All The Crazy Shit Shia LaBeouf Did Before He Turned 13

These days, it seems that all you need to do to get a bad rap is chase a homeless guy down the street, get arrested during a Broadway play, storm out of a press conference quoting a French footballer, wear a paper bag over your head to a red carpet premiere, plagiarise a short film and then the apology for plagiarising, and start a fight out the front of a strip club.

But as Shia LaBeouf currently rivals Amanda Bynes for post-child-star craziness, it is well worth noting that LaBeouf is hardly acting out of character here. This latest run of activity is nothing compared to an upbringing that was unconventional to say the least. Here are some of the crazier moments in Shia’s early life.

At Ten, He Was A Foul-Mouthed Insult Comedian

Talking to Parade in 2009, LaBeouf chronicled his early stand-up career at LA comedy clubs such as the HBO Theater, The Ice House and Baked Potato, and it would seem that he was attracted to public conflict even at this early age.

“I’d get up there and go, ‘Hey, motherfucker! It’s time for some jokes.’ And all the drunks would be like, ‘Hey, wait a minute. This is weird as hell! What’s this 10-year-old talking about?’ Plus at the Ice House, where they would normally serve drinks during the show, they had to hold the drunks’ drinks while I was performing, which they didn’t like, so you’re already starting off on a bad foot. So I would just attack them. I would come at guys, like, ‘What’s going on with you in your life, man?’ I would just break a whole guy’s life down. ‘He’s a 50-year-old man at a comedy club by himself?’ There are so many jokes there, sad, weird, twisted stuff. And everybody would laugh at it, and that guy would hate it. I was like an insult comic.”

Also At Ten, He Smoked Weed With His Father, Who Introduced A Popular Strain To Hawaii

From all accounts, LaBeouf’s father wasn’t the most stable role model: a failed artist, a Vietnam vet, a heroin addict, and rather open about drugs with his son. He gave a ten-year-old Shia his first joint, and even sold drugs to the Hawaiian mafia.

“My dad brought something called the ‘elephant seed’ to Oahu, Hawaii”, LaBeouf recalls. “My dad wasn’t thinking franchise. He was selling things to the Hawaiian mafia, and then they would give it to their cab drivers to sell when they picked people up from airports.”

…Also, His Dad Once Pointed A Gun At Him

It was during a Vietnam flashback, and while he was addicted to heroin, but it was also his son, and a gun…

At Twelve, He Got A Hollywood Agent By Cold-Calling And Pretending To Be His Own Manager

Anyone who has seen LaBeouf’s brilliant comedic work in Even Stevens would not be surprised that the same kid that routinely schooled adults on the Disney show actually got that role by hooking a Hollywood agent in that classic way: looking her up in the Yellow Pages, and posing as his own 50-year old British manager. Within weeks he had parts on ER, The X-Files and Suddenly Susan.  He didn’t even harbour dreams of stardom, instead viewing acting as an easy way to make money, telling the Denver Post, “When I first got in, it was primarily a financial decision. We were pretty broke.”

Bonus Fact: He Blew The Whistle On The NSA Surveillance Scandal Back In 2008

Yup – an FBI consultant working with him on the film Eagle Eye told LaBeouf one in five phone calls were recorded and logged, then played him a call he’d made two years earlier. He told this story on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno show in 2008, back when it seemed like a hilarious tall tale rather than a prescient warning shot.