
Sure, some celebrities become mega-famous overnight, but a lot of Hollywood success stories only happen after an actor or musician has taken a bunch of bit and back-up parts. Need further proof?
From JLo to Matthew McConaughey, Channing Tatum to Angelina Jolie (yes, really!), these 17 stars all appeared in music videos well before becoming household names.
Image via GMV Jams/YouTube; TrishaYearwoodVEVO/YouTube
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Courteney Cox
1In Bruce Springsteen's 1984 video for "Dancing in the Dark," a lucky girl gets picked out of the crowd to dance onstage with The Boss. It was none other than then-20-year-old model Courteney Cox who was cast in the video. Ten years later, she'd become one of the most famous Friends on TV!
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Alicia Silverstone
2Before she played Cher Horowitz in 1995's Clueless, Alicia Silverstone was already famous thanks to her appearances in three of Aerosmith's music videos. The first was for "Cryin'," in which Alicia played a teen who rebels after a fight with her cheating boyfriend played by Stephen Dorff.
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Liv Tyler
3Liv may be famous Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler's daughter, but after starring in Aerosmith's Thelma & Louise–themed video for "Crazy" -- which also featured Alicia Silverstone -- in 1994, she was well on her way to becoming a star in her own right.
After the video blew up, Liv made her film debut in Silent Fall, starring Richard Dreyfuss.
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Gina Gershon
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Channing Tatum
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Wentworth Miller
6The hot Prison Break star appeared in not one but two Mariah Carey videos. The first, "It’s Like That," was released in 2005 and featured Wentworth in a Zorro-esque mask. The second was "We Belong Together."
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Christina Hendricks
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Jeremy Renner
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Jennifer Lopez
9Yeah, yeah, so in the '90s, JLo was a Fly Girl on In Living Color, but she was also a backup dancer in Janet Jackson's 1993 video for "That's the Way Love Goes." Funny how imagining JLo as backup anything is just mind-blowing now.
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Zooey Deschanel
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Matthew McConaughey
11Alright, alright, alright. In 1992, Trisha Yearwood was more country music star than Food Network star, and Matthew McConaughey was more country music video star than ... Lincoln car commercial star? We kid! But yeah, he appears in this video for Trisha and Don Henley's single "Walkaway Joe."
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Angelina Jolie
12She was such a baby! Angelina Jolie starred in Meat Loaf's 1993 video for "Rock and Roll Dreams Come Through" when she was only 18. Wonder if she realized then that she'd go on to act, write, direct, have six kids, and save the world?
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Josh Duhamel
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Kesha
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Elijah Wood
15In 1989, Paula Abdul was unstoppable -- and clearly, smart enough to know a fellow star when she saw one! She cast 8-year-old Elijah Wood in her video for "Forever Your Girl," and he went on to star in so many major movies -- probably most notably Lord of the Rings.
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Naomi Campbell
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Benicio Del Toro
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