During the 2020 College Football Playoff national championship game, a video showed Vince Vaughn chatting with Donald Trump in a private suite. The video quickly spread across the internet and led to public backlash against the actor, already known for his conservative leanings. Talking about the incident with the Los Angeles Times, Vaughn explained:
“It was the only time I’ve ever met him. We said hello. He was very personable. I didn’t get into policies.”
He cleared up his political stance by saying:
“The only candidate I ever supported is [former Libertarian presidential nominee] Ron Paul. … I don’t have a party that I support and endorse. In fact, for me, sometimes it’s difficult to find a candidate that you feel is philosophically consistent and not just going along with whoever is funding their particular party.”
The ‘Wedding Crashers’ actor also touched on the social media users asking Hollywood to cancel him:
“I think people are more charged than ever about these things. But I don’t think most people take that stuff as seriously as the small percentage that’s making noise about it.”
Sharing his thoughts about different views in politics, he added:
“I was raised with the idea that you could have different likes and beliefs, and you should respect and defend that in other people, not shout it down. The people you disagree with the most, you should stand up for their right to do that.”
Despite the social media backlash, Vaughn’s ‘Freaky (2020)’ grossed $18.1 million at the box office against a $6 million budget with generally good reviews. Still, most of the productions he took part in at the time remained comparatively minor projects. Some of his films, like ‘Queenpins,’ flopped after their release in the years following the video.
On the other hand, the actor’s career had been on the decline since the release of ‘Wedding Crashers.’ The projects that came after the 2005 movie received negative reactions from the critics. For example, ‘Couples Retreat’ rated 11% on Rotten Tomatoes, while his appearance in comedy projects received criticism for ‘not being diverse.’
So, Vaughn talked about this period in his career by saying it was ‘like stock analysis’ in a chat with British GQ. Then, he referred to his attempt at more serious roles with his part in the second season of ‘True Detective,’ adding:
“I’m not blaming anyone else but myself here. The machine can make you idle. You read a script, and then you agree to a role, then soon enough you’re on set looking at a scene that has had all the juice and the life sucked right out of it.”
Mentioning his comedy career after ‘Wedding Crashers,’ the actor went on:
“You become a hired gun doing a very inoffensive PG-13 movie, and, well, you kind of just go along with it. Like anything in life, you’re either growing, or you’re dying. When you get too comfortable, you start to decline.”
While Vaughn stopped appearing in major films and TV shows, he changed his direction to movie productions in time by founding Wild West Productions. The company produced some well-received works, including Netflix’s ‘F is for Family,’ which rated 85% on Rotten Tomatoes.