How Ex-Hercules Kevin Sorbo Keeps His Finances Buff

CANNES, France -- Former Hercules star Kevin Sorbo still likes to flex his might -- in the markets. "I've always invested wisely," he told The Price of Fame at the Cannes Film Festival. "I invested even before I made money on Hercules. I have a well-balanced portfolio. I got stocks, I got bonds, I got gold, I got silver."

Asked to share more specifics, the 52-year-old actor replied, "There's no secret method. I've hired and fired a lot of different money handlers in my life as I went through the job thing."

Sorbo struck television gold in Hercules: The Legendary Journeys (1995-1999) and Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda (2000-2005), with both series reaching heroic heights through syndication. Now, Sorbo is developing films through his own production company, and he's a still an actor for hire -- who apparently gets hired a lot. He's appearing in five movies being shown at the Marche du Cannes, the festival's international bazaar of films. One is Poolboy, an action comedy featuring Sorbo as a Vietnam veteran who returns home to reclaim his chlorinated turf and avenge the murders of his wife and son.

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"I'm still hustling," he said. "I still like to act. I had to reinvent myself and get out there."

Aside from appearing in the recent hit Soul Surfer, he has had mostly lower-profile roles since Andromeda ended its run in 2005. He said he weathered the recession by not panicking. "I got killed like everyone else when the economy fell apart," he said. "But I was able to hold on to most of those stocks and made a comeback."

Despite the financial roller coaster, Sorbo still rises at 4:30 a.m. and is on the Internet checking the markets and making calls to investors while juggling script-reading. He calls himself a saver, except when it comes to his three children. Sorbo grew up one of five children in Mound, Minn., and he remembers his father, a junior high school teacher, "anguishing monthly over the bills."

Sorbo, one of the best golfers in show business, managed to play way back when at some fancy courses. One of the neighborhood country clubs, Hazeltine National in Chaska, Minn., hosts major pro tour events. Sorbo would simply climb over the short fence of a park adjacent to the links and sneak onto the greens at dusk, and swing away until he couldn't see.

He can afford to play wherever he wants now, but the recent economic hydra he and the rest of us had to slay recalled to him an eternal truth about personal finance. Said Sorbo: "You never know what tomorrow may bring."