Mel Torme wasn’t very patient with his #1 fan on Night Court.
Nor was Queen Elizabeth.
Also, James Woods as recurring villain.
Merv Griffin is arguably the worst fictional version of self.
Entourage had a ton of people playing themselves. I remember a few. Bob Saget playing a nasty version of himself. Sasha Grey turning Vincent into a coke addict. Gary Busey turning himself into a total nut.
Matt Damon is credited for only one episode on IMDB, though. I think they referred to his hounding afterward without him being on.
Selena Gomez and Anthony Bourdain also played themselves.
I agree that stand-up comedians sometimes play worse versions of themselves on scripted shows, and I agree with your examples.
However, I think it’s even more common with stand-up comedians when they do their stand-up routines. In many cases, we are led to believe stand-up comics are portraying themselves on stage, when in fact they are portraying greatly exaggerated, or completely false versions of themselves. The better stand-ups do it best and most convincingly.
A prime example is Bill Burr. Burr often portrays himself as a dimwitted, misogynistic, racist (and every other type of -istic) character on stage. And he’s quite convincing. His NSFW Philly Rant is a good example. But, I’m confident, after seeing many not-in-character interviews with Burr, that he’s a pretty intelligent, pussycat of a fellow IRL.
The late Gilbert Gottfried and George Carlin (especially in his later grouch years) are two others off the top of my head. Brutal, contemptible, and funny-as-hell onstage; gentle, intelligent, and somewhat boring off stage.
A recent one is Matthew Broderick playing Matthew Broderick on Only Murders in the Building (not to mention a few other celebrities playing themselves).
And “Jerk Brent Spiner” also turned up in one episode.
“Sorry to interrupt sirs, but we’ve got a 10-07 on our hands.”
“Oh Jesus, again Ben?”
“No, bullshit, because I wasn’t WITH a hooker today, ha-HA!”
No, that’s just how Gary Busey is.
(My bold)
I agree with your assessment, and was surprised to learn that his wife is an African American woman.
Forgive me if he has already been mentioned, but Woody Allen comes to mind as a comedian who created a character, “Woody Allen,” who was the opposite of himself. Jack Benny, whose “Jack Benny” character was a vain, ill-tempered miser, was in real life a kind and generous man. Allen’s “Woody Allen” character was a nebbish, to use an apt Yiddish expression. In his early days as a stand-up comedian, he played that character, so well in fact, that people assumed that was what he was really like, which it was not. It was a character he created.
Later, of course, he played that character under various names in various movies, but when he appeared on the Tonight Show or in night clubs, he played “Woody Allen,” the nebbish.
Anthony Jeselnik is an even better example, IMO. If even a tenth of the stories he tells about “himself” onstage were true, he’d be in prison.
And then there was Andrew ‘Dice’ Clay.
The comedy folk duo Garfunkel & Oates played “themselves” on a short-lived Netflix series à la Flight of the Conchords.
Maybe the video for that is a bit closer?
When I saw that video, I’d never seen her perform anything, and thought “That is one gutsy artist, to portray herself as such a shallow, horrible person.”
Character actress Margo Martindale on Bojack Horseman.
Good call!
Patrick Stewart on Extras (show cited a few times here, but this particular scene…)
David Duchovny played himself as an insecure wannabe academic on The Chair.