I bring this up because I just finished reading Treasure Island, and I see that Robert Newton played Long John Silver in the 1950 Disney version, then went on to play the same character in Long John Silver (1954), made by Treasure Island pictures 9using the same director as the Disney film, Byron Haskin). They then went on to do a TV series The Adventures of Long John Silver that ran for 26 episodes.
It made me think of Bela Lugosi playing the vampire “Armand Tesla” in Return of the Vampire (1943), a Columbia film in which he basically plays Count Dracula in what is essentially a sequel to the 1931 Universal film, except that they didn’t have the rights to the name.
And, of course, there’s Sean Connery as James Bond in Never Say Never Again (1983, Warner Brothers/Columbia). In fact, the same year gave us George Lazenby playing James Bond in all but name in the TV movie The Return of the Man from U.N.C.L.E. (Viacom), although it’s little more than a cameo.
Going back older films, Alan Hale, Sr. (born Rufus Edward Mackahan, and the father to Alan Hale, Jr. , The Skipper from Gilligan’s Island) played Little John in Douglas Fairbanks’ 1922 Robin Hood (United Artists), then again in Erol Flynn’s The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938, Warner Brothers), and then again in Rogues of Sherwood Forest (1950, Columbia)
The character has spanned over 20 years and 23 seasons of network television. Along with his main cast roles on Homicide and SVU, Munch, or Belzer portraying a parody of the role, has also appeared as a character in other TV series, movies, talk shows, albums and comic books:
Homicide: Life on the Street—119 out of 122 episodes in the series
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit—242 out of 325 episodes in the series
American Dad—one episode: “Next of Pin”, Detective Munch shows up at the end of the episode to recruit Steve to join him as a detective after being impressed by Steve’s detective work at the bowling alley.
30 Rock—two episodes: “¡Qué Sorpresa!”, the characters are watching an SVU episode, with dialogue written and action shot specifically for 30 Rock. Richard Belzer also appears as the actor playing Munch in “Last Lunch”, part one of 30 Rock 's series finale, when Jenna Maroney (Jane Krakowski) lands a guest role on SVU as a corpse.
Jimmy Kimmel Live!—one episode: October 7, 2009. Richard Belzer was interviewed as himself, then does an impromptu scene as Munch with Kimmel and Joel McHale.[48]
Munch has become the only fictional character, played by a single actor, to physically appear on 10 different television series. These shows were on five different networks: NBC (Homicide: Life on the Street, Law & Order, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Law & Order: Trial by Jury, and 30 Rock), Fox (The X-Files and Arrested Development), UPN (The Beat), HBO (The Wire) and ABC (Jimmy Kimmel Live!). Munch has been one of the few television characters to cross genres, appearing not only in crime drama series, but sitcom (Arrested Development), adult animated sitcom (American Dad), late night comedy (Jimmy Kimmel Live!) and horror and science fiction (The X-Files).
Klaus Kinski played Nosferatu/Count Orlok/Count Dracla in the 1979 Werner Herzog remake of Nosferatu (having played Renfield in Jess Franco’s 1970 Count Dracula) , then went on to play the same part in the 1988 film Vampire in Venice from a different studio.
Evan Peters played Pietro Maximoff (Quicksilver) in the FOX produced X-Men movies, and then Pietro in the Disney-produced Wandavision. Now, Disney purchased FOX between these, but there was already a different Pietro in the MCU at the time of Wandavision.
Speaking of Marvel and Disney, Deadpool & Wolverine went out of its way to bring back characters from Fox and New Line Cinema. Every character is basically making their MCU/Disney debut. Even the character played by Chris Evans…
I don’t know what to do with Sony’s Spider-Man and the shared deal with Disney. He’s owned by Sony but makes appearances in MCU produced films as well.
Christopher Lee played Dracula in several films for Hammer Studios, then also played him for Jess Franco in Count Dracula, and wiki lists a whole mess of production companies for that one, and also was in a French comedy called Dracula père et fils for yet another producer.
The Marvel movies, now that they’re leaning into the multiverse stuff, will have plenty: Wesley Snipes, who was Blade in three movies for New Line, appeared in Deadpool & Wolverine (Marvel Studios/Disney). Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, Tyler Mane as Sabretooth, Dafne Keen as X-23, Jennifer Garner as Elektra and Chris Evans as Johnny Storm all appear as well after their initial appearances were in Fox Studios properties.
(Ninja’d by @OldManLogan who answered while I was typing)
Similarly, John Carradine played Dracula (with a moustache!) for Universal in House of Frankenstein (1944) and House of Dracula (1945), and then played him for other studios in Billy the Kid vs. Dracula (1966) and Nocturne, Granddaughter of Dracula (1979)
Mae Questel voiced Betty Boop in the original Fleischer Studios cartoons, then returned for Betty’s cameo in Who Framed Roger Rabbit (Touchstone Pictures / Amblin Entertainment).
Boris Karloff was famous for playing the Frankenstein Monster for Universal, but he played Baron von Frankenstein in the 1958 film Frankenstein 1970 and also (voice only in an animated film) in Mad Monster Party (1966) (although his name was Victor in the first and Boris in the second).
And even though he said he’d never play the Frankenstein Monster again after three times for Universal, he did so again for the episode “Lizard’s Leg and Owlet’s Wing” of the TV series Route 66 October 26, 1962, which also brought back Lon Chaney, Jr. as The Wolf Man.
Jerry Haleva played Saddam Hussein in both Hot Shots! films (20th Century Fox) and The Big Lebowski (PolyGram), along with a few other productions. He’s never played anyone else.
Clarnece Linden “Buster” Crabbe famously played both Buch Rogers and Flash Gordon in serials for Universal, but in 1979 he played “Commander Gordon” to Gil Gerard’s Buck Rogers in the TV series Buck Rogers (Glen Larson productions)
“I’ve been doing this since before you were born”
Nicholas Rowe played Young Sherlock Holmes in the 1985 movie of that name, but he came back to play Sherlock Holmes (in a film-within-a-film) in Mr. Holmes (2015)
Paul Newman played Fast Eddie Felson in The Hustler (1961) for 20th Century Fox and again in The Color of Money (1986) for Touchstone. Disney eventually bought 20th Century Fox putting both under the same umbrella, but not at the time the second film was made.
Peter O’Toole played Henry II in Becket for Paramount and The Lion in Winter for Avco Embassy. O’Toole said he played it as the same character.
Harold Lloyd played the same character in The Freshman for Pathe and in The Sin of Harold Diddlebock/Mad Wednesday for United Artists. Scenes from The Freshman start out the latter film.
If that one counts, Lynda Carter’s Wonder Woman spent one season on ABC, then moved to CBS for the 2nd and 3rd seasons.
Officially, the title changed from Wonder Woman to The New Adventures of Wonder Woman. The setting was changed from the 1940s to the 1970s. Lyle Waggoner’s character in the latter seasons was portrayed as the son of his character in the first season.
Charles Gray (The Narrator in Rocky Horror Picture Show and Ernst Stavro Blofeld in Diamonds are Forever) played Sherlock Holmes’ REAL Smarter Brother, Mycroft, in The Seven per Cent Solution (Universal, 1976), then played him again multiple times in the Granada/PBS series of Sherlock Holmes adaptations (the ones with Jeremy Brett). In fact, when Brett fell too ill to continue they rewrote the stories so that Mycroft solved them.
Back in the day if you wanted to cast Teddy Roosevelt you just called Sidney Blackmer (Ruth Gordon’s husband in Rosemary’s Baby). He played TR seven times for a variety of film and TV studios.
Bobby Watson played Hitler in nine films. He was the go-to guy in the 40s if you wanted a cameo appearance of the Nazi leader, and did it for several studios.