# Great "one off" acting performances **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 28, 2019, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653 "2019-03-28T08:03:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![russian\_heel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f05b48/32.png) [@russian\_heel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/russian_heel)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/1 "2019-03-28T08:03:42Z")
The quotes because the actors may or may not have had actually had acting roles before but weren’t full time actors at the time or known as “actors” such but scored good performances in a movie: Richard Dawson in “Running Man” Mick Jagger in “Freejack” Tom Arnold in “True Lies” Roddy Piper in “They Live” And the most controversial one: I thought Brian Bosworth was awesome in “Stone Cold” Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a8b319/32.png) [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disgruntled_Penguin)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/2 "2019-03-28T09:38:15Z")
Oprah Winfrey in The Color Purple but what is Tom Arnold if he isn’t primarily an actor? I’m looking at his IMDB page and if someone with that many acting credits isn’t considered an actor then I’m not sure I understand the question. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/3 "2019-03-28T10:59:56Z")
> [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](#): > > …but what is Tom Arnold if he isn’t primarily an actor? I’m looking at his IMDB page and if someone with that many acting credits isn’t considered an actor then I’m not sure I understand the question. Same goes for Dawson. Running Man is his last role in a long distinguished acting career. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/4 "2019-03-28T11:03:36Z")
Beatrice Straight in _Network_ Carrie Snodgress in _Diary of a Mad Housewife_ Louise Fletcher in _One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest_ ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 11:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/5 "2019-03-28T11:20:54Z")
Harold Russell in [The Best Years of Our Lives](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036868/). This movie came up in the thread about decades. Harold Russell had never acted before, he played an Army veteran who had lost his hands, exactly what he was. From this role he became the only actor to win two Oscars for the same role, one for Best Supporting Actor and another special Oscar for being an inspiration to returning WWII veterans. Bosworth is a good choice, his first role, and even though the movie kind of sucked his performance wasn’t bad. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/6 "2019-03-28T11:37:25Z")
**Andre the Giant** in **The Princess Bride**. You could argue that it didn’t really require much acting, or that he’d been “acting” his way through his wrestling career, but this really was unlike anything he’d done before, and he really did do a good job (If he’d done a bad job, you’d have known it). He was immensely proud of his role, showing it off when he could. I just recently read Cary Elwes’ book _As You Wish…_ about the making of the film, and Andre comes of as a sympathetic, gentle, and doomed creature (“We don’t get much time, us small and big guys,” he said, referring to the often short lives of the very large and the very big, plagued as they are with health problems.) ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/7 "2019-03-28T11:51:13Z")
Mick Jagger was not good in _Freejack_. You could clearly see him reading his lines off of cue cards. ---
**Author:** ![BeagleJesus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/5daacb/32.png) [@BeagleJesus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BeagleJesus)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/8 "2019-03-28T12:19:48Z")
Mos Def in _Something the Lord Made_. Even though he is primarily known for his music, dude held his own with Alan Rickman…that’s saying something. ---
**Author:** ![mcgato](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac8455/32.png) [@mcgato](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mcgato)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/9 "2019-03-28T12:56:54Z")
Bjork in [Dancer in the Dark](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0168629/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_39). ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/10 "2019-03-28T13:17:24Z")
She’s famous as an actor-turned-politician, but **Helen Gahagan** (later known as Helen Gahan Douglas) only had one movie role – as Ayesha\* in the definitive 1935 version of H. Rider Haggard’s **She** [, where she played the evil powerful queen, the original “She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed”. Her appearance and style undoubtedly influenced the Evil Queen in Disney’s _Snow White and the Seven Drawfs_ two years later, and other Evil Queens years later. \*actually, for some reason they changed her name in the movie to “Hash-a-Motep,” but She’s “Ayesha” in Haggard and all other adaptations. ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/11 "2019-03-28T13:28:05Z")
Dwight Yoakam made a great drunken, violent (stereotypical) redneck in _Slinglblade._ ISTR being touched by Sean Combs’s (or whatever iteration of his name he was using at the time)performance in \*Monster’s Ball.\*It was really just a bit part, though it’s his story that is the catalyst for everything that follows. I don’t know, it really stuck with me long after the film ended. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/12 "2019-03-28T13:38:58Z")
Maybe the OP means “Wow. Where did that come from” acting performances. Bob Geldof of course is great in The Wall. You’d think musicians would be more adept at acting given how they channel performance into their songs…but music and speech are completely different parts of the brain. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/13 "2019-03-28T13:41:56Z")
> [@Two\_Many\_Cats](#): > > Beatrice Straight in _Network_ > > Carrie Snodgress in _Diary of a Mad Housewife_ > > Louise Fletcher in _One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest_ I’m not sure how the OP is defining “one-off” performances, but all of those people had acting roles before and after their breakout performance (as did Tom Arnold, and Oprah had many roles after her first one). If we are talking about non-actors who had a star performance, you have to include drill instructor F. Lee Ermey in _Full Metal Jacket_, which led to a considerable film career. ---
**Author:** ![Patch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a183cd/32.png) [@Patch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patch)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/14 "2019-03-28T14:05:02Z")
Chris Tucker as Ruby Rhod in _The Fifth Element_. It was an over-the-to version of himself, but it was an outstanding part. ---
**Author:** ![tingbudong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tingbudong/32/520_2.png) [@tingbudong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tingbudong)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/15 "2019-03-28T14:13:45Z")
Seems like many great one-offs are actors/performers essentially playing themselves. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but it could be a reason you don’t get many other memorable roles out of them. Some get lucky though, like Mark Whalberg, who consistently puts in good roles playing a version of himself, but falls on his face trying to play anything else. Sent from my SM-G920W8 using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/16 "2019-03-28T14:38:00Z")
William Obanhein as Officer Obie in _Alice’s Restaurant_. Yes, he was playing himself, but he got great reviews from those who saw the movie (the NY Times called him “marvelous,” and “maybe the most appealing villain since Captain Hook”). After the movie was done, Obanhein went back to police work. ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/17 "2019-03-28T15:25:05Z")
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as Roger Murdoch ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/18 "2019-03-28T15:37:40Z")
Morris Day as Morris Day in _Purple Rain_. I don’t know if he ever acted in any other productions, but he did a good comic job in PR and lightened up the sober mood of the movie. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/19 "2019-03-28T15:38:36Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Harold Russell in [The Best Years of Our Lives](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036868/). This movie came up in the thread about decades. Harold Russell had never acted before, he played an Army veteran who had lost his hands, exactly what he was. Not quite. He _was_ an [Army veteran](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0751174/?ref_=ttfc_fc_cl_t8) who lost his hands in a training accident (on D-Day, no less!) but the part he played, Homer Parrish, was a Navy veteran. > [@Homer Parrish](#): > > I didn’t see much of the war… I was stationed in a repair shop below decks. Oh, I was in plenty of battles, but I never saw a Jap or heard a shell coming at me. When we were sunk, all I know is there was a lot of fire and explosions. And I was ordered topsides and overboard. And I was burned. When I came to, I was on a cruiser. My hands were off. After that, I had it easy… That’s what I said. They took care of me fine. They trained me to use these things. I can dial telephones, I can drive a car, I can even put nickels in the jukebox. I’m all right, but… well, you see, I’ve got a girl. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 28, 2019, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653/20 "2019-03-28T15:48:29Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > Not quite. He _was_ an [Army veteran](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0751174/?ref_=ttfc_fc_cl_t8) who lost his hands in a training accident (on D-Day, no less!) but the part he played, Homer Parrish, was a Navy veteran. Thanks. Small detail but important to note for the quality of his performance. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/great-one-off-acting-performances/831653.md?page=2)