I thought you were going to say Quaker Oats. What the hell is this “diabeetus” thing?
Mariette Hartley for not being James Garner’s wife?
Robert Wagner did some commercials for reverse-mortgages or life insurance.
I don’t remember him strictly for it – I’m a pretty big fan of The Man From UNCLE and Hu$tle – but it was a notable moment when I started nosing around on Amazon and realized I’d actually read his PhD thesis as an undergrad. I knew the author’s name at the time, it just didn’t occur to me that it might have been that Robert Vaughn.
William Shatner for his Priceline commercials.
Rowan Atkinson - at least in the US - will forever be Mr. Bean, despite having the lead in Blackadder.
Hugh Laurie will also be associated with House, even though most of the other characters he’s played in his long career have been well-meaning dimwits (Bertie Wooster, the various employers of Blackadder, tons of characters in Fry and Laurie, etc, etc).
Nitpick…he was only Blackadder’s employer in Blackadder the Third - his one appearance in Blackadder II was as one of Edmund’s drinking buddies (who was, though, as much of a ninny as any other non-House character of his), and he was Capt. Blackadder’s subordinate in Goes Forth. In the framing story for Back & Forth he was more or less a social equal (until the end).
I’m not sure he’ll forever be House, but maybe that’s just my long acquaintance with his British roles and near-total lack of familiarity with House - beyond the most superficial knowledge of the premise - talking.
Orson Welles did Gallo Wine commercials. “We will sell no wine before it’s time.”
After 8 seasons and 176 episodes House is the opposite of being an incidental career point.
Margaret Hamilton and Maxwell House coffee (although you might have to be pretty old to make that connection).
Athletes are gonna be a great source for this.
Vikings defensive end Jim Marshall played in a record 282 consecutive games with a record 270 straight starts (both records have since been surpassed), but now he is best known for a 66 yard wrong-way run.
Leon Lett of the Cowboys is now best known for 2 boneheaded plays that were not typical of his career - one coming in a long-since-decided Super Bowl where he picked up a fumble and ran it towards the end zone - but began to celebrate early and had the ball knocked out of his hands before reaching the end zone.
And unlike William Daniels, he was in the Wonder Years!
…with Kaley Cuoco as his daughter?
(…the child the Klingons Didn’t kill…?)
I was going to say “William Shatner for his singing.” It’s quite something.
Exactly what, no one is certain, but it *is *something.
Alec Guinness resigned himself to the fact that he would be nothing but Obi Wan Kenobi for millions of people.
BB King and his diabetes ads.
Lenard Nimoy and his art photography. Link is kinda not safe for work: www arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/photography/arthistory_leonardnimoy.html
Henry Winkler for his ad for reverse mortgages.
Pat Boone for walk-in bathtubs.
Since this is concerning mostly actors and other artists I think it will work better in Cafe Society.
This is the only thing I ever knew about Mean Joe Green. I think other Gen Xers might agree:
