Tara Reid has 16 movies in the pipeline after fears Sharknado would ruin career

Tara Reid was so convinced that starring in Sharknado would destroy her career that she tried to pull out of it.

The American Pie star could never have imagined that the low budget movie about a tornado filled with sharks would go on to be such a huge success.

She went on to star in six of the Syfy TV movies and her career has done nothing but go from strength to strength since.

The 45-year-old currently has a whopping 16 movies in the pipeline, including her first as producer, Masha's Mushroom, a thriller in which she also plays the title character.

When Tara signed up to star in Sharknado as April Wexler, it was called Dark Skies, and she wasn't happy when movie bosses revealed the real title.

During an exclusive chat with Mirror Online, she said: "We freaked out, we were calling our agents, saying 'They can't call it that, we can't put that on our resume, we're never going to work again'.

"But it ended up working out good because of the name - who knew?

"Never, ever, ever, ever did I think it would be this successful.

"We didn't know when it was coming out or nothing, we thought it was just a stupid movie, take the money and run, nobody's going to see it."

Tara said she was on holiday in Mexico when the movie first aired and that her phone suddenly started ringing off the hook.

The movie was getting over 1 million mentions per minute on Twitter and was trending around the world.

She said: "A few days later I got on the plane and sat in my seat and the flight attendant comes up to me and says, 'Oh my god, I love your movie'. I'm thinking he means American Pie but he said 'Sharknado is everything!'

"I thought I was being punked, it was so funny."

Looking back on filming the cameo-packed films, she added: "It was hard because we knew how ridiculous we looked, but the more straight we played it and the more we were dead serious the funnier it would be.

"But we were dying, it was like the stupidest thing we'd ever done. Screaming 'Run Fin, run!' and there's no sharks there and screaming when we had no idea what they were going to look like.

"We didn't know if we were screaming for a big shark or a little shark, it was so stupid, we didn't know what we were doing but it was so funny."

Despite the success of the six movies they made, Tara doesn't think the franchise will ever return.

She said: "I really don't think it'll come back. When you think about it, we went to space, we went all over the world, we time travelled, there's not much more we could do."

Now, she's looking to the future and the 16 movies she's currently working on.

As well as producing Masha's Mushroom, she's working on comedy 3 of a Kind with her business partner Philippe Ashfield, vampire horror Bloodthirst, crime flick The Faction of a Hitman and many more.

Tara told us: "They're all exciting because they're all different types of genres.

"I think the most exciting for me is going to be Masha's Mushroom but the one I'm doing next is based on a true story, it's a mafia movie and I start shooting that soon, it's going to be a really cool story.

"3 of a Kind is a really funny comedy so we're kind of mixing it up with everything."

She added: "I was known for comedy so it's nice to show other sides of myself.

"This whole pandemic and everything we've gone through, I've felt so many emotions through it and I love taking my work out on it, it's like my own therapy, so to have all these great movies that I'm going to be shooting in the next year, it's just crazy.

"They keep getting pushed and it's frustrating but it's good because I can take all of the emotion I'm feeling through this and put it into my character, so that's going to be exciting."

During lockdown, Tara has joined website Thrillz where people can buy personalised video messages from her for themselves or their loved ones.

Tara was even recently trusted to reveal the gender of a happy couple's baby to them.

On signing up, she explained: "I thought it was such a cool thing to do right now because everyone's in quarantine, nobody can shop for gifts or clothes, what can you buy people that they don't already have?

"I thought what a cool concept that you can get a message from your favourite celebrity telling you that your loved ones are thinking of you.

"I did one the other day where they had to reveal their baby gender. It's amazing to be trusted with that."

Tara added: "It feels so good. I get just as excited as they do. You can do something so small but it becomes big for all of us.

"We're in such a dark age now, weird times going on, and to put a smile on someone's face is contagious. They'll never forget it and it's something they'd treasure forever.

"It's a really cool thing that you can do to make people happy and I think it's a great creation."

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