In Hollywood, it is pretty easy to gauge how successful an actor’s career is. For example, if you are looking at a movie star like Kevin Bacon, all you need to do is examine how much money their movies have made. Alternatively, if you are considering how successful a TV star like Kyra Sedgwick has been, the most obvious thing to do is take a look at how well their most famous show did in the ratings.
Of course, at the end of the day, TV shows and movies are made to make money for the people involved in their production. For that reason, a lot of actors care a lot more about landing big-money deals than winning awards. If you examine the amount of money that Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon were paid throughout their careers, it is clear that both of them were highly successful.
Despite the big-money contracts that Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick earned, it would be a real shame if they cared more about that than making shows and movies that mean something to them. After all, several years into their marriage and careers, Sedgwick and Bacon found out that they had been the victims of a massive scam that stole a portion of their money. Fortunately, the couple has largely recovered financially but there is still no doubt that their lives were made a lot worse by the man who swindled them.
Incredible Careers
Ever since 1984’s Footloose first turned Kevin Bacon into a legitimate movie star, he has remained a mainstay of the business. As a result, Bacon has headlined a long list of beloved or acclaimed movies including Tremors, Mystic River, and X-Men: First Class among others. In fact, his success in Hollywood has allowed him to create so many connections that the six degrees of Kevin Bacon game was created.
Even though Kyra Sedgwick has never been one of the biggest stars in Hollywood, she has become one of the best actors of her generation. Best known for starring in the critically acclaimed TV drama The Closer, Sedgwick’s stunning portrayal of that show’s main character is the main reason why it enjoyed so much success.
The Criminal Scheme
Back in 1960, a man named Bernie Madoff founded a penny stock brokerage that would eventually be called Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities. Once so respected that he was named the NASDAQ chairman in 1990, 1991, and 1993, for many years people seemed to think that Madoff could do no wrong when it comes to investments.
At the height of Bernie Madoff’s career, major stars like John Malkovich and Steven Spielberg were investing with him. While Madoff liked to flaunt his celebrity clients, he also accepted money from several charities and retirement funds. With that in mind, it is incredibly disgusting that Madoff’s company was a scam throughout most of its existence.
Instead of investing his client’s money, Bernie Madoff spent years on end operating a massive Ponzi scheme. What that means is that he constantly had to find new clients so he could use their cash to pay off some of his existing clients and take most of it for himself. By the time Madoff’s scheme was revealed to the world, prosecutors estimated that he’d defrauded his 4,800 clients out of roughly $64.8 billion. While that number is so high that it is difficult to comprehend, it should be noted that Madoff financially ruined many people and even forced some charities to shut down forever.
Falling Victim
When Bernie Madoff’s criminal actions became headline news, a lot of people suddenly realized they were his victims. Unfortunately for Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon, a portion of their fortune had been invested with Madoff’s company and they found out it was gone overnight. While Bacon and Sedgwick haven’t revealed exactly how much of their money Madoff stole, it seems extremely likely that it was a huge amount.
During a 2012 appearance on Piers Morgan Tonight, Kyra Sedgwick was blunt about her opinions of Bernie Madoff while also having a surprisingly healthy view of her situation. "I see him as a sick man and I see us as adults who made a choice. And I see a lot of people who are so much worse off than we are, and I think that s**t happens." While talking about what she lost, Sedgwick described it as "hard-earned money that we worked very hard for that was what we thought in a safe place.". She then went out of her way to clarify that "the fact of the matter is that we did not lose everything."
During a 2017 interview with The Guardian, Kevin Bacon’s take on Bernie Madoff was very similar to his wife’s comments. “It was a bad day. But pretty quickly we were able to see all the things we had as opposed to whatever we lost, and those are the biggest cliches: children, health, love, a nice home. So we got through it together. I don’t think about Madoff, like, at all.” Furthermore, when the interviewer talked about the fact that he’d interviewed some of Madoff’s victims who were retirees or worked retail jobs, Bacon made it clear they are the real victims.