Brad Pitt in 12 Monkeys. Previous to that I had thought of him purely as a crappy chick flick actor, eyecandy for the ladies, but he did a wonderful job in that movie.
Really? Huh, I’ve only known him as a tough guy.
Yeah, he first came to prominence on the sitcom Moonlighting.
I’ll second that; I was quite astonished.
Sarah Michelle Gellar as “Buffy.” Kristy Swanson is much prettier and has more of an athletic build. However, in retrospect it was Swanson who was miscast.
Darn, that was the one I was going to say.
OK, seeing as I already mentioned why I thought he was perfect when I first heard he was cast, can you enlighten me as to why you, and maybe others, thought it was such a bad choice?
Quite the contrary, he’d already done several good guy-accessible films early in his career: Kalifornia, True Romance and Se7en all came out before 12 Monkeys. (As did Interview With A Vampire, but that was more targeted to women.)
Gwyneth Paltrow in Proof. She always struck me as someone who just turned up and read their lines – and then she rocked my world.
Jennifer Aniston in The Good Girl. She never stood out to me as someone who was capable of turning in a really compelling dramatic performance – but good god, she hit all the right notes in that one.
(Looking at these two examples, maybe all that the actors I’m so-so about need to do to impress me is to rub up against Jake Gyllenhaal a little on-screen. Hmmmmm.)
Anyway, I saw The Good Girl last night and my sole reservation about going to see Friends With Money was instantly lost, like tears in rain.
Thomas Haden Church in Sideways. I only knew him before that as the goofy mechanic from Wings. In fact another Wings alumnus that surprised me was Tony Shalhoub in The Man Who Wasn’t There.
It’s good to see accomplished actors shed the “wacky sidekick” TV roles.
Same for me. Ellis Dee has pointed out other non-chick flick movies he’d done prior to 12 Monkeys, but that was the first of the bunch that I saw.
The biggest surprise for me, though, was Leonardo DiCaprio in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape. Because of that film, I’m willing to give any post-2000 film of his a chance.
Another nomination for Leonardo DiCaprio, although the film was Catch Me if You Can.
It wasn’t a sitcom – it was an hour-long detective show, with a romantic comedy vibe.
For someone who went from heavy drama to something lighter: I first saw Stanley Tucci as a truly evil billionaire in Murder One (Best. TV. Show. Ever.) – though it was far from his earliest role, it was a huge, major breakthrough for him – so imagine my astonishment to learn he could do comedy, as in The Impostors, which he not only starred in but directed and wrote.
Hayden Christensen in Shattered Glass. Any performance that makes you want to crawl into the screen and just beat a guy in the face with your fists until your fists are broken has to be worth something, right?
Well, I’ve always liked Aniston, so I didn’t have ANY reservations about that movie, and I thought it was great. She’s good in it, and holds her own against the best women working in the field. Her instincts seem to be to just “tone it down” or underplay things, like when Robin Williams gets a dramatic role. I never find that great, but I find it hard to criticize.
BTW, I think that “Along Came Polly” is one of the most underrated comedies from the past 5 years, and if you like Phillip Seymour Hoffman AT ALL, I consider it essential viewing.
Nielson obscure? Heck, I knew who he was, and not just because of Forbidden Planet. Nielsen, who’d had his share of roles (including leads) back in the 1950s, was familiar from plenty of TV shows and movies. He played the captain in The Poseidon Adventure, fer cryib’ out loud, and had just appeared as a villain in Stephen King’s Creepshow (opposite Ted Danson, who was obscure at the time. I was shocked when I saw the film years later and realized who it was.)
And Airplane was full of serious stars tapped (usually against type) to play humor – Robert Stack, Lloyd Bridges, Chuck Connors. The casting of Neilsen shouldn’t have raised any eyebrows – he was in distinguished company in doing this. And his role wasn’t anywhere near as broad as Frank Drebbin would later be. Neilsen just turned out to be one of the few Zucker/Zucker/abrahams went back to for more movies.
I never think I’m going to like Nick Nolte or Kevin Bacon in anything they do, and I always love them. Even KNOWING I’ve always loved them doesn’t make me go into a film THINKING I’m going to love them…or even LIKE them. But I always do.
The stage version of “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”: I still cannot wrap my mind around the fact that John Lithgow has a really good singing voice.
Well, while they never used anyone quite as heavily as Nielsen, Robert Stack appeared again in Baseketball, Lloyd Bridges did the Hot Shots movies, and they even reused Kareem in Baseketball and Reggie Jackson as well. (who first appeared in The Naked Gun.)
Two for me…
I was furious when I heard Reese Witherspoon would play June Carter in Walk the Line- but she did a more than decent job. I liked her performance much more than Joquin Phoenix. Secondly, I’ve always thought Friends was awful and admittedly held a prejudice towards its cast until I saw Lisa Kudrow in The Opposite of Sex. I couldn’t believe how funny and touching she could be and I must confess to occasionally watching re-runs of friends just to watch her.
Well, I chose the term poorly; I meant “washed up.” Sure sign: he was a guest star three times on “The Love Boat.”*
First of all, Connors wasn’t in the film. And, of course, Stack and Bridges were in the same boat – former leading actors who were cast, not because they were top stars at the time, but because of the connection to their earlier persona. I could have mentioned them, but focused on Nielson because he was able to revitalize his career with the role. Bridges was particularly bad doing comedy (unlike Nielson and Stack, he didn’t undertand he was funniest when he underplayed, and he was even worse in Hot Shots), and Stack didn’t seem particularly interested in doing more comedy.
*Love Boat guest stars fell into two categories: young, upcoming actors/actresses for the younger audience and old, washed-up names for the older audience.