Shia LaBeouf is a Strange Fella Indeed.
I know this post will look like I am bashing Shia LaBeouf, but the truth is I really really like the guy. I just think he is really strange, but I think the stranger he gets the better his performances get. Fury, American Honey, and Honey Boy are, in my opinion, underrated and deserve way more credit than people give it. He had a troubling childhood, which he chronicled a little bit in Honey boy, his latest movie. When I say he had a messed up childhood I mean stuff like his father being an addict, his father giving him weed at around age 11, and his father also had PTSD and once held a gun to Shia. I mean all in all he turned out all right, he is just kind of strange but in the most complimenting way.
He would preform at bars as an insult comic at age 10.
When Shia was around 10 years old his parents, Jeffrey Craig LaBeouf and Shayna Saide, weren't making a lot of money. So, Shia decided to go into stand up, not for the love of comedy but rather because he just wanted a new backpack. Shia said in an interview " I wanted a new backpack, that's how I got into this business - I wanted a new backpack". He would apparently go on stage and say the crudest things he could think of, even picking a guy out from the audience to roast, the bar goers ate it up. Shia recollected in 2009 when appearing in Talking to Parade about his stand up "I’d get up there and go, ‘Hey, motherfucker! It’s time for some jokes.’ And all the drunks would be like, ‘Hey, wait a minute. This is weird as hell! What’s this 10-year-old talking about?’... I would come at guys, like, ‘What’s going on with you in your life, man?’ I would just break a whole guy’s life down. ‘He’s a 50-year-old man at a comedy club by himself?’ There are so many jokes there, sad, weird, twisted stuff"”
When he was 12 he got a manager by flipping through the yellow pages and calling around.
Shia was only around 11 when he decided he wanted to be an actor after a night of preforming skits on the Tonight Show. He had met another kid who was a professional actor. According to Hollywood Reporter the professional actor had a bunch of cool surf stuff and only had to attend school about three hours a day, which was really appealing to Shia. Shia then flipped through the yellow pages looking for a manger. He cold called a couple of them pretending to be the British manager of himself. It impressed one manager who knew Shia was a child when he called but liked his hustle, soon she went to see his stand up. The manager signed him on and funded his headshots, bought his way into important events, even allowing him to stay at her house. Soon he was booking big time gigs on "X-files", "Freaks and Geeks", and eventually "Even Stevens."
Shia accidentally leaked government information.
You read that correctly, back in a 2008 interview Shia had with Jay Leno he exposed the FBI. He claimed that a FBI consultant they had working on the set of his movie Eagle Eye told him some information, I don't think Shia knew at the time but it was definitely top secret information which Shia blew the whistle on. He said that the FBI consultant told him they could use your security box microphone to listen in on your house, they can control your car with OnStar, and the big secret which was that the government records 1 in 5 of your phone calls. He said the FBI agent even played back a phone call that Shia had had two years back. IF THEY COULD DO THAT IN 2008 THEY PROBABLY FILM OUR ENTIRE LIVES NOW, just saying.
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He pissed off Steven Spielberg.
Shia has been quite open with how much he disliked working with director Steven Spielberg. Apparently Steven was the one who put in a good word about Shia to Micheal Bay. After how well Shia preformed in the Transformers franchise Steven was ready to work with him in the new Indiana Jones movie. Shia had always looked up to Steven and was quite disappointed when he finally got to work with him. He reportedly did not like the Crystal Skull movie and would say so in interviews, claiming Harrison Ford did not like it as well. He claims Steven and himself had "dropped the ball" when making this film. This upset both Harrison and Spielberg, Harrison later called Shia a “fucking idiot” for publicly bashing the movie. Later in 2016, Shia told Variety what he thought of Steven “You get there, and you realize you’re not meeting the Spielberg you dream of,” LaBeouf said. “You’re meeting a different Spielberg, who is in a different stage in his career. He’s less a director than he is a f—ing company.”
He spilled the beans on Megan Fox cheating.
Shia and Megan Fox were very close during the filming of Transformers. At the time Megan was engaged to Brian Austin Green, so the rumors surrounding her and Shia were pretty scandalous, I guess you can say. But, no one really knew what was going on, until Shia took it into his own hands to say they did for sure. When an interviewer at Details asked Shia if he did hook up with Megan Shia nodded and said "Look, you're on the set for six months, with someone who's rooting to be attracted to you, and you're rooting to be attracted to them." The interviewer then asked if Megan was with Brian Austin Green at the time and... Shia got a bit strange and said "I don't know, man. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. . . ." repeating the phrase 12 times, saying it differently each time, like he was trying to say it just right. Megan Fox later confirmed the relationship as well on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen, but I bet she was pretty pissed at Shia for putting it out there in the first place.
Shia plagiarized a short film he made.
Back in 2012 Shia made his first film, it was released at the Cannes film festival. Soon everyone realized that this film was plagiarized, sometimes word for word, from a graphic novel written by David Clowes. Shia went on to plagiarize a few more works even though people were calling him out left and right. He later apologized on twitter for taking David's work, and said in an interview with ArtNet that this was the reason he started his performance art.
Shia stares down drivers who are reckless on the road.
This isn't so crazy, but I mean why won't he look away. That is just a angry Shia LaBeouf locking eyes. That is all I have to contribute to this one.
The "I am not famous anymore" paper bag.
I mean, I don't know why he did it. It was one of his performance art pieces, or maybe a statement on how Steven Spielberg and other big directors did not want to work with him after he had bad mouthed Indiana Jones. But, it was pretty strange and hilarious. I wonder if it was meant to be hilarious or instead super serious Labeouf art.
The #IAMSORRY project.
As another one of Shia's performance art pieces he decided to dawn the same paper bag and allow complete strangers to meet with him. Apparently he set up a pop-up shop of sorts in which anyone was allowed to go and meet Shia. The stranger would walk in and have a table of props to choose from, strange things, everything from pliers to flowers. Strangers were allowed to do whatever they wanted in the room while Shia did not interact but sat in silence and, for the most part, cried. According to Shia, he had gotten raped while doing #IAMSORRY. He told Dazed in an interview “One woman who came with her boyfriend, who was outside the door when this happened, whipped my legs for 10 minutes and then stripped my clothing and proceeded to rape me.” I wonder what this was supposed to mean? I guess he was sorry for Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull?
He became a meme.
In 2015 Shia collaborated with the same two guys that came up with the "I am not famous anymore" bag. They made a copyright free group of monologues, made to encourage people to use the video and do with what they please, and boy did people do whatever they wanted with it. It became one of the most well known jokes online, with the best monologue being the "Just do it" speech. Written by Joshua Park, who is a health nut upon research online. I don't know if they knew it would spark so many jokes or if people would be motivated by it... I AM MOTIVATED BY IT BTW. Lets enjoy a couple of edited videos of the speech made by fans.
Shia watched all of his movies in ten hours and live streamed it.
Above is Shia reacting to the ending of the Even Stevens Movie during his 2015 #AllMyMovies project. He sat at Manhattan’s Angelika Film Center for ten hours and watched all his movies in chronological order and invited fans to join him in the theater. He live streamed his face during the event to show all the emotions and self reflection he was experiencing at the time. This has so many good moments, above is my favorite.
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He got married in Las Vegas
I don't think Shia would have gotten married any other way. I don't think this one is SO strange but I just wanted to include this. Shia and Mia Goth wed in October of 2016 and had the wedding streamed online live, sounds like something I would do. The two have had a rocky relationship and have since separated. Somewhere there is a video on Youtube that I watched a long time ago where Shia gets in a fight with Mia, a couple of fans came up and offered Shia a ride and he accepts, he tells them that he would have killed her if he didn't get away, AND then he proceeds to call Megan Fox on FaceTime. It is so strange, go look it up.
The "He will not divide us" thing started.
Shia is too serious about things IMO... I mean, well, I don't know. He begun in 2015 the "He will not divide us" protest, the "he" being Donald Trump. He had a webcam streaming at a location 24 hours a day, again strangers were allowed to attend, they would protest Trump and Shia would participate and spend a considerable amount of time there. It only sparked an idea in people to go and trigger Shia and other attendees. This "He will not divide us" just became a mess. He got in altercations and I think he licked a guy? Reddit went after Shia hard.. this one goes deep. If you want to know more about this I recommend you watch the three videos I linked below by the hilarious Internet Historian, I also recommend you subscribe to him, he has super interesting videos, you won't be disappointed.
Did I miss any good Shia moments? Did you learn something new about Shia? Let me know in the comments below!