He was also that congressman in The Contender. He wasn’t psychotic or borderline insane there, although he was the antagonist.
Sorry, the above post was about Gary Oldman.
You should see the Sharpe movies.
Not to mention her Mrs. Iselin in the original Manchurian Candidate. Now that I think of it, in this role she reminds me of Maggie Thatcher.
Kevin Costner in JFK asserting the existence of a conspiracy, versus Costner in Bull Durham who believed Oswald acted alone.
I seem to recall Dr. Dre playing a cop in Training Day… this from the guy who was rapping “Fuck Tha Police” some years ago.
Speaking of Training Day, Denzel Washington wasn’t playing his usual character either.
Telly Savalas made a career of playing nasty psychopaths. Then he was cast as Kojak and became not only a hero, but a sex symbol.
Humphrey Bogart played criminals for years, until The Maltese Falcon turned him into good guy roles.
And then there was Jack Elam. His early career was nothing but nasty bad guys. Then he grew a beard and started playing loveable comic relief.
She’s also the voice of sweet little Susie Carmichael in the Rugrats cartoon and Cleo the dog in Clifford the Big Red Dog on PBS.
Don’t forget Larry Hagman, who went from the tense Presidential translator in Fail Safe to befuddled astronaut Tony Nelson in I Dream of Jeannie to evil mega-capitalist J. R. Ewing in Dallas.
And before Robert Reed got trapped in The Brady Bunch he played an idealistic young lawyer in the socially relevant series The Defenders.
Roscoe Orman. Played an unrepentant pimp named Willie Dynamite the same year he entered many of our lives as Gordon Robinson of Sesame Street.
Could any two character be less similar than Vic Mackey and Tony Scali?
And Ice-T, who rapped the song “Cop Killer”, now plays a cop on one of the Law & Orders.
Betty White
From office tramp in THe Mary Tyler Moore Show to sweet, naive and innocent in Golden Girls.
Oh, and she was the horribly potty-mouthed grandma in that man eating crocodile movie.
Damn, that’s the one I came in here to say. Those characters are on opposite ends of the spectrum.
And Gary Oldman actually played a midget in Tiptoes. Beat that.
Based on White’s role on MTM and Rue McClanahan’s role on Maude, the two actresses had originally been cast on The Golden Girls in the other’s part. But when they started reading the scripts, they both were looking to play new characters and decided to swap roles.
There’s also Tara Strong, who does the voice for both Princess Clara and Toots Bronstein on Drawn Together.
And Dave Willis, one of the creators of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, does the voices of Meatwad, Carl, and Ignignokt the Mooninite - three characters who sound and act completely different.
I’ll see your Gary Oldman and raise you Lon Chaney playing an armless man in The Unknown and a legless man in The Penalty. And I’ll throw in John Leguizamo as Toulouse-Latrec in Moulin Rouge for good measure.
I may be wrong, since I never watched the former show, but how do the roles Neil Patrick Harris played in Doogie Howser M.D. and How I Met Your Mother compare?
Hugh Laurie played Bertie Wooster in the wonderful BBC “Jeeves and Wooster” series, and now he’s the brillilant but totally nasty House on the current TV series… not only a 180 degrees in terms of character, but thoroughly believable as an American rather than a Brit!
It’s late and I’m too tired to research specific roles, but two names won’t let me sleep 'til I write them down.
Phillip Seymore Hoffman
John Malkovich
(and, oh yeah) Billy Bob Thornton
That’s Three for you to kick around. G’night all.