The Love Guru (2008) – Mike Myers
There was a time when Mike Myers was the equivalent of comedy gold. He was a member of Saturday Night Live, he was Wayne Campbell, he was Shrek, he was Austin Powers. It seemed like he was unstoppable. A career that began in earnest in the early 90s was still going strong into the 2000s. Although Myers suffered a few missteps along the way (I’m looking at you, Cat in the Hat…) the success of both the Austin Powers and Shrek franchises helped to secure his bankability. Until he wrote and starred in The Love Guru.
A bizarre mashup of cultural appropriation, sports comedy, and toilet humor, the most positive thing most critics could find to say about the film was that the musical numbers were “oddly watchable.” Critics were bored and disgusted by the sheer number of jokes that centered around obscene sexual puns, and members of the Hindu community were distraught by the amount of negative stereotypes perpetuated by Myers in the film. His character, just for the record, is an American raised in India. Fan reception was not any more forgiving. The movie was also a financial bomb, making back just a little more than half of its total budget at the US box office. Even after it was released worldwide, its total earnings still only came to about 40% of the budget. Luckily for Myers, his success as Shrek has earned him continued work over various television shorts and other appearances, but his career otherwise has never recovered.