Mark Wahlberg Worried 'Boogie Nights' Would Be 'Next Level of Exploiting Me' After Calvin Klein Ads

The actor and producer shares his initial doubts about playing porn star Dirk Diggler in Paul Thomas Anderson’s classic 1997 film: "It was not appealing to me"

Mark Wahlberg is reflecting on one of his iconic roles.

The actor and producer, 50, recently opened up to Cigar Aficionado about his initial reluctance to star in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Boogie Nights, in which he played a '70s porn star named Dirk Diggler.

“When I first heard about the film and the subject matter, it was not appealing to me,” Wahlberg told the outlet. “But you have to understand too, I came from the whole Marky Mark thing, pulling down my pants, Calvin Klein underwear — I just didn’t know if this was just, like, the next level of exploiting me, and all of a sudden we’re going to lose the underwear.”

“Showgirls had just come out,” the former Calvin Klein model added. “That was supposed to be a big, controversial movie and ended up being, you know, a bomb. But I kept hearing about the script and, you know, there were lots of people circling the movie at the time.”

“Burt Reynolds ended up playing Jack Horner,” he said, noting “[Robert] De Niro was attached at one point, Sydney Pollack was attached, Sean Penn — you know, a lot of really talented people circling this movie.”

The Departed star went on to say that his “agents kept pushing” him to read the Boogie Nights script and he “was a little curious about it.”

“So I read the first 25-30 pages, and I kind of put it down,” he told the outlet. “I was like this could be something great, or this could be absolutely terrible.”

After meeting with Anderson — who went on to direct films like There Will Be Blood and Inherent Vice — Wahlberg said they "hit it off right away,” and the rest is history.

“That was the movie that kind of set things in motion,” he added.

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During an appearance onThe Ellen DeGeneres Show in 2022, the Father Stu actor revealed that he still has possession of the prop penis he wore in the film. The answer came as part of a round of rapid-fire questions from host DeGeneres.

"Where is that?" she asked him, to which he responded, "It's in a safe locked away. It's not something I can leave out! All of a sudden my kids are looking for the spare phone charger and pull that thing out, 'What the heck is that?' Wouldn't be a good look."

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