Oh wow. I’ll second that one. I knew Sirius Black was played by someone I’d seen before, but for some reason I didn’t make the connection.
I think I’m used to seeing Oldman play through-and-through rotten characters like Zorg (Fifth Element), Zachary Smith (Lost in Space 1998 remake) and Stansfield (Léon).
Gene Hackman isn’t quite unrecognizable in {b]Young Frankenstein** – once you know it’s him. I know the first time I saw it, I didn’t know him, but upon seeing it again, once I read his name in the credits at the end, it was obvious, and I don’t know how I missed him.
I’m surprised by the appearance of Sarah Jessice Parker in Hocus Pocus. I swear that she looks completely different from herself in sex in the City.
Waltrer Brennan is also unrecognizable in the Invisible Man, as is Clint Eastwood in The Return of the Creature and as a pre-Firefox pilot in Tarantula.
How about Torin Thatcher (the evil magiciann in Seventh Voyage of Sinbad and Jack the Giant Killer, the reverend in Hawaii, and the Prosecutor in Witness for the Prosecution in The Man Who Could Work Miracles? It’s the only role I know where he has hair.
I didn’t recognize him at all as bad son George Kellogg in The Road to Wellville, until I looked it up for that nakedness thread.
Add Jim Gordon in Batman Begins to Oldman’s, “that was him?” moments.
I knew that he was in Batman Begins, but I couldn’t recognize him. Maybe his playing a good guy threw me for a loop.
I saw James Earl Jones in The Great White Hope long after seeing him in Field of Dreams and all the Tom Clancy flicks. The crazy thing is that his head stayed the same size through all that! It was huge even when he was all wiry an muscular! :eek:
I had seen Top Gun several times before I realized that Tim Robbins had a very significant role in the film. Most of the time he has the helmet and O[sub]2[/sub] mask on, but at the final scene on the aircraft carrier he is very reconizable.
Man, that is hilarious! I never picked up on that before - but I can picture both characters in my head and you are definetly right.
I actually felt a jolt when I noticed that was Bowie. Took me out of the movie for a minute. Then I had to whisper it to my wife.
“That’s David Bowie!”
“Whu? Where?”
“Right there! Tesla!”
:eek:
He was great.
I watched almost a full season of 2 and a Half Men before my husband clued me in that the reason I recognized Alan is because he was “Duckie” from Pretty in Pink. :smack:
I also spent the entirety of Way of the Gun trying to figure out where I knew Longbaugh from. It wasn’t until I was driving home from the theater that it hit me; Dr. Gonzo! Man, he looked a lot different.
Patrick Stewart in I Claudius as Sejanus.
(Where did that hair go?)
James Earl Jones is also the bombardier in Dr. Strangelove (1964). I didn’t recognize him when he first appeared, but as soon as he spoke you knew who it was.
Brad Pitt in Kalifornia. Creepy.
^^^Back to the propman, more than likely. I think Stewart revealed that he went bald at nineteen.
Sir Rhosis
Oops, was referring above to Patrick Stewart’s hair, didn’t realize the thread had gone to two pages.
Sir Rhosis
He’s the martian who tells Larry (aka Rocketman) where the bomb is located.
Y’know, the bomb that will destroy Earth so Mars can take it’s place. 
It took a few viewings of Almost Famous for me to realize that the band’s new manager is played by Jimmy Fallon. He didn’t suck or try to be wacky, so I never knew it was him.
Don’t Martians need an Iludium Q-37 Space Modulator to do that?
I’m so used to seeing John Voight in movies nowdays that it was a shock to see him so young when I caught Deliverance on TV the other day.
Same goes for Vince Vaughn. He’s been in so many movies lately that when I saw him again in Swingers he just looked so thin.
And even though he stars in the film Swingblade, Billy Bob Thorton does not look or sound like any of his recent roles (where he seems to play himself) in that movie.
I have to consciously remind myself that Eli Wallach (who was just in last week’s Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip as a doddering old man) was Tuco in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.
IMDB says he began to lose his hair at 19. He was 36 when the picture was taken, 5 years later when he was in Excalibur he still had side hair. So possibly their was help from the prop department but much of that hair was likely still his own.