- - - John Goodman Recalls 'Frightening' Early Career Days After Moving to N.Y.C. 50 Years Ago (Exclusive)

Eric Andersson, Juliet LopezJuly 18, 2025 at 11:00 PM

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John Goodman on July 12.

John Goodman, who voices Papa Smurf in the new movie Smurfs, recalls the early days of his acting career in an interview with PEOPLE

He says it was a “frightening” time when he moved to New York City after college to pursue his “passion”

Goodman went on to find fame on the sitcom Roseanne, which premiered in 1988, before starring in films like The Flintstones and The Big Lebowski

Like Dan Conner, the good-natured dad he played across 17 seasons on ABC sitcoms Roseanne and The Conners, John Goodman was once a high school football jock.

“I wasn’t particularly good, but I could block,” says the 6'2" Missouri native. Goodman hoped he could continue with football at Missouri State University, where he attended college.

But an unfortunate combination sacked those dreams: “I got injured,” says Goodman, now 73, “and I didn’t have the grades.”

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He soon traded gridiron plays for stage plays and threw himself into his school’s theater program. “I found a passion,” says the star of the new Smurfs movie (in theaters now). “I started paying attention for the first time in my [academic] career.”

Turns out he was a much better actor than a football player.

After graduation he moved to the Big Apple to pursue his dream of becoming a professional actor. “The early days of acting were frightening. I went straight from school to New York City 50 years ago this summer. I had to go because if I didn't, I would kick myself in the rear end for the rest of my life. So it was just a matter of saying that I tried.”

Before long, he succeeded. After landing some work early on, “I kind of knew I could do this,” recalls Goodman. “I gravitated toward whatever was offered and tried to make the best of that.”

Goodman made his Broadway debut in 1985 with the Huckleberry Finn musical Big River and appeared in movies like Revenge of the Nerds and Raising Arizona.

But it was Roseanne, the groundbreaking comedy about a financially struggling family led by a wisecracking matriarch played by Roseanne Barr, that put him on the map when it premiered in 1988.

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Lecy Goranson, Roseanne Barr, John Goodman, Sara Gilbert, Michael Fishman in 'Roseanne.'

“I went in to read with Roseanne the first time, and I never do this, but I walked out of there knowing I had the job. It was just too good of a fit,” he says of the chemistry with his onscreen wife. (Goodman recently admitted he and Barr, who was fired from the Roseanne reboot in 2018 for a racist social media post, have not spoken in years; the show was renamed The Conners after her departure.)

In the decades since, Goodman has racked up dozens of screen credits — working alongside everyone from Elizabeth Taylor in The Flintstones to Jeff Bridges in The Big Lebowski — earned 11 Emmy nominations (he won once) and built a reputation as one of the most versatile actors in Hollywood.

Paramount Animation

A scene from the new movie 'Smurfs.'

His latest role: voicing Papa Smurf in the animated adventure Smurfs. Goodman says it delivers a moving message about the importance of community support: “Things do get rough, but if we hang in there, we’ll ride it out together.”

Smurfs is now in theaters nationwide.

For more on John Goodman, pick up the new issue of PEOPLE.

on People

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Source: “AOL AOL Entertainment”