“I HAD A BIG GOLD LAMÉ
JACKET WITH A BADGE
THAT SAID ‘SECURITY’.
PEOPLE THOUGHT IT WAS
FUNNY, ALTHOUGH I TOOK
IT VERY SERIOUSLY.”
JOHN GOODMAN KFC EMPLOYEE
“I worked at a Kentucky Fried Chicken once, in St Louis, Missouri. It was ’69 so I must have been
17 years old. And they told me it was all you could eat. After my first night there I woke up at 3am and
threw up. And I said, ‘Okay, the all-you-can-eat part is not gonna work out.’ I did not last very long.
Do I still eat KFC now? Oh yeah, you bet. Good stuff. It’s a delicacy where I am.”
RYAN GOSLING
SECURITY GUARD
“I only really had one job before doing this. My
uncle was an Elvis impersonator called Elvis Perry
and I was in his act. I was seven or eight and I had
a big gold lamé jacket with a badge that said
‘SECURITY’. People thought it was funny, although
I took it very seriously. I thought they really did
need me for security, which I guess they didn’t.”
RIZ AHMED
TELESALESMAN“The worst job I’ve ever had was cold-calling
people, pretending they’d won a holiday when
actually it was a way of getting double-glazing
salesmen into their house. It developed my acting
skills, but I got fired. It paid for a pair of trainers
that summer, though, so it’s all good.”HUGH BONNEVILLE
CLEANER“I cleaned toilets at a legal firm in Marylebone in
London after I left school. I can remember having
my hand down the U-bend, with rubber gloves on,
and thinking, ‘One day I won’t have to do this.’ I’d
gone to the Jobcentre on Edgware Road because
I needed to build up some money to go on a
backpacking trip. I got $65 a week, which was
pretty epic back in 1981.”AARON ECKHART
GROCERY BAGGER & VALET“When I was 18 I bagged groceries. The guy who
hired me said, ‘Can you run?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ He said,
‘Good, because I never want to see you walking.’
Whenever I would go to get the cart, I would run.
I bag my own groceries to this day. And I valeted
at the Beverly Hills Hotel. In fact, I crashed two
cars there. It’s a very high-pressure job. When my
boss was asked why he didn’t fire me, he went,
‘He’s got a good smile.’ Which is still working for
me today.”