I’m not sure whether to count Steve Carrell: he was appearing in a Woody Allen film, and stealing scenes in BRUCE ALMIGHTY and ANCHORMAN, well before starting his famous run on THE OFFICE – but he’d done plenty of television work before that.
But his first on-screen work was apparently a small movie role – so if you’re fixing to disqualify him on a technicality, maybe qualify him on a technicality instead.
But she won an Oscar for ***The Last Picture Show ***shortly before her character became well known on The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
Beyond that, LOADS of TV stars had some movie success early in their careers.
Tony Randall was in dozens of movies before starring on TV in The Odd Couple, most notably in the old Rock Hudson/Doris Day comedies.
Ernest Borgnine starred on ***McHale’s Navy ***after winning an Oscar for Marty.
Carroll O’Connor had small parts in many movies, including Liz Taylor’s Cleopatra and James Michener’s Hawaii, before playing Archie Bunker.
Long before*** Father Knows Best or Marcus Welby***, Robert Young appeared in movies like*** Crossfire***.
Long before Gilligan’s Island, Jim Backus was James Dean’s Dad in Rebel Without a Cause.
Long before Columbo, Peter Falk had roles in Murder Inc. and Pocketful of Miracles.
TV’s favorite frontiersman Fess “Davy Crockett/Danie Boone” Parker, was in the giant ant movie Them!
Telly (Kojak) Savalas was in ***The Birdman of Alcatraz ***and The Dirty Dozen.
Michael Landon starred in ***I Was a Teenage Werewolf ***long before ***Bonanza ***or Highway to Heaven.
Christopher Lloyd and Danny DeVito were mental patients in*** One Flew Over the ******Cuckoo’s Nest ***before appearing on Taxi.
Years before comedies like ***Soap ***or Empty Nest, Richard Mulligan had a memorable role as insane General Custer in **Little Big Man.
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Ted Danson was in the horror anthology Creepshow years before getting on Cheers.
More recently…
Tony Shalhoub had small roles in many movies (including ***The Siege ***and Barton Fink) before starring in Monk.
David Schwimmer had small roles in ***FLight of the Intruder ***and Jack Nicholson’s ***Wolf *** before playing Ross on Friends.
James Gandolfini had small roles in over a dozen films – including some pretty big movies, like CRIMSON TIDE and GET SHORTY – before he started working on television in general and playing Tony Soprano in particular.
Would Cybil Shepherd count? She was the female lead in The Last Picture Show (her first acting role) and had a supporting role in Taxi Driver, but at least for people my age is much better known Moonlighting and her sitcom Cybil.
Jane Lynch has had a long career in both movies and TV, and until about five years ago was probably best known for supporting roles in Christopher Guest mockumentaries and in The 40 Year Old Virgin. She’s much more famous now die to her role as Coach Sue on Glee.
Speaking of which, Craig T Nelson had lots of small movie roles before Coach.
How bout Anthony Edwards? In the '80s, he’s the other other guy in Top Gun; he’s the stoner in Fast Times At Ridgemont High; he’s a Revenge Of The Nerds nerd; he’s second banana under everyone from John Cusack to Timothy Dalton to Beau Bridges; and then comes his career-defining role on ER.
Tom Skerritt. He did lots of character work in movies and even had a lead in a major hit film* – which did nothing for his career. But being cast as Jimmy Brock in Picket Fences won him an Emmy and got him noticed.
*MASH. He played Duke Forrest. Who was Duke Forrest? The guy who was left out of the TV show, even though he was equal to Sutherland and Gould in the film.
After playing Sally Field’s husband in Punchline, and Nicolas Cage’s old prison buddy in Raising Arizona, and a whole bunch of movie cops, and yet other roles in films headlined by Walter Matthau or Kirk Douglas or et cetera, John Goodman became famous as Dan Conner on Roseanne.
Kirstie Alley’s first big exposure was as Saavik in Wrath of Khan. Five years later she was the female lead on Cheers.
Patrick Stewart’s big break as Jean-Luc Picard came after years of supporting roles in Dune and Excalibur and Lady Jane and et cetera.
About any working male actor in the 50s and early 60s probably put some time in on horseback. And many later well known actors put in some time in those live anthology dramas on tv in the 50s and 60s too. Isn’t the progression generally bit parts to supporting parts to lead roles?
Dennis Franz had small parts in plenty of movies before he became TV’s go-to actor for cops from HILL STREET BLUES to NYPD BLUE and beyond. (And, come to think of it, Dann Florek was kind of all over the place in big-screen supporting roles before his four-hundred-episodes-and-counting run on LAW & ORDER incarnations.)
Shifting gears entirely, I figure Ty Burrell’s a celebrity not from his performances in BLACK HAWK DOWN or DAWN OF THE DEAD – and not from playing Nicole Kidman’s husband in FUR, or spending film after film after film in Edward Norton’s shadow, or whatever – but from his Emmy-winning role as Phil Dunphy after all of that.
Charlie Sheen should be the start of a new thread - “Actors and actresses who starred in films, tanked, and got new careers in TV”
Jon Cryer wouldn’t qualify for that one because he always played second banana roles in films - kind of like when he started with Two and a Half Men.
Leading roles in Hiding Out (he’s the one hiding out) and Morgan Stewart’s Coming Home (he’s Morgan Stewart).
Except for child actors and standup comedians, I would think you could probably say this is true of more TV stars than not. Most actors are going to do grunt work in film at some point.
I think one good counter-example to this thread’s premise is Jim Carrey. He’d been in films and not making it big, then finally landed a star role on a sorta cult TV show – The Duck Factory – which got wiped from everyone’s memory.
He appeared in the film Earth Girls are Easy, but was billed way down. Even when Comedy Central ran it, they didn’t mention that Carrey was in it in the advertising.
He started getting recognition on the TV series in Living Color, finally, but he really hit it big in movies with the Ace Ventura films
Lloyd Bridges was a supporting actor in a bunch of flicks before Sea Hunt.
Alan Alda was a bit player before MAS*H
He starred in The Mephisto Waltz and The Paper Lion (where he played George Plimpton) before M.A.S.H. Maybe not huge films, but he definitely wasn’t a Bit Player
Those are from memory. iMDB and Wikipedia list other roles.
No. He starred in several films; Paper Lion was his biggest hit, but was first or second lead in about five others (mostly flops).