Audrey Hepburn, Tatum O’Neal and More Who Became Stars After Making Their Debut Performances

These stars were instant hits thanks to their electrifying performances.

Audrey Hepburn

“She had everything I was looking for: charm, innocence and talent,” said William Wyler, who directed Audrey to a Best Actress Oscar for her Hollywood debut in 1953’s Roman Holiday. “She also was very funny.”

Gene Kelly

The Broadway actor and dancer’s film debut came at age 29 opposite Judy Garland in For Me and My Gal, and he was “appalled” to see himself on the big screen. “I had an awful feeling that I was a tremendous flop.” Hardly.

Whoopi Goldberg

The Color Purple’s author, Alice Walker, recommended Whoopi to play Celie for the 1985 movie. “You dream about this kind of stuff,” says Whoopi, who won a Golden Globe and was nominated for an Oscar for the role.

Tatum O’Neal

“Most people on the set hated me, especially the actors!” recalls Tatum in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter about shooting 1973’s Paper Moon, starring her dad, Ryan O’Neal. She admitted she was unruly and precocious, exactly the right characteristics to play a child grifter. At 10, Tatum became the youngest Oscar winner ever, taking the Supporting Actress prize.

Brad Pitt

Howdy, cowboy! Geena Davis’ (Thelma) sex scene with Brad’s ripped drifter in Thelma & Louise — his major-studio breakthrough — was so hot, it sent her over the edge. Literally!

Orson Welles

Citizen Kane is considered by many to be one of the greatest films of all time, but its writer, director and star said he was lucky during a 1970 interview with Dick Cavett on The Dick Cavett Show: “Ignorance — sheer ignorance. There is no confidence to equal it. It’s only when you know something about a profession that you’re timid or careful.”

Jennifer Hudson

“When I was on American Idol, I would see articles saying, ‘Jennifer Hudson for Effie White,’” says the performer about the character in Dreamgirls to Entertainment Weekly. “I was like, ‘Who’s Effie White??’ ” She soon found out! Her costarring role as Effie in the 2006 adaptation of the Broadway hit won her the Best Supporting Actress Oscar.

Julie Andrews

Mary Poppins, the 1964 musical about a magical nanny, became a classic and made Julie a star … and an Oscar winner! “I was extremely nervous,” she recalls in her memoir Home Work: A Memoir of My Hollywood Years, of her first day on set. “I was acutely aware of the camera’s presence and surprised by the number of shots required to make up one small scene.”

Jamie Lee Curtis

Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh’s daughter made her film debut in 1978’s Halloween. “Thank you, [director] John Carpenter, for choosing me to embody the every girl, Laurie Strode,” Jamie shared in an Instagram post.

Barbra Streisand

“I saw [the movie] Funny Girl … and it just seemed to me, I must say, okay,” says Barbra of her starring role in the 1968 film that won her the Academy Award for Best Actress. “I felt that [Fanny Brice and I were] so instinctively alike that I didn’t have to work to get her.”