“First Black Superhero”: Preceding ‘Crush’ Halle Berry’s ‘Catwoman’ By 7 Years, Shaquille O’Neal’s $1,700,000 Grossing Film Demanded Fire Stunts

Back in 1997, LA Lakers legend Shaquille O’Neal starred as a Black Superhero in the movie, “Steel.” The movie wasn’t exactly a success at the box office and grossed a mere $1,700,000 at the box office. The movie was a trendsetter in the sense that it proceeded Halle Berry’s “Catwoman” by 7 years. Shaq’s expensive but well-paid failure meant that he was the first black actor to play a Superhero. According to Shaq Uncut, the movie meant enough to Shaq for him to have done his own stunts.

O’Neal’s failure as an actor in Steel was accompanied by Kazaam, which also failed to impress at the box office. Regardless, he still managed to carve out a career as an actor and has since acted in multiple movies. This includes a range of cameos in major movies and TV series, despite the fact that lead roles didn’t prove to be his cup of tea.

Shaquille O’Neal had no regrets about starring in box office failure Steel

While O’Neal’s lead roles didn’t pan out, he was still paid $5,000,000 for his work in Kazaam. For Steel, however, his motivations were more related to what the movie could mean.

He wanted to play the role of a black superstar. In some ways, he was already that for a range of Orlando Magic fans, something that also happened during his time with the Lakers.

Shaq ended up doing all his stunts, according to his book, Shaq Uncut. The movie still ended up a failure, even though the NBA star ran through fire for it:

“After I finished Kazaam I get a call from the legendary Quincy Jones, who wants to turn me into the first black superhero. So I did a movie called Steel. I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone at the time, but I did all my own stunts, which included running through fire and jumping across a couple of buildings.”

Shaq would have been disappointed to see that Catwoman, which just came out 7 years ago, proved a huge success. The movie featured his longtime crush Halle Berry. Still, Shaq can always claim that it was him, who did first.

Shaquille O’Neal’s Kazaam also proved to be a box-office disaster

The movie Kazaam did not mean any of the things Steel did. Still, in hindsight, Shaq might look back at Kazaam more fondly.

This is due to the simple fact that it paid him a whopping $5,000,000. Still, Kazaam had a budget of $20 million.

The movie made just around $5 million. This was mostly down to the proceeds from the first weekend, after which Kazaam was said to have vanished into the abyss.