that Cranston appeared in a 1980s Preparation H commercial at the beginning of his career, before his better-known television roles.

That detail has become a fan-favorite piece of trivia because it contrasts so sharply with Walter White, one of modern TV’s most intense characters.

Cameron Diaz

Cameron Diaz appeared in a Coca-Cola commercial before becoming a movie star.

Mashed wrote about the early Coca-Cola ad, describing Diaz running up a lighthouse in a commercial before her breakout role opposite Jim Carrey in The Mask.

Diaz had already been modeling before acting, so commercials fit naturally into her early entertainment path. They gave her camera experience before Hollywood fully arrived.

Steve Carell

Steve Carell appeared in a Brown’s Chicken commercial before becoming one of TV comedy’s biggest names.

A widely circulated early ad shows Carell promoting the Chicago-area chicken chain years before The Daily Show, The Office, and The 40-Year-Old Virgin.

Carell’s later comedy style became much more subtle, awkward, and character-driven than a standard fast-food spot. But that is what makes the commercial interesting.

Paul Rudd

Paul Rudd’s early screen work included commercials before he became a beloved comedy actor.

Rudd later became known through Clueless, Friends, Anchorman, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, I Love You, Man, and Marvel’s Ant-Man films.

Benicio del Toro

Benicio del Toro appeared in commercials before becoming an Oscar-winning actor.

Del Toro later built a career around intense, strange, and often unpredictable performances in films like The Usual Suspects, Traffic, 21 Grams, Sicario, and Che.

Mila Kunis

Mila Kunis appeared in commercials before becoming widely known through television.

Like many child and teen actors, Kunis built early experience through small screen jobs and advertising before landing the role that changed everything: Jackie Burkhart on That ’70s Show.

Kunis later expanded far beyond sitcom fame with Family Guy, Black Swan, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Friends with Benefits, and Bad Moms.

Morgan Freeman

Morgan Freeman’s early career included commercial work before his later film breakthrough.

Freeman’s rise was slower than many. He worked in theater, children’s television, and supporting roles before becoming one of the most respected actors of his generation. His later credits include Driving Miss Daisy, The Shawshank Redemption, Se7en, Million Dollar Baby, and The Dark Knight trilogy.

Courteney Cox

Courteney Cox had a major early commercial moment before Friends.

Cox later appeared in Bruce Springsteen’s “Dancing in the Dark” video, then became globally famous as Monica Geller on Friends. She also built a major film identity through the Scream franchise.

John Travolta

John Travolta appeared in commercials before his breakthrough as one of the biggest young stars of the 1970s.

Travolta later became known through Welcome Back, Kotter, Saturday Night Fever, Grease, and eventually Pulp Fiction, which launched one of Hollywood’s great career comebacks.

Tobey Maguire

Tobey Maguire worked in commercials as a young performer before becoming Spider-Man.

Maguire later became known through The Ice Storm, Pleasantville, The Cider House Rules, and especially Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Joseph Gordon-Levitt started acting young, and commercials were part of that early screen world.

He later became a child and teen TV star through 3rd Rock from the Sun, then successfully moved into adult roles with Brick, (500) Days of Summer, Inception, Looper, and The Dark Knight Rises.

Lindsay Lohan

Lindsay Lohan’s path to fame began with modeling and commercials.

Her breakthrough came with The Parent Trap, where she played twins and proved she could carry a major family film at a young age. She later became one of the defining teen stars of the early 2000s through Freaky Friday, Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, and Mean Girls.

Elisabeth Moss

Elisabeth Moss appeared in commercials before becoming one of television’s most acclaimed actors.

Moss later became known for The West Wing, Mad Men, Top of the Lake, The Handmaid’s Tale, and The Invisible Man. Her career developed from child and teen acting into some of the most intense adult dramatic work on television.

Aaron Paul

Aaron Paul’s early career included commercial work before Breaking Bad made him famous.

He later became Jesse Pinkman, one of modern television’s most emotionally memorable characters. The role won him multiple Emmy Awards and turned him from a working actor into a widely respected performer.

Naomi Watts

Naomi Watts appeared in commercials before becoming an internationally respected actress.

Her career took time to break through. After years of smaller roles, she became a major name with David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive, then earned acclaim for The Ring, 21 Grams, The Impossible, and many other projects.