# Actors who played characters with their own last name

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/actors-who-played-characters-with-their-own-last-name/404925>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [May 21, 2007, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/actors-who-played-characters-with-their-own-last-name/404925 "2007-05-21T14:34:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![AmbushBug](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ambushbug/32/4600_2.png) [@AmbushBug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AmbushBug)\
**Post date:** [May 23, 2007, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/actors-who-played-characters-with-their-own-last-name/404925/21 "2007-05-23T07:16:55Z")

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I’m sure this doesn’t count but I always thought it was cute that the characters in the _Men In Black_ movies played by Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones were “anonymized” as Agents “K” and “J” respectively - but it always seemed (from the VHS boxcover) that as actors they had already been “anonymized” by the commonality of their own last names. “Smith and Jones as… Men In Black!”

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**Author:** ![CairoCarol](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cairocarol/32/3825_2.png) [@CairoCarol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CairoCarol)\
**Post date:** [May 23, 2007, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/actors-who-played-characters-with-their-own-last-name/404925/22 "2007-05-23T07:32:30Z")

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IIRC in the first (?) episode of the 1980s TV show “Remington Steele” several characters had names that clearly echoed the real names of the actors. The one example I can think of, though, was a bit of a further twist on that: mystery man Remington Steele, played by Pierce Brosnan, originally showed up using the pseudonym Bruce Pierson.

I swear there are more examples, but googling the show, I’m not seeing it (Stephanie Zimbalist played Laura Holt … hard to see the connection there).

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**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/actors-who-played-characters-with-their-own-last-name/404925/23 "2007-05-24T12:48:59Z")

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[Victoria Vetri](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Vetri) played “Angela Dorian"in Rosemary’s Baby. Mia Farrow’s Rosemary remarks “I thought you were the actress Victoria Vetri.” Vetri used the name"Angela Dorian” when photographed for Playboy magazine.

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