'Grease 2' star Maxwell Caulfield admits he was jealous of Michelle Pfeiffer's success after the movie's failure

• Caulfield's fame was on the rise leading up to the release of "Grease 2."
• He said after the movie opened he "couldn't get arrested for about a year" he had gone so cold.
• However, Pfeiffer thrived: "Michelle rose like a Phoenix," Caulfield said.

"Grease 2" was supposed to make actor Maxwell Caulfield into a major movie star. It didn't.

The 1982 sequel to the iconic musical "Grease" only took in a paltry $15 million compared to the original's over $100 million take. However, it did launch the career of Michelle Pfeiffer, who played the movie's female lead, Stephanie Zinone.

Looking back now, Caulfield admits to Page Six that Pfeiffer's rise was hard to take while he was shunned by Hollywood.

"Michelle rose like a Phoenix, right? Did 'Scarface,' and so that made it even, frankly, a little harder to swallow," Caulfield said.

Caulfield had some major heat on him going into "Grease 2." The English actor had impressive performances on Broadway in "The Elephant Man" and "Entertaining Mr. Sloane," so being cast in the lead as English exchange student Michael Carrington seemed like his next step to being the latest Hollywood hunk.

But the failure of "Grease 2" led to Caulfield going ice cold. As the actor put it: "I couldn't get arrested for about a year."

Meanwhile, Pfeiffer, who only had a few TV appearances under her belt when she was cast as Caulfield's love interest in the movie, went on to become a major star.

"But you know, listen, every actor has his and her own path," Caulfield said. "She has gone on to multiple Oscar nominations and the rest of it. She delivers and she defines Hollywood beauty. You can't begrudge them their success. But as I said, simultaneously, it makes it that much tougher to see, that you've been benched. And it took a long wait time to come back."

However, Caulfield did get his moment in the spotlight. Starring as egotistical musical Rex Manning in 1995's "Empire Records" has become his career-defining moment. The cult following for the movie is actually celebrated every April 8 on social media, which is the unofficial date of "Rex Manning Day," which in the movie is the date he shows up at the record store to sign autographs.

"It goes mental," he told Page Six of the attention he gets every year for Rex Manning Day. "I literally have to put out like a statement because I can't possibly respond to the sort of floodgates that open."

Caulfield recently shot an episode for "American Horror Story."