What am I, chopped liver?

I've followed Robert Downey Jr's career over it's ups and downs, and like many I was intrigued by his choice to play an action hero in Iron Man, based on a Marvel comic book character, which is due in theaters May 2, directed by Jon Faveau, and featuring a great cast - Jeff Bridges (as Iron Man's nemesis) and Terrance Howard (for crying out loud!) I got a kick out of his reasoning:

“I went after Iron Man because Keanu Reeves got The Matrix, and Johnny Depp got Pirates,” he says. “I’m looking at all these posters of the movies I’ve seen with my son, and I’m thinking, ‘Damn! I could do that!’”

But when he continued with this comment, I was pretty annoyed:

He was “tired of working my butt off doing films nobody sees.”

So what does that make me, nobody? I don't quite understand why one of the most celebrated actors of his generation doesn't feel validated until he makes a movie that 16 year old boys want to watch (no offense to 16 year old boys, of course, but let's just say that the acting chops of the star is not generally the main draw for them).

I would have been fine if he said, "I wanted to get paid." But to suggest that adults who pay good money to see sophisticated movies don't count at all is pretty darn insulting.

Here is the Parade article where these comments appear:

http://www.parade.com/articles/editions/2008/edition_04-20-2008/1Robert_Downey_Jr