Lea Thompson says ‘Howard the Duck’ destroyed her career

These days, any actors looking to boost their careers sign on for a Marvel movie. This was not always a surefire path to success, however, and actress Lea Thompson claims that her turn in 1986’s Howard the Duck ultimately wreaked havoc on her cinematic career.

Thompson, speaking to Genevieve Hassan for the Season 4 opener of the Celebrity Catch Up: Life After That Thing I Did podcast, reflected on what a poor career choice it was to star alongside the notorious cinematic duck.

“It was devastating — in the course of a year I was in the biggest hit (Back to the Future) and the biggest bomb, so that probably destroyed my film career. Even though I did some good films after that, it was really difficult.”

Thompson elaborates on her turn in the adaptation of the Steve Gerber creation in the just-published podcast episode. Thompson also notes though the movie didn’t advance her career, it did deliver a significant silver lining.

“Because of that, I had turned down Some Kind of Wonderful — and the week after Howard the Duck opened my friend Eric Stoltz brought me the script again. That’s where I met my husband — so sometimes the worst thing turns out to be the best thing.

But she also took time in the interview to salute the Howard stans inexplicably still out there.

It’s interesting that it still has such legs. People love Howard the Duck and those are some of my favorite fans, because anybody that goes: ‘I don’t care what anybody says, I think it’s really cool’ is my kind of person. I wear my Howard the Duck scarlet letter like a badge of honor.”

Thompson recently tried her hand at directing an episode of Resident Alien to add to her resume. As SYFY noted, “the actress who played Lorraine McFly in the Back to the Future trilogy” steered a creepy episode that features the youth of Patience putting on a play to try to reverse the town’s increasingly creepy reputation.