13 Actors Who Weren't Trying To Break Into Hollywood But Got Discovered By Chance

Becoming a successful actor is something most people only dream of, but for some people who achieve it, it was never actually their dream at all.

Here are 13 actors who had no intention of pursuing an acting career before getting their first role:

1.Jennifer Hudson may not have won American Idol Season 3, but her incredible performances caught the attention of the Dreamgirls casting directors. After leaving the reality competition, she was invited to audition for the role of Effie White.

She told Entertainment Tonight, "The week that I sang 'Weekend in New England' [on American Idol] and Barry Manilow was the guest mentor on the show, he arranged my 'Weekend in New England' similar to 'And I Am Telling You,' with the same musical breaks and big notes and stuff like that because I reminded him so much of Effie. I feel like that was my pre-audition for the role, which had people buzzing about Jennifer Hudson for Effie White."

Watch her screen test below:

2.When Rosario Dawson was 15, Vibe filmed a commercial outside her house, so she sat on the stoop to watch a grip she had a crush on. Later in the day, a group of people "suddenly turned and looked at [her] and [she] thought [she] was in trouble, and it ended up being a pre-production group from Kids that were scouting for locations." Director Larry Clark and writer Harmony Korine asked her to audition to play Ruby.

She told Dazed, "Larry said he was making his first movie and would I be interested. And Harmony was jumping up and down, like, 'Oh my God, I wrote this character for you without even realizing. I didn't even know you. You're perfect for this character, you have to come in. You have to come in, you have to come in.'"

3.After having no luck finding the right fit for Tina Carlyle in The Mask by looking at top models, casting director Fern Champion asked a modeling agent she knew for suggestions. Her friend said, "There is one gal" — Cameron Diaz. The model enrolled in acting and dance classes to prepare for the part.

Director Russell Chuck told Variety, "[Diaz] was the only person for the part as far as I was concerned after her first reading. And then I saw the chemistry with her and Jim [Carrey]. Eight callbacks later, including improvs with Jim, I finally convinced producers."

Watch part of her screen test, starting at the 4:30 mark, below:

4.When Alyssa Milano was 7, her babysitter, who wanted to become an actor, dragged her along to audition for an onstage production of Annie. Since other children were there, the babysitter asked if she wanted to audition too. Milano agreed, even though she "had no idea what that word (audition) meant."

On the Unstyled podcast, she said, "I knew 1,500 kids where there. Only four got picked, and I was one of the four."

5.Vin Diesel was discovered after breaking into a theater as a kid. Bored and unafraid, he and his friends started vandalizing and playing inside the theater. However, the creative director, Crystal Field, caught them. Rather than call their parents or the police, she recruited them for her upcoming play.

On The Roseanne Show, he said, "[Field] shoved a script in our faces and said, 'If you want to play here, be here every day at 4 p.m. Here's $20 a week.'"

He went on to balance more plays with his schoolwork.

6.Before booking the role of Jules on Euphoria, Hunter Schafer was a model who had "not acted before and was not planning on it really either." However, while preparing to enroll in fashion school, she saw a casting call "for trans girls, who didn't have to be experienced and it didn't say Euphoria or anything but [she] was like, 'Huh.'" Though intrigued, she brushed it off at first, but then, her modeling agency sent her in to audition.

She told Entertainment Weekly, "They hooked me up with an acting coach through the audition process, and he cracked me like an egg, and I kind of, like, started falling in love with the script and, like, acting itself over that period of time and it happened, like, I got cast. It's just the wildest process, over, like, a few months, I would say."

7.Before playing Nick Young in Crazy Rich Asians, Henry Golding was a travel host in Malaysia. Director Jon M. Chu, who was frustrated that they hadn't cast any unknown actors yet, found Golding through the recommendation of an accountant who'd met him one time.

Chu told Vulture, "I think I blew it off, because I got so many emails from people who have good-looking Asian male friends that are just good-looking Asian men. Twenty-four hours later, I just happened to go back to the email, and I'm looking at his Instagram, and he had these charming little videos of him giving tours, talking about food, talking about cats, and it was mesmerizing."

Then, they connected through a mutual Facebook friend. Golding had always wanted to act but never pursued it. After meeting the director over Skype, however, he embarked on the audition process.

8.While casting Over the Edge, director Jonathan Kaplan "wanted real teens, as opposed to professional actors — and kids who were also age-appropriate." With no budget for a professional casting director, he sent his friend, talent scout Jane Bernstein, to schools in search of "the new James Dean." At a middle school in Westchester, New York, she discovered Matt Dillon while he was skipping class. After auditioning, he booked the role of Richie.

Bernstein told Vice, "On our last day in Westchester, we were walking through the crowded halls of this one school, and the bell rang and everyone ran back to class. But there was this one kid — and he really was a kid, like 12 or 13 — who was soft and young but who had a toughness about him. ... It was clear from the very beginning that Matt was trying his hardest to play the role of a tough guy. Maybe Rocky Balboa. Or the Fonz, from Happy Days. Or maybe just a punk kid."

9.While on a spring break trip in Panama City Beach, Florida with her friends, then–Texas State University student Sasha Lane was dancing when she caught the attention of American Honey director Andrea Arnold, who approached her about the role of Star. Her friends intervened. One was concerned Arnold was trying to coax her into doing porn, but another googled the director to prove she really was who she said she was.

Lane told Glamour, "I remember thinking it wouldn't ever happen. But Andrea and the crew came to my hotel that night. The next day, instead of going back to Texas with my friends, I moved my bags into her car. I said to her, 'If you kill me, my friends know where I am, so don't try.'"

10.Jason Statham used to sell cheap watches and other jewelry on the street to fund his diving career. Through his additional work as a model, he met director Guy Ritchie, who cast him as Bacon in Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels because he "was interested in what [Statham] used to do on the fucking street."

The actor told Esquire, "He'd written a character that was the same as me. And he said, 'I love it. Give me some of the patter.' At the time, I had loads of it. Loads of it. And he was fascinated with that, and he just wanted someone who was authentic. He said, 'I'm gonna get someone from fucking drama school to do this? How can they learn what you've learned?' It's such an esoteric fucking subject, no one knows about it unless you're in it. You can't read it in textbooks."

11.Growing up, Ellen Pompeo "sort of" wanted to be an actor, but she "didn't know how to go about it." Letting those dreams take a backseat, she became a bartender. However, one night at work, she served an agent. At first, Pompeo thought she was trying to flirt with her, but she turned out to be a legitimate agent who helped her land auditions for commercials.

She told ABC News, "[Acting] came to me."

12.When Eva Mendes was in college, a talent manager discovered her while leafing through her friend's photography portfolio. Soon after, she booked parts in music videos for Aerosmith and the Pet Shop Boys.

She told the Sydney Morning Herald, "There was a commercial casting director who’d let me audition for commercials and kept bringing me in for callback. One day, after a year of never booking a job, I said, 'Okay, tell me what I need to change so I can get cast.' She said, 'Honey, it's just your look. You're too ethnic, so you're never going to be the face of any American product.' ... I have fond memories of that moment now, because that woman actually provided me with the fuel I needed, so I used it as a challenge, to give me that fire or extra kick I needed to break through."

13.And finally, after being in and out of prison for more than 10 years, Danny Trejo began his sobriety journey, then became a drug counselor. In 1984, he visited the set of Runaway Train to help out an actor he was sponsoring, and he was invited to be in the movie himself.

On PBS's Finding Your Roots, he said, "This guy says, 'Hey, do you wanna be in this movie?' And I [said,] 'What I gotta do?' He says, 'Do you wanna be an extra? ... Can you act like a convict?' ... I said, 'I'm a professional.'"