# Roles that literally could only have been played by one person **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 26, 2015, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898 "2015-05-26T19:44:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/41 "2015-05-26T23:24:00Z")
> [@Peanuthead](#): > > I [can](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noseMJc2Pm0). Of course I’ve seen this before. Fallon doesn’t really have the looks, and certainly doesn’t have the acting credentials. The voice impersonation is good though, like all Jimmy’s acts. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/42 "2015-05-26T23:27:19Z")
I’ll play … Given the times and the roles, while other people have played Quasimodo and the Phantom of the Opera, nobody alive in the mid-1920’s was able to do it as effectively as **Lon Chaney** , makeup maestro and man of a thousand faces. … To me, it’s difficult to see anybody other than **James Cagney** play George M. Cohan in _Yankee Doodle Dandy_ - I’m sure that many people at the time, prior to the release, would have had a hard time seeing the usually hard-boiled-gangsta Cagney a fit _for_ the role. So he doesn’t really fit other than in that “You didn’t read the OP” way, but 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/43 "2015-05-26T23:29:55Z")
> [@Leaffan](#): > > I can’t imagine anyone else pulling off what Val Kilmer pulled off as Jim Morrison in “The Doors.” > > He sang all the parts himself with total believability, and the acting was spot on. I haven’t seen that, but that’s what I’ve heard. Similarly, Johnny Depp was pretty well spot on in Fear and Loathing. If you watch the documentary Gonzo, IIRC, they have some comparisons and it’s almost hard to tell apart Depp and Thompson. Now, sure, someone else could have played Hunter in Fear and Loathing, but probably not like Johnny. Of course, I’d wager that most of the people that watched the movie (such as myself) had no idea who Hunter S Thompson was, much less what he sounded like, what he looked like or what his mannerisms were. It was just a movie about cocaine and acid. ---
**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 26, 2015, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/44 "2015-05-26T23:33:25Z")
So it’s 1977 and you’ve gotten the green light for a SUPERMAN movie, and you can pick literally any guy on the planet for the title role. No, go ahead; I’ll wait. ---
**Author:** ![tapu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@tapu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tapu)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/45 "2015-05-26T23:43:34Z")
Peter O’Toole in “The Stuntman” And thinking of the actors in that, others may have been able to play Manson in “Helter Skelter” but it’d be tough to beat Steve Railsback. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/46 "2015-05-26T23:46:44Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > So it’s 1977 and you’ve gotten the green light for a SUPERMAN movie, and you can pick literally any guy on the planet for the title role. No, go ahead; I’ll wait. It’s much more fun to read the list of other actors considered for the part (and cringe): Warren Beatty, James Caan, Burt Reynolds, Kris Kristofferson, Nick Nolte, Robert Redford, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Ryan O’Neal, Jeff Bridges, Jan-Michael Vincent, David Soul, Robert Wagner and Jon Voight. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/47 "2015-05-27T00:11:46Z")
> [@Sefton](#): > > No one could play Indiana Jones except Harrison Ford. If they’d cast Tom Selleck, it would have been awful. There are FIVE actors who could have played Indiana Jones - and did. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/48 "2015-05-27T00:15:19Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > I’m pretty sure Peter Dinklage is the only actor who could pull off Tyrion Lannister. He has both the sense of humor and gravitas the role needs. [I think Jordan Prentice could have done it.](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0696015/reference) I used to confuse the two of them before Game of Thrones came on. ---
**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:** [May 27, 2015, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/49 "2015-05-27T00:17:42Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > The first attempt at filming the book had Arnold playing the Fezzik. By the time they filmed it, Arnold was too big a star but he recommended Andre for the role. Much better choice but there are also several other wrestlers or football players who would have been good in the role. Maybe, but William Goldman, who wrote the book, said Andre was exactly what he had in mind for the role. [Sidekicks](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105402/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_16)would not have worked without Chuck Norris. The point of the film was that the kid was training in martial arts and kept fantasizing about Norris helping him out. There was no one else of that stature in the martial arts field (as far as the general public was concerned). I don’t think anyone else could have played the parts that the Marx Brothers, W. C. Fields, Charlie Chaplin, and Buster Keaton made famous. And no one but Jacques Tati could ever be M. Hulot (at least, not live action). The role of Jonathan Brewster in **Arsenic and Old Lace** was written for Boris Karloff (who played it on Broadway). Raymond Massey just didn’t work in the film (there were many jokes about Jonathan killing people because they said he looked like Karloff; the lines fall flat). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/50 "2015-05-27T00:18:11Z")
> [@bup](#): > > Have you seen _ **The Aviator** _ (the biopic about Howard Hughes)? Cate Blanchett \*disappeared \*into Kate Hepburn for me. > > I’m trying to think of early movies, before special effects were good, where maybe an actor was the only person physically capable of pulling off some feat in a movie - like Houdini, who was reportedly a terrible, horrible, no-good very bad actor in the few movies he headlined, or Johnny Weismuller (but clearly other people played Tarzan). Probably the closest I could come is Harold Russell in **The Best Years of Our Lives** , where he played a serviceman returning home after losing both hands when his ship had been sunk. Harold Russell actually _had_ lost both hands (due to a training accident, not in combat). It’s kind of hard to find an actor who not only could act (he received the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor) and had both hands blown off. But for roles that (now in beautiful hindsight) we see only one person could play, George C. Scott as _Patton_ sticks out in my mind. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/51 "2015-05-27T00:39:07Z")
I’m looking to be educated, Dopers. I was very, very lucky in that when the movies came out, I had never read the Lord of the Rings books, read The Hobbit a long time ago–didn’t like it, remembered almost nothing of it–never saw the Bakshi film, or anything else to give me a visual reference, in short, I had no expectations. I can’t imagine anyone but Ian McKellen as Gandalf. Maybe John Gielgud? Died in 2000. Max Von Sydow? I 'unno. Richard Harris? Too frail looking in the Potter films. Christopher Plummer? Nah. I’m open to suggestions. (Pardon the slight hijack) ---
**Author:** ![jrbor76](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9e8a1a/32.png) [@jrbor76](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jrbor76)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/52 "2015-05-27T00:42:39Z")
Seth MacFarlane as Ted. That is all. ---
**Author:** ![Battle\_Pope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@Battle\_Pope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Battle_Pope)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/53 "2015-05-27T00:43:24Z")
Audie Murphy as Audie Murphy in _To Hell and Back._ ---
**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 27, 2015, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/54 "2015-05-27T00:44:53Z")
> [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](#): > > I had no expectations. I can’t imagine anyone but Ian McKellen as Gandalf. Maybe John Gielgud? Died in 2000. Max Von Sydow? I 'unno. Richard Harris? Too frail looking in the Potter films. Christopher Plummer? Nah. > > I’m open to suggestions. Sean Connery? ---
**Author:** ![JohnGalt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johngalt/32/184_2.png) [@JohnGalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnGalt)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/55 "2015-05-27T00:51:31Z")
I can’t imagine anyone other than John Cleese playing Basil Fawlty. ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/56 "2015-05-27T00:51:55Z")
It’s a very small set of films, and for certain definitions of “only” the answer is zilch. I’ll mention the horrible bit in an **Ocean’s Eleven** sequel where Julia Roberts creates a disturbance because she looks just like Julia Roberts. But, that dumb joke would work with any famous actress. The best candidates are star vehicles: the Presley movies, the Beatles films. Star vehicles where the actors are encouraged to do their shtick (and their shtick makes up much of the movie’s content) include: Robin Williams in **Aladdin** (animated.) Jim Carrey’s films, such as **The Mask**. Maybe Eddie Murphy in **Beverly Hills Cop** The films could have been made with other actors, but would have been so different as to not be the same film. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/57 "2015-05-27T00:52:57Z")
Maybe the most obvious is Bogart in Casablanca. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/58 "2015-05-27T00:54:26Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Sean Connery? Now your talkin’. He’s still in his thirties, though, isn’t he? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/59 "2015-05-27T00:55:53Z")
> [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > Yeah, Hugh Jackman is six foot, Wolverine about five foot three’. I was referring to Peter Dinklage play Tyriol Lannister, a character who is shaped a great deal by the fact he is a dwarf. Mr. Dinklage is an actor who happens to be a dwarf. It sort of seems required for the part. Certainly, cheaper than the CGI required to make an actor of normal height appear to be half that. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2015, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898/60 "2015-05-27T01:00:18Z")
> [@Battle\_Pope](#): > > Audie Murphy as Audie Murphy in _To Hell and Back._ Apparently they toned down the truth becuase the director thought it wasn’t believable for audiences. That is hardcore. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/roles-that-literally-could-only-have-been-played-by-one-person/720898.md?page=4)