It was only just today that I realized Pedro Pascal played Oberyn Martell on Game of Thrones. He was so great in that part but I just never connected them. Has that ever happened to you where you realize someone played a character much later?
We were watching something or other one night, I don’t remember what, and one of the characters inspired me to comment, “I could picture Steve Buscemi playing that character.”
My wife said, “That is Steve Buscemi.”
Blush.
Often. But I can’t think of a specific instance.
I was several seasons into It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia when I learned that Charlie’s mom was played by the same actress as Miss Yvonne from Pee-Wee’s Playhouse.
She died in February of this year.
Not an actor, but a writer: I was a big fan of Howard Overman’s work on Misfits and Crazyhead. But I later discovered he had written"Missions," one of my favorite episodes of Hu$tle.
Rebecca De Mornay in Jessica Jones a while back. I didn’t place her until I saw a clip of The Hand That Rocks The Cradle years later while looking up something about Annabella Sciorra (who was in Daredevil on Netflix).
Years ago when I was on dial up, I found an online comic book called Chesire Crossing. It was a story involving characters from The Wizard Of Oz, Alice In Wonderland, Peter Pan, plus just Mary Poppins. The creator obviously could not draw. The art was made on MS Paint or such. It was almost entirely geometric shapes that had been carefully placed and then filled with color. But, the writing was fantastic! The creator had clearly done their reseach and understood the source material. It was a new, inventive and exciting story. But none of it violated canon. I recommended it to all my firends.
Only this past month or so did somebody tell me that the creator of Chesire Crossing was Andy Weir, the wrter of The Martian.
I remembered him from a long running online comic he did before that one, Casey & Andy.
I used to do it all the time with both Sam Rockwell and Billy Crudup. Halfway through watching a movie that I hadn’t previously read about I would suddenly realize, “Oh that’s…”
I was watching the remake of Sabrina last night when it dawned on me that Nancy Macrhland who played Livia Soprano was the mother of Harrison Fords character.
I also was surprised to learn that Dominic Chianese who played Junior Soprano was also in Boardwalk Empire as the Commodore. And today I learned he also was Johnny Ola in Godfather 2.
Frequently. One case that stands out is Gene Hackman playing The Old Blind Hermit in Young Frankenstein. It seems incredibly obvious now, but when I first saw the film I didn’t realize that it was him until the final credits.
A couple of weeks ago, I channel surfed into a movie called, “Endless Love”. There was a scene that contained some young guy who had a small part that wasn’t at all necessary to the movie. I had to do a double take to realize it was Tom Cruise.
I believe the Commodore was played by Dabney Coleman. Dominic played his lawyer, Leander Cephas Whitlock.
I’m terrible with facial recognition, real life and roles of actors. When watching shows on TV with my husband, I’ll keep my tablet at hand because he’ll say "Isn’t that the guy who played [character] on [show] and I have to look it up. The best I can manage is thinking this one or that one looks sorta familiar. I’m usually pretty good with voices, but faces, not so much.
More than once I have been watching a particular movie and thought “That actor is really good. I wonder why I’ve never seen him in anything else before.” So I make it a point to watch the credits, so that I can find out who this wonderful new talent is.
Invariably, it’s Gary Oldman, who of course I have seen dozens of times before.
On several occasions, I’ve watched Curb Your Enthusiasm and thought “why does that bit-part actor look so familiar?” - only to find out later that they were a main cast member on Herman’s Head. Larry David must have loved that show…
I thought Gene Hackman was uncredited in Young Frankenstein.
Now I guess I’ll have to watch it again to make sure. Man, the things I go through.
IMDB doesn’t list him as “uncredited”. But the real evidence is to watch the credits.
Boy, I hope I don’t miss it, otherwise I may have to watch it again.