‘Gladiator II’ star Paul Mescal’s first big role was a breakfast sausage ad in Ireland: It ‘paid for my rent for 5 months’
With an Oscar nomination under his belt and the hotly anticipated Ridley Scott epic "Gladiator II" on the horizon, Paul Mescal's career couldn't be going better. But before Hollywood producers were lining up to woo him to their projects, Mescal was hustling to make ends meet.
In a recent GQ profile, the 28-year-old recalled a commercial he did for the Irish sausage brand Denny at the beginning of his career. Mescal, who had just graduated drama school, was interested in serious dramatic projects. But as he noted in an interview last year with BBC Radio 4's "Today," he was "poor" at the time.
"My agent was like, 'I don't know how you'll deal with this, but we've got a sausage advert that you can go on,'" Mescal said. "I was like, 'Absolutely. I need to pay my rent.'"
The ad, which featured the "All of Us Strangers" star as an Irish teen who's inspired to travel the world, was a financial lifeline to the young actor.
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"That paid for my rent for five months, so I'll hear no Denny's slander," he told GQ.
Indeed, Mescal said last year that he tries to remind himself of his sausage-selling experience as his career continues to grow.
"If I ever feel like I get too big for my boots, it kind of pops up somewhere that we shouldn't forget that I was promoting sausages when I got out of drama school," he said.
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The actor added that he felt "lucky" to be Irish and be able to benefit from the country's government funding for higher education: Drama school cost him just $10,000. The affordable tuition allowed him to be more selective about his post-Denny roles.
"How do you start your career, let's say, $200,000 in debt, and expect to have any kind of artistic integrity with the choices that you make?" he told GQ. "What if somebody turns around and goes, 'You can do this terribly written piece of work, but it's going to pay off your college debt?'"
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