Before he became Andy Taylor on the hit television series The Andy Griffith Show, Andy Griffith was primarily a film actor. "Griffith appeared in films like A Face in the Crowd and No Time for Sergeants. The latter film was developed from a Broadway play, in which Griffith also starred.

But one film, just a bit later in Griffith's career, was so bad that it drove him to what would later become the opportunity of a lifetime.

In 1958, Griffith starred in a film titled Onionhead. The film was not warmly received by audiences or critics. According to an interview with The Birmingham News, Griffith got a front-row seat to how badly received the film was.

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"At the preview of this picture, Onionhead, there were two girls in front of me," said Griffith. "One left for 15 minutes. When she came back, she said to the other, Sorry to have been gone so long.'

'You haven't missed a thing,' she was told."

The poor reception stunted Griffith's career. "I spent a year at home, because I couldn't get arrested for it [Onionhead] there," the actor joked.

Strangely enough, the sour situation gave Griffith the swift kick in the pants he needed to decide to pursue television.

"I went to the television department of William Morris and said, 'Get me a television series — I'm ready. Either that or we get out of the business,'" said Griffith. "Earlier, I had refused to do a series."

So, it turns out a film like Onionhead was good for one thing: It gave us The Andy Griffith Show.