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While many actors at the highest level of the entertainment industry may expect to make a few personal changes for a role, such as subtly altering their appearance, some actors have made extreme, shocking sacrifices for a movie. Months-long commitments, learning difficult skills, or pushing the boundaries of physical and mental well-being are not typically expected for the average movie role, but when an actor fully commits in these ways, the results can be transformative and even difficult to shed.

There is arguably a sacrificial element to acting at any level, since the actor must assume the likeness and qualities of a person other than themselves. However, these 14 actors have been known to take extreme, even detrimental, measures to achieve captivating performances and sacrifice greatly, much more than most would be willing to do.

Related: 18 Early Predictions For Oscars 2024: Actors, Director & Best Picture

Robert Pattinson Only Ate Canned Tuna...

Many films and television shows use choreographed routines to express a character’s emotions or push them forward to a new place in their arc, but more often than not these are dance routines on solid ground. Netflix’s “Spinning Out” puts its characters, and audience by extension, on ice.

In “Spinning Out,” Kat Baker (Kaya Scodelario) is a gifted skater who had a bad fall that halted her career and created major trepidations in trying what used to be routine moves for her. But when an opportunity arises for her to shift her track slightly and become a pair skater, she does go for it, learning to push past her trauma as she learns a new style of skating.

“Part of the metaphor of the show is, when you fall, you get back up,” executive producer Tory Tunnell tells Variety. “Kat is one-of-a-kind. She’s elegant, but she’s...

On a muggy Monday night in June, a ginormous rainbow flash mob storms the sidewalks outside Manhattan’s Irving Plaza. It helps that this particular Monday falls during Pride Month – but that’s not the reason why so many female-presenting fans have strung their hair through multi-color beads and scrunchies, holding rainbow flags emblazoned with the hashtag “#20Gayteen.”

Inside, 27-year-old Hayley Kiyoko – dubbed “Lesbian Jesus” by her fans – awaits. She poses and talks with the lucky ones who paid for meet-and-greet photo ops with the rising star. They ask for prom poses,...

Portraying Tonya Harding required Margot Robbie to find empathy for a villianized woman, to balance comedy and pathos — and, to believably land a triple axel, the move that made Harding famous before she was infamous. However, Robbie was raised in Dalby, Australia, a coastal town where temperatures rarely go below freezing.

Now the Neon/30 West release is a specialty hit, and Robbie has become a Golden Globe and SAG Award nominee with a litany of gravity-defying onscreen spins. Credit for that transformation goes to choreographer and former Ice Capades skater Sarah Kawahara, who also served as onetime choreographer for Harding’s nemesis, Nancy Kerrigan.

Kawahara’s choreography subjects include Peggy Fleming, the 2002 Olympics opening ceremony, and Will Ferrell in “Blades of Glory.” She said the 1994 attack on Kerrigan had a huge impact on her career. “It changed the face of skating,” she told IndieWire in a recent phone interview. “All...

Tonya Harding is still best known as the woman who maybe, possibly, potentially played a part – for the record, she denies it – in her figure-skating rival Nancy Kerrigan getting hit in the knee just before the 1994 Olympics. Margot Robbie knows this – the Australian actress spent months studying the sad backstory of Harding's life in preparation for the biopic I, Tonya, and she was well aware of what the public's opinion on the disgraced athlete was. But the more Robbie dug, the more she developed sympathy for the fallen champion. When...

This review was written for the theatrical release of "Blades of Glory". The blissfully silly "Blades of Glory" is one of those rare comedies that puts a goofy smile on your face with the premise alone -- Will Ferrell and Jon Heder playing the world's first competitive male pairs figure skaters -- and keeps it planted there right until its wacky finale.

Co-directors Will Speck and Josh Gordon, probably best known for those popular Geico caveman commercials, have made a highly agreeable feature debut capturing the energetic irreverence of early Farrelly brothers.

With Ferrell's legions of Ricky Bobby fans already primed to go along for the ride, the Paramount release should cut some glorious figures at the boxoffice for weeks to come.

Having already parodied NASCAR drivers and soccer dads, it was probably only a matter of time before Ferrell got around to skewering figure skaters, but he does it up right as Chazz Michael Michaels, a swaggering rocker on ice with grungy black hair who finds himself banned from the sport after getting into a brawl with his rival, the narcissistic but naive Jimmy MacElroy (Heder).

Stripped of their gold medals, Michaels and MacElroy are having a tough time surviving in the real world. The perpetually soused Chazz takes refuge under an evil wizard suit in a kids ice revue, while Jimmy gets a job in the shoe department of a sporting goods store.

But when a former stalker of Jimmy's (Nick Swardson) points out a loophole in the figure skating rule book, the two previous foes join forces, much to the chagrin of reigning sibling champs, the diabolical Stranz and Fairchild Van Waldenberg (real-life husband and wife Will Arnett and Amy Poehler).

Working from an inspired script credited to brothers Jeff Cox and Craig Cox, as well as John Altschuler & Dave Krinsky ("King of the Hill"), Speck and Gordon maintain a comfortable pace while coaxing terrific performances from their game cast.

In addition to the pitch-perfect Ferrell (in a role originally meant for Ben Stiller) and no-slouch Heder (making good on that "Napoleon Dynamite" promise), the rest of the cast cuts a comic swath both on and off the ice.

Also proving to be good sports are Scott Hamilton, Sasha Cohen, Nancy Kerrigan, Brian Boitano, Dorothy Hamill and Peggy Fleming, all on hand to deflate some of the self-seriousness known to go along with the turf.

Tech aspects are uniformly smoothly executed. Montreal's Olympic Stadium and architecturally prominent Habitat '67 are captured to notable effect by cinematographer Stefan Czapsky ("Ed Wood"), while veteran costume designer Julie Weiss has truly outdone herself with all those over-the-top Lycra creations, getting a little help from the Bob Mackie, Bill Hargate and Ray Aghayan houses.

Also credit skating choreographer Sarah Kawahara for routines that are anything but routine and "American Idol" runner-up Bo Bice, who puts the right anthemic arena rock spin on the titular closing theme song.

BLADES OF GLORY

Paramount Pictures

DreamWorks Pictures presents a Red Hour/Smart Entertainment production

Credits:

Directors: Will Speck & Josh Gordon

Screenwriters: Jeff Cox & Craig Cox and John Altschuler & Dave Krinsky

Story: Craig Cox & Jeff Cox & Busy Philipps

Producers: Ben Stiller, Stuart Cornfeld, John Jacobs

Executive producer: Marty Ewing

Director of photography: Stefan Czapsky

Production designer: Stephen Lineweaver

Editor: Richard Pearson

Costume designer: Julie Weiss

Music: Theodore Shapiro

Cast:

Chazz Michael Michaels: Will Ferrell

Jimmy MacElroy: Jon Heder

Stranz Van Waldenberg: Will Arnett

Fairchild Van Waldenberg: Amy Poehler

Coach: Craig T. Nelson

Katie Van Waldenberg: Jenna Fischer

Darren MacElroy: William Fichtner

Hector: Nick Swardson

Running time -- 94 minutes

MPAA rating: PG-13...