Viggo Mortensen played “Moses Hochleitner,” one of the Amish, in Witness.
I just saw a little bit of Cleopatra on TV today. I had no idea Archie Bunker had been a Roman senator.
George Clooney in Return of the Killer Tomatoes. Not a small role.
Here’s a compilation of scenes from his early appearances:
He starred with Debbie Reynolds in Tammy and the Bachelor. That’s where I knew him from.
(I’m not that old, but I have watched a few old movies).
Was watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer (movie) and was surprised to see Ben Affleck as one of the opponents on the basketball team.
That could qualify as his first comedic role. Jeez but he nailed the funny there.
Well, since inanimate objects count: There’s an episode of Leave It To Beaver with the Munster’s house in it. There’s no gate or fence around it, but it’s supposed to be a creepy vacant house. Then it guest starred on Dragnet after it was washed up and out of work.
Or even better, his role as Dawson (Thor) in Adventures In Babysitting.
He also played a British General, both 1960s and his ancestor at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, on “The Time Tunnel”. He was turned down for the Skipper on “Gilligan’s Island”. Apparently casting someone who could be frustrated at Gilligan yet not perceived as a bully was a hard job until they found Alan Hale Jr.
Ruth Gordon (born 1896) appeared as an extra in some 1915 silent films and didn’t work in films again until 1940. When she won an Oscar in 1968 for “Rosemary’s Baby” she said how encouraging this was for her career.
I have Judgment at Nuremburg (1961) on my DVR. I noticed that William Shatner had a significant role as Army Capt. Harry Byers, the assistant to Spencer Tracy’s Judge Haywood.
Shatner’s actually in plenty of stuff before Star Trek. He appeared in several Tv series – Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Twilight Zone (twice, most famously for Nightmare at 20,000 Feet), The Outer Limits, * and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (with Leonard Nimoy!). He also appeared in a number of flicks, including The Outrage a western remake of Akira Kurasawa’s Rashomon. That’s an interesting flick, as far as the casting goes – besides a young Shatner, it has Paul Newman (as a Mexican !), Claire Bloom, Howard da Silva (before he played Ben Franklin), and Edward G. Robinson.
But it’s like nobody noticed him until he sat in the Captain’s chair.
*Remaking Kurasawa’s samurai films as westerns seemed to be required. They did it to The Seven Samurai and Yojimbo, too.
As well as Laurence Harvey. Who knew just how Jewish the Old West was!
“They called him…Irving.”
Old thread but fascinating. Cobie Smulders appeared on Smallville as Lexs girlfriend one episode.
David Boronez gets beaten up by Al Bundy in one episode of Married with Children. Emily Dechanel has a small part in the Alamo and Cold Mountain.
The Star Wars prequels are full of this. Kiera Knightley as a decoy Queen. Rose Byrne as a Handmaiden. Joel Edgerton as Owen Lars.
Ford played Bob Falfa, the guy in the cowboy hat who races against Paul LeMat toward the end of the flick: “That car looks like a cross between piss yellow and puke green!”
IIRC, he had just finished filming Star Wars when Coppola cast him in Apocalypse Now. (I don’t recall if Star Wars had been released yet, but he was certainly a megastar by the time his scenes were filmed.) If you look at the name tag on his Army uniform, you’ll see his character was named Col. Lucas at his request.
This may or may not be his first film appearance; I don’t know if he’s ever confirmed or denied it:
http://www.boreme.com/posting.php?id=17482
In re “Columbo”: A very young Katey Sagal (aka “Peg Bundy,” “Leela”) was the hot secretary/mistress in the episode where Jackie Cooper was running for the Senate. Kim Catrall was in one episode when she was about 15.
Somebody may have mentioned it already, but Richard Dreyfus was also a college student in The Graduate: “You want me to call the cops? I’ll call the cops!”
Walter Koenig (aka “Ensign Chekov”) was a GI in an early episode of “Combat!” Leonard Nimoy was also in a couple of episodes as a German-speaking GI (but his characters had different names).
She played a nymphomaniac with a split personality on one episode of “Night Court.” Dan Fielding managed to get her into the broom closet for a quickie and ended up regretting it. It was hilarious!
Watch him in Adventures in Babysitting.
Nimoy was also in an episode of “Sea Hunt” as a Latin American revolutionary or something similar (it must have been right about the time of the Cuban revolution).
Heh, I just resurrected a similar thread yesterday because I was watching The Fugitive last night and recognized Jane Lynch as a colleague of Harrison Ford’s character. Also, Kirsten Nelson–who plays Chief Vick on Psych–has a bit part.
The other day I saw an episode of Law & Order circa 1993 with a very young Fred Weller. I didn’t even know he was acting then, since I hadn’t heard of him before In Plain Sight.