For a long time, Matthew Lillard blamed the Scooby-Doo movies for his career taking a nosedive. In an interview with Variety published on Thursday, October 8, the 56-year-old actor explained that he has a love-hate relationship with the franchise, noting he is ultimately grateful for the humbling experience.
"I felt a ton of pressure to not suck. It was the first big movie that I was in and it was a big opportunity for me," Lillard reflected about the 2002 live-action film, where he played Shaggy.
"And then I felt that now that Scooby-Doo is this big movie, I'm now going to go off and be a big movie star." "It was right about this time, after the second movie, that my career took a real nosedive for a long time," he recalled.
"Like, I may be one of those guys from the '90s that never comes back." The Scream star eventually realized the problem wasn't Scooby-Doo, but that he was aging out of the young roles that had defined his career. "I resented Scooby-Doo for a long time," he admitted, though he never regretted the films.
The money he earned helped him and his wife Heather Helm weather a difficult period when they sold their house and cars and downsized their lives. Looking back, Lillard now sees the experience as a necessary reality check.
"I felt like before this movie, 'I'm doing all these movies and I'm a big guy.' The reality was I'm not," he admitted. "I was always a character actor, and I thought I was more than that.
There was like a real humbling of Matthew Lillard that happens right after this movie that now I'm so grateful for."