To be fair, it was the exact same character but with a different name. Sipowicz was on Hill Street Blues as two characters, one a hard nosed cop with an attitude, the other as a hard nosed cop with an attitude that was evil.
Patrick Duffy will always the “The Man from Atlantis” to me.
Hugo Weaving is always gonna be Agent Smith. Sorry about that.
It took me ages to stop seeing “Easy Reader” from The Electric Company every time Morgan Freeman was on screen. But I’m over that now.
I don’t think anyone’s mentioned Howard Hesseman as Dr. Johnny Fever yet. Most of the cast of WKRP, really, if you ask me.*
So. Effing. True.
I’ve spoken to him briefly in person, and he just is Bill Adama.
My son and I recently started watching White Collar together. On it, James Rebhorn plays an FBI agent with some seniority. When I was in high school Rebhorn was on Guiding Light and played an abuser who beat his wife and raped his step daughter. I was in high school thirty years ago. A quick glance at IMDB tells me Rebhorn has had about a hundred other roles. Even so, I cannot see him without thinking “Eek! Bradley Raines!”
Was he playing a character on SNL, though? I mean, he was Chevy Chase (and you’re not). On the other hand, he did four “Vacation” movies over the course of 14 years. He’ll be Clark Griswold to me, just like Randy Quaid will always be Cousin Eddie.
Also, Dan Aykroyd will forever be Elwood Blues. John Belushi could go a couple of ways. Either Jake Blues or Bluto Blutarski. Or the Samurai.
For me, though, it’s like Bob Newhart always being Bob Newhart.
After Chevy Chase’s stint on SNL, when he was Tony Carlson in Foul Play or Fletch or Clark Griswold in the Vacation movies, he was just that Weekend Update host in other situations.
Some of this might be based on how old people are and which role they saw the actors in first. If you grew up in the 80’s Chevy Chase is Clark Griswold to you and William Daniels is Dr. Mark Craig or the black car.
I grew up earlier and saw those actors in things that made strong impressions before the later characters came along.
I’m old enough that I did see the first season of SNL with the Not Ready for Prime Time Players and Chase hosting Weekend Update. And I was grown up by then. Still, Chevy always equals Clark Griswold to me. YMMV.
Brian Blessed is a renowned classical trained actor, and I have never been able to see him as anything other than as Vultan. :smack:
Say THAT three times fast LOL
Carolyn Jones as Morticia Adams
Everybody playing a major role in the cast of A Man For All Seasons (Scofield) as their characters (except Orson Welles)
Don’t forget the liberal gun nut in The President’s Analyst.
Fortunately for me, I first saw him as King Henry II in Becket with his hair and beard dyed black, so it’s easy for me not to think of that in his other roles.
Second the Shooter McGavin pick.
For me, Willaim Daniels is Mr. Feeny. I grew up in the 90s and would say the majority of my generation sees him as such. I didn’t even know that was his name - I was curious about who you guys were talking about and looked it up - FEE-HEE-HEE-NAY!
The janitor from Scrubs.
Ricardo Montalban = Mr. Roarke
Gary Coleman=Arnold Drummond
John Ritter=Jack Tripper
Brent Spiner=Data
Derek Jacobi=Emperor Claudius
If an actor is good or lucky enough to have more than one defining role, like John Hurt, or Sylvester Stallone, then this doesn’t happen. Certain actors sabotage themselves to me, like:
Hugh Grant=loves hookers
Mel Gibson=Drunken racist nut
Eddie Murphy=Fat suit role
I know he was a trained Shakespearean actor, but Robert Reed is Mike Brady.
Brian Keith was so firmly entrenched in my mind as Uncle Bill in Family Affair that it was a shock to hear him swearing like a stevedore in The McKenzie Break (1970).
John Barrowman will always be Captain Jack Harkness to me. I was surprised when he poped up in Zero Dark Thirty and immediatly wondered what Torchwood had to with the hunt for Osama bin Laden. 
DEFINITELY not true.
True for Paul Scofield, as I observed above. But Leo McKern is No. 2 in the Village and Rumpole of the Bailey, not Thomas Cromwell. And John Hurt is Kane in Alien and Winston Smith in 1984 and Joseph Merrick, The Elephant Man, fer cryin’ out loud! Robert Shaw isn’t just Henry VIII, but a score of other characters, including Red Grant, the SPECTRE agent who almost did Bond in. Nigel Davenport is in a lot of things I’m familiar with Vanessa Redgrave (admittedly not a major role in the film as Anne Boleyn)is a ton of things, including Lady Alice More in the later TV production of A Man for All Seasons.
A lot of the others didn’t get many standout roles, but some of them showed up just two years later in the film version of Peter Scaffer*'s The Royal Hunt of the Sun (Robert Shaw, Nigel Davenport
“Men? Men are weak.”
“I was there the day [del]man blotted out the sun[/del] the strength of men failed.”
I’m surprised when I see things like John Wayne as Rooster Cogburn, marlon brando as Don Corleone. Hadn’t you folks seen the movies each of them had made for the 3 previous decades or so?
Brando is one of thoe most respected of American actors. Yes Stanly Kowalski thrust him into the limelight, but he received Oscar nominations like every year after that (4 or 5 in the 50s)
With lesser lights I can see always recalling them in a popular role. But it really seems to denigrate an actor’s ability if a person cannot recognize him as the character he is protraying. It was never thought of as a great movie or role, but I defy anyone to see Kowalski or Corleone in Brando’s Sakini in “Teahouse of the August Moon”.
The cast of Friends. No matter what they do, they are all The Friends. Forever.
Although he’s had many other good roles, **Bill Paxton **will forever be **Pvt. Hudson *from Aliens!
*
“Game over man!”
Funny, I always envision him wearing a frock, as in that Priscilla movie.
George Wendt - Norm! From Cheers.
Carroll O’Connor - Archie Bunker
Jean Stapleton - Edith Bunker
Sherman Hemsley - George Jefferson
Tom Selleck - Thomas Magnum
Alex Karras - Mongo
Ron Howard - Richie Cunningham
Arnold Schwarzenegger - the Terminator
Sylvester Stallone - Rocky
Jason Alexander - George Costanza
Levar Burton - Kunta Kinte
Etc, etc, etc.
There were a few people I couldn’t actually remember their real names. Only their character names, like Cliff Claven (George Ratznberger?) and Sam Malone (Ted Danson! Ha!)
