Comic actors who've given good or great dramatic performances

Cafe Society
1

*“Dying is easy. Comedy is hard.” *
the probably apocryphal final words of Edmund Kean (1787-1833)

Inspired by this thread, who are some very talented comic actors who’ve given some great but decidedly non-comic performances? A few that come to mind:

Carol Burnett in Friendly Fire = in one of her first turns after playing Eunice and Mrs. Wiggins for 13 years, Carol blew critics and fans away as the mother of a Vietnam casualty. Her scene at his casket was literally breathtaking.

John Cleese in “Francis Ford Coppola’s” “Kenneth Branagh’s” Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein - this was a dreadful movie (Branagh is firmly convinced that “draggin’ capes automatically equal tense drama”) but a hoary maned Cleese was perfect as Victor Frankenstein’s brilliant mentor Waldeman.

Jerry Lewis in The King of Comedy = while the movie could be argued to be a very dark comedy, Lewis had a decidedly straight role as the megalomaniacal late night talk show legend. He gave a much better performance, imho, than in any of those godawful Dean Martin pictures that somehow became classics.

Don Rickles, Dick Smothers and Alan King in Casino = it was brilliant casting to use Vegas fixtures in this piece, but Rickles surprised me most as the much-put-upon nebbish manager of the titular Casino. He actually wasn’t annoying for once.

Steve Martin in And the Band Played On - while Steve Martin has given many non-funny performances, this time it was intentional as he plays the nameless brother of an early AIDS victim in a cameo.

Lily Tomlin in And the Band Played On and Tea With Mussolini - as a medical investigator in the first and a trapped archaeologist in the second, she was an excellent supporting performance. (I believe her role in Mussolini was her first openly gay character.)

Elizabeth Montgomery will always be known as Samantha, but she shone in several movies including .The Awakening Land (about which not enough good can be said- this was to historical miniseries what The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman was to made-for-TV historical movies), The Legend of Lizzie Borden and Sins of the Mother.

Comic actors whose dramatic work never much impressed me, incidentally: Rex Harrison, Buddy Hackett and (as much as I absolutely love and adore and would marry her) Dolly Parton

2

Well, Robin Williams is an Oscar-winning actor (who’d been nominated a few times before that for dramatic performances) who’s more widely-considered a comic actor.

Bill Murray in Razor’s Edge and Lost In Translation.

Dan Ackroyd has done several dramatic turns, too.

3

It’s been a while since I’ve seen it, but I’ll offer Billy Connelly in Her Majesty, Mrs. Brown

4

Is Johnny Depp a comic actor or a dramatic actor? How would he fit in this thread?

5

John Ritter in Sling Blade

6

A few obvious examples from recent years:
Jim Carrey in The Truman Show and Man on the Moon (although both movies had comedic aspects)

Adam Sandler (of all people) in Punch Drunk Love

Will Smith in Six Degrees of Separation

Mike Meyers in 54

7

Sean Connery in almost every movie he’s done. He started out as a Scottish comic actor.

8

He managed to be somewhat menacing in Grosse Pointe Blank.

9

He’s one of the few actors who’s almost “unclassifiable” (and I mean that as a compliment).

10

Going back a few years, I was always impressed by Bob Hope in Beau James – a generally forgettable movie, but I thought he played the character well.

Then there’s Patty Duke, who is almost ALWAYS better in dramatic roles than in comic ones.

Mickey Rooney in movies with horses (The Black Stallion, National Velvet) but NOT in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

11

Agree that the movie sucked, but that Cleese was a revelation. I frequently wonder why he doesn’t try something like this again.

12

I was so very impressed with Murray in this film. Unfortunately everyone in the theater I was in had expected a comedy so they left complaining how terrible it was. I feel he never got the recognition for the very good acting job he did in this film.

May I suggest a role and two comedic actors who both performed it and did great jobs performing dramatically in it.

The trainer in Requim for a Heavyweight. In the Playhouse 90 (live TV) version Edd Wynn was so, so good. I’ve sometimes wondered after his portrayal of the the fighter’s trainer, if trainers do him to get credibility in their corners.

Same role but in the feature film version, Mickey Rooney. Completely different portrayal. Still incredibly good. I’m not sure Rooney ever attained that level again.

I might put forward Jackie Gleason, in this list, but other than moments in The Hustler and portions of Gigot he never really achieved it. I had such hopes for Soldier in the Rain, (the one he did with Steve McQueen) but it was just silly instead of dramatic, touching or moving.

TV

13

I was so very impressed with Murray in this film. Unfortunately everyone in the theater I was in had expected a comedy so they left complaining how terrible it was. I feel he never got the recognition for the very good acting job he did in this film.

May I suggest a role and two comedic actors who both performed it and did great jobs performing dramatically in it.

The trainer in Requim for a Heavyweight. In the Playhouse 90 (live TV) version Edd Wynn was so, so good. I’ve sometimes wondered after his portrayal of the the fighter’s trainer, if trainers do him to get credibility in their corners.

Same role but in the feature film version, Mickey Rooney. Completely different portrayal. Still incredibly good. I’m not sure Rooney ever attained that level again.

I might put forward Jackie Gleason, in this list, but other than moments in The Hustler and portions of Gigot he never really achieved it. I had such hopes for Soldier in the Rain, (the one he did with Steve McQueen) but it was just silly instead of dramatic, touching or moving.

TV

14

Sorry about the double post. I haven’t done that in a couple of years. I wonder what happened.

Anyway, I thought of another one.

Richard Pryor

He was good in The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars and Motor Kings. Yes, I know there were some light moments in it but Pryor did a good dramatic turn. He also did a good dramatic job in Greased Lightning. But the one that really showed his dramatic talents was Some Kind of Hero. Quite impressive.

TV

15

Dan Aykroyd also did well in Driving Miss Daisy

16

Jonathan Winters in the Twilight Zone episode “A Game of Pool”.
He did a tremendous job of “playing it straight”. He’s one of the wackiest people in the world and he’s always doing something crazy in movies, tv series, talk shows, etc. So this role (as “Fats” Brown) was quite an accomplishment.
Then again Jack Klugman, who could also be considered a ‘comic actor’, was in that episode and played his part well. (Jack Klugman made 4 “Twilight Zone” episodes but “A Game of Pool” was his best.)

17

Will Smith did a great job in Ali… Too bad the movie itself wasn’t so hot, and (almost) let his performance go to waste.

18

It’s hard to believe, but he was nominated for an Oscar in that role!

Jim Carrey was the first one I thought of. In addition to the movies already mentioned, he also had a dramatic turn in a made for TV movie called “Doing Time on Maple Drive” that got semi-decent reviews. I think he played the recovering alcoholic son. He did this movie even before he was on In Living Color.

Bruce Willis was first thought of as a comedic actor from his “Moonlighting” days, so his role in the movie “In Country” was quite a switch. It’s a very good performance from a very underrated actor, IMO.

19

We made it all this way without anyone mentioning Tom Hanks? Probably because he’s been a great dramatic actor for so long that people forget he started on Bosom Buddies and Bachelor Party. His slow transformation into comic-actor-with-substance started in Splash and Big, and then he did a 90 degree turn into drama with Philadelphia, and never went back.

That also makes him unique in that he never really went back to comedy. Most of the other actors here have moved back and forth between comedy and drama, but Hanks hasn’t really done a comedic role since 1989.

But he’s a great host on SNL.

20

An enraged and disappointed Dan Ackroyd menacing Gillian Anderson in House of Mirth is a frightening sight.

What about Mary Tyler Moore in Ordinary People?