# People with two separate careers in show biz **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 23, 2016, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879 "2016-04-23T06:07:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/121 "2016-05-02T00:39:26Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Prior to All in the Family he did quite a few guest appearances on episodic tv. Being Carl Reiner’s son probably didn’t hurt But how weird is it that neither of us thought to add Carl Reiner to the list? Nominated for Emmy after Emmy after Emmy after Emmy for _acting_, winning repeatedly, in the '50s with Sid Caesar. Then nominated for Emmy after Emmy after Emmy after Emmy for _writing_, winning repeatedly, in the '60s with Dick Van Dyke. And then he’s _directing_ big-screen movies in the '70s: OH GOD, with George Burns, in '77; and then THE ONE AND ONLY, with Henry Winkler, in '78; and then THE JERK, with Steve Martin, in '79 – and then DEAD MEN DON’T WEAR PLAID with Martin; and then THE MAN WITH TWO BRAINS, with Martin the year after that; and then ALL OF ME, with Martin the year after that. And then SUMMER RENTAL, with John Candy, the year after _that_; but never mind about directing; he eventually went back to earning Emmy nominations, and the occasional win, as an actor – and then he was AFAICT the only writer credited on a made-for-television movie that earned him yet another Emmy nomination. (Though that one was apparently for _producing_, which reminds me that Reiner also produced movie after movie that I haven’t mentioned – one of which, in the '60s, was based on the semiautobiographical novel he wrote in the '50s, which is pretty impressive for a Broadway performer from the '40s.) ---
**Author:** ![Moonlitherial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4bbf92/32.png) [@Moonlitherial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moonlitherial)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/122 "2016-05-02T02:41:02Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Leonard Nimoy, author of I AM NOT SPOCK and I AM SPOCK, earned three straight Emmy nominations playing Spock, and had little trouble directing _Trek_ movies like THE SEARCH FOR SPOCK because he’s obviously in his element when folks are talking about phasers or warp drive or Vulcan logic or a Klingon cloaking device. > > And then, since he has an unrelated knack for handling light comedy, he directed the biggest American box-office hit of the year: THREE MEN AND A BABY. > > Huh. > [@TBG](#): > > He also once had a fairly infamous turn at singing. About a hobbit. And he had a fairly significant photography career even while continuing some of his previous careers. ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2016, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/123 "2016-05-02T04:48:41Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > Merv Griffin, as well as a singer and TV show host, wrote the _Jeopardy!_ theme song (which probably made him more money than anything else he ever did). By all accounts, Merv was loaded, but very few people knew precisely how much money he had. He supposedly told one interviewer, “Let’s put it this way- if I’d never done anything in my life but write the _ **Jeopardy!** _ jingle, I’d be worth $17 million.” Paul Anka told Howard Stern that the _ **Tonight** _ intro music he wrote brought him about $800,000 a year by the time Johnny Carson retired. And it would have brought him TWICE that, if Johnny hadn’t demanded that Anka give him co-credit as the composer! Perhaps I missed it, but… did anyone mention Johnny? He started as a magician, didn’t he? ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/124 "2016-05-03T14:24:57Z")
What about Steve Martin? Stand up, banjo player, singer, actor, magician, writer, producer, and artist. The man has done it all. ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/125 "2016-05-03T16:14:07Z")
Eddie Murphy started out in stand up comedy in the 80s. At that time his act was considered quite edgy and risqué. Now most of his work is voice acting for children’s movies like Shrek and Mulan. ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/126 "2016-05-03T16:16:15Z")
The actor Omar Sharif was in dozens of films, and got a best supporting actor nomination for Lawrence of Arabia. He was also one of the world’s top bridge players. I don’t know if that counts as a second ‘career’, but I find it cool. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/127 "2016-05-03T22:29:04Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Donnie Wahlberg went from being a founding member of boy band New Kids on the Block to totally stealing Blue Bloods from Tom Selleck. His brother Marky Mark has had a similar career path. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/128 "2016-05-03T23:37:02Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > John Houseman first became famous as a producer on both Broadway and of movies, notably _Citizen Kane_ Did I miss it, or has nobody mentioned Broadway producer/director/actor/writer Orson Welles, who produced a lot of movies and directed a lot more movies and acted in even more movies and won an Academy Award for one of his dozens and dozens of outings as a Hollywood screenwriter? Not bad for a radio legend with a knack for stage magic. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2016, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/129 "2016-05-03T23:42:16Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > Il Duce wrote Romance novels. A little off-topic, but too good not to mention. And Roderick Spode designed women’s lingerie… ---
**Author:** ![outlierrn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/outlierrn/32/3005_2.png) [@outlierrn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/outlierrn)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/130 "2016-05-04T03:31:01Z")
Tom Savini; B movie actor, award winning effects artist, sex machine. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/131 "2016-05-04T03:41:05Z")
Theodore Bikel was a wonderful character actor in some pictures in the 50s and 60s, and also a well-known folk singer in the era that ushered in the hippies. Helmut Pfleger is a Grand Master chess player and also a commentator for televised tennis matches in Germany. I once payed chess against him, before I knew he was any good. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/132 "2016-05-04T03:59:14Z")
Has nobody mentioned Hedy Lamarr? She was one of the top billing leading ladies in Hollywood from the 30s to the 50s, and also an inventor, who held the 1942 patent on a jam-proof radio guidance system for torpedoes during WWII, which was still in use in the '60s, utilizing a system that ultimately led to Bluetooth. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2016, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/133 "2016-05-04T07:03:08Z")
More precisely, she and George Antheil (who composed film scores and in his spare time composed avant-garde music) co-invented frequency hopping, which they patented in 1942. It appears that some other people independently thought about the idea. It didn’t get used until the 1960’s because no one could figure out how to use it in a practical way. At that time, the people wanting to use the idea discovered (in patent searches) Lamarr and Antheil’s patent, which had already run out. The idea was generalized into techniques now referred to as spread spectrum. Bluetooth is one application of this idea. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/134 "2016-05-05T01:01:13Z")
How about Garry Marshall? In the '60s, he’s a professional writer for Jack Paar and Joey Bishop – and for MAKE ROOM FOR DADDY, and for THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW, and for I SPY, and for GOMER PYLE, and for plenty of other shows. In the '70s, his work as a _producer_ made him a television legend – earning Emmy nominations FOR THE ODD COUPLE before that _“creator of HAPPY DAYS”_ tag got permanently linked to his name – but the ace up his sleeve when producing those was, he wrote episodes for both shows, because of course he did. From that running start, he was of course able to spin off LAVERNE AND SHIRLEY as well as MORK AND MINDY – which means he wasn’t _done_ earning Emmy nominations as a producer – but come the '80s, he decided to start directing big-screen movies. Again, he had the ‘writer’ card, and so could slap together THE FLAMINGO KID and direct _that_; but with that established, he soon moved on to directing a Tom Hanks movie in '86, and a Kurt Russell movie in '87, and a Bette Midler movie in '88, and then Julia Roberts becomes a superstar on his watch with PRETTY WOMAN. Incidentally, he acts in movies he neither directs nor produces nor writes; though he of course pads his résumé out from there by casting himself in projects where he’s serving in some other capacity. The point is, there’s exactly one type of role he can absolutely nail, and people ask him to play it – but I could mention plenty of _other_ stuff he went on to write, or produce, or direct; his latest is in theaters now. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2016, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/135 "2016-05-05T23:39:04Z")
> [@outlierrn](#): > > Tom Savini; B movie actor, award winning effects artist, sex machine. Also a director. He did the remake of Night of the Living Dead years before zombies were a fad. Savini’s protege, Greg Nicotero mainly known for effects, producing and directing Walking Dead, etc. has also done some acting, mostly as zombies, but he also played one of the soldiers in Day of the Dead. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2016, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/136 "2016-05-06T00:14:36Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > Has nobody mentioned Hedy Lamarr? She was one of the top billing leading ladies in Hollywood from the 30s to the 50s, and also an inventor, who held the 1942 patent on a jam-proof radio guidance system for torpedoes during WWII, which was still in use in the '60s, utilizing a system that ultimately led to Bluetooth. That’s _Headley_! Sorry. Couldn’t resist. I’ll just show myself out. :o ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [May 10, 2016, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/137 "2016-05-10T23:56:14Z")
As a teen, John Francis Daley was acting on FREAKS AND GEEKS as the dweeby kid brother to the magnificent Linda Cardellini; and in his twenties, he spent like seven years as an FBI psychologist on BONES, which sadly didn’t have Linda Cardellini. Anyhow, he wrote the screenplay for the incredibly successful HORRIBLE BOSSES, and then wrote the screenplays for yet other movies – including the VACATION flick that he directed – and his next writing credit is next year’s SPIDER-MAN movie. \ Cardellini. ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2016, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/138 "2016-05-11T03:57:15Z")
Besides Ron Howard from “Happy Days”, Anson Williams (“Potsie”) has directed quite a a few tv shows such as “Charmed”, “Star Trek Voyager”, “Star Trek Deep Space Nine”, “Sabrina Teenage Witch”, etc. Doesn’t seem to have directed any full length movies, I wonder if that was his choice or if no one ever gave him a chance. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Jeffrey\_Lebowski](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_jeffrey_lebowski/32/215_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Jeffrey\_Lebowski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Jeffrey_Lebowski)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2016, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/139 "2016-05-11T04:16:36Z")
Dave Hill is a standup comedian who just put out his 2nd book of essays, “Dave Hill Doesn’t Live Here Anymore”. He’s also a musician of some note - he’s been in a heavy metal band with Moby (Diamondsnake), and his own band, Valley Lodge, made the song which has become the theme for John Oliver’s HBO show Last Week Tonight. [Dave and his father covering Stairway to Heaven.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZXYrr_d3Jw&feature=youtu.be) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2016, 11:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879/140 "2016-10-01T11:28:50Z")
Bumping because I hadn’t realized Paul Newman got nominated for a Palme D’Or for directing **The Effect Of Gamma Rays On Man-In-The Moon Marigolds** , and again for directing **The Glass Menagerie** – acting in neither, just like he didn’t act on TV in that adaptation of **The Shadow Box** (which got him nominated for an Emmy as a director likewise), and just like he didn’t act in **Rachel, Rachel** (which got him a whole _bunch_ of directing nominations, including a bunch of wins). And as an actor directed by others – well, you know: biggest movie star in the world, with bunches of nominations and bunches of wins and et cetera. Anyhow, whenever he directed himself – nothing; a number of actors who’ve been mentioned here racked up accolades when directing themselves, and also earned wins by doing each without the other, which we can tease apart as _separable_; but AFAICT, Newman only ever earned awards or even nominations when acting without directing, or directing without acting, and I figure that’s just _separate_. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-with-two-separate-careers-in-show-biz/752879.md?page=8)