Nick Cage in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
Staying with Big Bang Theory - I don’t think James Earl Jones is quite the party animal he is portrayed as in “The Convention Conundrum (S7, E14)” Although I’m sure Carrie Fisher would have been just as pissed off as she was in the episode.
Interesting fact: Carrie and James had never met until this episode. When she first saw him, she cried out “Dad!!” They even alluded to them never seeing each other in their one scene “together.”
Just because I’ve been relistening to the BBC radio shows - Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement of Flight of the Conchords are playing versions of themselves. More gormless and useless than bad.
Of course! How could I forget that? Disappointed with myself I did not think of Cage in my ‘off the top of my head’ list in my OP.
If songwriting is allowed, Taylor Swift’s Blank Space is exactly this.
Good one, though I had to check to make sure they were playing themselves. They go by their real first names at least in the show, so I’ll take that.
Also good use of the word gormless - a very gormful word.
BTW, by ‘worse version’ I don’t necessarily mean just more unlikeable or more evil or bad. Dumber, more gormless and useless, less successful, are also acceptable versions of ‘worse’ for the purpose of this thread,
I love that series (Episodes); thanks for reminding me.
ML: You have TWO dads?
Child: Yes; they’re gay.
ML: Both of them? What are the odds of that?!
And he responded “Simba!”
Adam West on Family Guy.
Tim Stack on My Name Is Earl.
Adam West more weird, James Woods more evil.
Foster Brooks and Dean Martin made careers playing drunkards.
In real life, Brooks rarely drank, and Martin was relatively disciplined.
Here’s Margot Robbie in a bubble bath playing Margot Robbie in a bubble bath explaining mortgage-backed securities. Not really sure what they were going for with this, but I don’t think she’s usually tipsy in a bubble bath telling people to fuck off.
Or the show Extras with Ricky Gervais. Especially season 1.
My favorites were Kate Winslet as Kate Winslet starring in a movie about the holocaust, just so she can get an Oscar nomination, and Ben Stiller as Ben Stiller being an a-hole director.
In the film After The Fox, Victor Mature played an aging leading man actor based on himself, and received a number of good reviews for it.
Of course! I just rewatched that a month or two ago.
That show was great. David Bowie writing an impromptu song about Gervais’ character was a classic moment (though it may not have aged well due to the fat shaming involved):
Matt Damon used to play a (presumably) unhinged version of himself on Entourage all the time. Often screaming at the Chase brothers to support his charities in various ways.
Damon’s ongoing “feud” with Jimmy Kimmel was also pretty funny.
This. However the movie version’s of Emily Watson, Michael Cera, and Channing Tatum stood out as particularly hilarious.
I came to the thread to mention this (too late!)
It could be argued that Tropic Thunder is this, if you allow characters not named identically to their actors. The main actors all do play actors with careers that are not unlike the real actors’ own careers. With the exception of Ben Stiller, who is playing Tom Cruise’s career more than he’s playing Ben Stiller’s career.
While Tom Cruise is playing a guy with big hands. (I’ve often wondered if Trump ever tried to get hold of those particular props or make-up appliances or whatever they’d be classed as.)
(Pardon digression!)
The real Tim Allen is a bitter, right-wing blowhard who pretty much hates the entire world and by all accounts is a total douchebag to everyone he works with. Tim Taylor in Home Improvement was an exponentially more pleasant person than Tim Allen is IRL.
Absolutely Fabulous periodically featured clients of main character Edina who were playing slightly-more-desperate versions of themselves. I remember Lulu and Baby Spice (Emma Bunton) particularly.
The 2016 movie featured others playing themselves (Jon Hamm and Kate Moss, to name two). I don’t recall if they seemed worse than their real selves, though.