There are actors who will not do sequels like Jodi Foster, and others who latch on to a role and reprise the heck out of it like Basil Rathbone with Sherlock Holmes.
I was lying in bed this morning and thinking about actors who have had the most different sequels.
I came up with Mike Myers with three: Shrek
Wayne and Garth
Austin Powers
Harrison Ford with three: Star Wars
The Tom Clancy stuff (*Clear and Present Danger,*etc.) Indiana Jones
Eddie Murphy with four: Dr. Dolittle
Beverly Hills Cop
Shrek
The 48 hours things with Nick Nolte
Anybody else in feature films? Let’s not wander into made for television or straight to video, OK?
Johnny Weissmuller with two sets: Tarzan and Jungle Jim
Clint Eastwood with two sets: Dirty Hairy and “The Man With No Name” Trilogy (although he does have a name in one of them, and a nickname in another, so I wonder why the character is thought of as nameless…)
Pales in comparison with Murphy and Ford’s sequel achievements, though.
Checking his IMDB listing, Eddie Murphy is releasing Daddy Day Camp next year, which puts him (tentatively) at seven sequels.
Jackie Chan does amazingly well in (at least) seven sequels: Cannonball Run, Police Story, Rush Hour, Drunken Master, Fist of Fury, the Shaghai movies and Armour of God. He hass so many credits that it’s hard to tell sometimes.
Also Young Master (Although I’m not sure Young Master and Young Master in Love were actually intended as the same series, or just marketed as such in English. I haven’t seen the former), and Project A (which I know were the same series).
The problem is, his character’s named Dragon in the Young Master films. Which is also his name in the Project A movies, so isn’t terribly unique to Young Master. and may be an artifact of the English translation (the name in Chinese isn’t given), so that’s not terribly useful in this case.
Ian McKellen has two: X-men and LotR.
William Powell has two: playing Nick Charles and Philo Vance.
Myrna Loy has two: playing Nora Charles and Lillian Gilbreth.
I’m not sure “The man with No Name” applies. Clint played a similar role in each film, but they were different characters so they aren’t really sequels. Lee Van Cleef was also in two of those films (“The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly” and “For a Few Dollars More”), but he played Angel Eyes and Col. Mortimer in those films.
Tengu. Chan directed both ‘Young Master’ movies quite early in his career. They were probrably sequels. Fearless Hyena is another two-part series, which brings his sequel count to nine, including the project A movies.
Chan has only two trilogies to date – Police Story had 4 parts, and the forthcoming Rush Hour 3.
I’ve had my doubts over the years, but it seems to be a popular conception that they are the same character. I can see “Fistful” and “For A Few” being the same character (wasn’t he named something like “Mako” in one of them?) more easily than I can see Blondie from TGTBATU being the same.
And I really wouldn’t say using the same actor as a different character in supporting roles invalidates the films from being in the same universe. My God, Columbo has arrested Robert Culp and William Shatner half a dozen times over the years.
On a more serious note, how about Christopher Lee? I got 6. [ul]
[li]Lord of the Rings[/li][li]Star Wars II & III[/li][li]The Hammer Studios Dracula films[/li][li]The Hammer Studios Fu Manchu films[/li][li]Richard Lester’s Three/Four Musketeers pair of films[/li][li]Several Made for TV Sherlock Holmes flicks[/li][/ul]