Dunno how many of these we’ll find. Maybe inspired by another property should be allowed.
Anyhooo…Richard Mulligan appeared as Custer in “Little Big Man” and as a teacher playing Custer in “Teachers”
Olivia Spencer in 30 Rock to play Harriet Tubman and also portrayed her in Drunk History.
Peter O’Toole played Henry II in Becket and A Lion in Winter.
Michael Sheard played Adolf Hitler in these films:
Hitler of the Andes
The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission
The Tomorrow People
Rogue Male
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Edward Herrmann has Franklin Delano Roosevelt in these films:
Annie
Eleanor and Franklin
Eleanor and Franklin: The White House Years
And Ralph Bellamy played him in these films:
Sunrise at Campobello
The Winds of War
War and Remembrance
James Cagney played George M. Cohan in these films:
Yankee Doodle Dandy
The Seven Little Foys
Jeannette Charles has played Queen Elizabeth II many times.
Jerry Haleva plays Saddam Hussein many times.
Christopher Lee played Dracula numerous times in various productions.
Peter Cushing played Van Helsing, or one of his descendants several times.
Several times, Lee’s Dracula met Cushing’s Van Helsing. But they weren’t always paired.
Judi Dench played Queen Victoria in Mrs Brown and Victoria & Abdul.
Henry Fonda played Admiral Chester Nimitz in In Harm’s Way and in Midway.
Charleton Heston played
Mark Antony in the 1959 film of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar
Mark Antony in the 1971 film of Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra
Judah Ben-Hur in the classic 1959 version of Ben-Hur
Judah Ben-Hur in a 2003 animated version of the same.
(Historical setting, if not a historical character.)
Bette Davis as Elizabeth I
The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939)
The Virgin Queen (1955)
Dracula and Van Helsing are historical characters?
Dracula was based on the real person Vlad the Impaler
Glenda Jackson played Elizabeth I in Elizabeth R and Mary, Queen of Scots.
James Mason played Erwin Rommel in The Desert Rats and The Desert Fox.
Helen Ryan has played Queen Alexandra on 3 separate occasions: In The Elephant Man, in the miniseries Edward the King /Edward VII and in an episode of the Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes (“The Mazarin Stone”).
I know this has been done before but I’m pretty sure I’ve never posted this one before:
Louis Giambalvo has played Al Capone in a movie and a miniseries … in the same year!
Often cast as a gangster in general. Fans might recognize him from such High Art as Weekend at Bernies, Death to Smoochy, Real Genius and Airplane II: The Sequel. He even played Tataglia, but not in, you know. Best character name: Lance Boil.
Vlad the Impaler was a historical character, but Dracula was not.
Richard Burton played Winston Churchill in The Valiant Years and The Gathering Storm.
He was played by Timothy West three times, in Churchill and the Generals, The Last Bastion, and Hiroshima.
Robert Hardy played him in five productions: Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years;*** Bomber Harris***; War and Remembrance; The Woman He Loved; and Miss Marple: The Sittaford Mystery.
Flora Robson played Elizabeth I in Fire over England and The Sea Hawk.
George C Scott played George S Patton in ***Patton ***and The Last Days of Patton.
In both cases, the third is the sequel to the second, so they’re not completely unrelated.
Peter Boyle played Frankenstein’s Monster in Young Frankenstein, and dressed up for Halloween in a Frankenstein’s Monster costume in an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond.