I was looking at the pre-order for Crime Story’s DVD reissue & noticed that the editorial review said “Featuring a stellar supporting cast that includes Stephen Lang, Bill Campbell, Ted Levine, Darlanne Fluegel and Joseph Wiseman. Guest stars include David Caruso, Julia Roberts, Gary Sinise, Kevin Spacey, Ving Rhames, Lorraine Bracco, Michael Madsen, Pam Grier, Steven Weber, Laura San Giacomo, Stanley Tucci, David Hyde Pierce, Andrew Dice Clay, Deborah Harry, and more.” That’s a whole lot of actors who became well known and, in most cases, well respected. Other than Pam Grier I don’t know if the others were particularly on the radar in 1986. Anyone else know of a tv show that proved as prescient?
Of that list, Bill Campbell, Andrew Dice Clay and Deborah Harry were all at least on par with Pam Grier, fame-wise, in 1986.
Bill “Billy” Campbell had starred in “the Rocketeer.”
Andrew Dice Clay’s was a darling of obnoxious, racist, misogynist, homophobic Frat boys everywhere for his standup routine.
Deborah Harry was the lead singer of the punk / new wave band “Blondie.”
That didn’t happen until the '90s. Back in '86, he was just a guy who’d done a little soap-opera work, maybe shown up for an episode of FAMILY TIES, that sort of thing.
I think The Rocketeer was early 90’s. Also that Clay’s heyday started after the series ended or at least after the first season of Crime Story. You’re right about Harry though.
Most of the anthology shows like Playhouse 90 or Studio One in the 1950s had a plethora of big names before they became famous. Studio One had Charlton Heston, Leslie Nielson (before Forbidden Planet), John Forsythe, Richard Kiley, E. G. Marshall, Lorne Greene, William Shatner (who did tons of TV before Star Trek), Art Carney, Mildred Natwick, Nancy Marchand, Mildred Dunnock, Jack Klugman, Anne Bancroft, Eva Marie Saint, Eva Gabor, James Dean, Edward Asner, Beatrice Straight, Bea Arthur, Lloyd Bridges, Joanne Woodward, Elizabeth Montgomery, Jack Warden, Dick York, Jason Robards, Martin Balsam, Yul Brynner (with hair!), Jack Lemmon, Grace Kelly (at the time she made High Noon), Robert Cummings, Vincent Gardenia, Walter Matthau, Jack Palance, Tony Randall, Eli Wallach, Mike Wallace (of 60 Minutes), Lee Remick, Keenan Wynn, Alan Young (Mr. Ed), Frances Sternhagen, Jerry Stiller, Jack Lord, Barbara Bel Geddes, Richard Basehart, Lee J. Cobb, Peter Falk, Steve McQueen, Dennis Hopper, and James MacArthur.
I haven’t checked on all of these, but most were up-and-coming young actors at the time; there were also quite a few people toward the end of their movie careers.
I’m sure Playhouse 90 has a similar list.
St. Elsewherehad a pretty good crop of interns through its run: Denzel Washington, Alfre Woodard, Bruce Greenwood, Howie Mandel, Mark Harmon, Ed Begley and David Morse, to name a few.
Whoever did the wiki article for “The Rifleman” (1958-63) listed all the various guest stars.
“The Untouchables” which aired at roughly the same time had a whole bunch of guest stars like Robert Redford, James Caan, Elizabeth Montgomery, Robert Duvall. Peter Falk, Martin Landau, Lee Marvin, Leslie Nielsen, Carroll O’Connor and many others.
It wasn’t usual for older series to get so many up and comers. They needed the work and I doubt if it cost much. You hear stories about James garner battling to get $1,200 a week for “Maverick”. In contrast Kyra Sedgwick gets something like $325,000 an epsisode for “The Closer” that she can safely invest with Bernie Madoff.
One of the treats in watching old episodes of Rod Serling’s ***The Twilight Zone ***is spotting future stars.
Among the people you’ll see:
Robert Redford (as a wounded policeman who’s really Death in disguise)
Charles Bronson and Elizabeth Montgomery (as the last survivors of a nuclear war)
Both William Shatner (twice) and Leonard Nimoy (in a small role as a WW2 soldier)
Dennis Hopper (as a neo-Naz)i
Robert Duvall (as a mentally disturbed man who falls in love with a doll in a miniature house)
Ronny/Ron Howard (as a kid Gig Young remembers from his childhood)
Peter Falk, as a Castro-like dictator
Of course, since this was an anthology series with no permanent stars, there were BOUND to be a lot of openings for young actors and actresses (some had big futures ahead of them; most, of course, didn’t).
More recently, Judd Apatow’s “Freaks & Geeks” and “Undeclared” both boast an impressive list of “before they were famous” roles. Most of them aren’t huge A-Listers (though several are), but it’s an impressive list anyway:
"Freaks & Geeks"
James Franco
Seth Rogan
Jason Segal
Busy Phillips
Ben Foster
Lizzy Caplan
John Francis Daley (“Bones”)
Martin Starr (“Adventureland,” “Knocked Up”, “Party Down”)
Linda Cardellini (Velma in Scooby-Doo movies + 126 eps of “ER”)
"Undeclared"
Jason Segal & Seth Rogan again
Jay Baruchel
Charlie Hunnam (lead in “Sons of Anarchy”)
Jenna Fischer (“The Office”)
Amy Poehler (was known a bit for UCB, but was just starting SNL the same season as Undeclared)
Kevin Hart (huge comedian right now)
How about the short-lived 1979 sitcom Working Stiffs? The stars were Michael Keaton and Jim Belushi… and Paul “Pee Wee Herman” Reubens was a regular.
Some mid-to-late Seventies variety shows launched a lot of careers, even if the shows themselves were terrible and nobody was watching them.
The ensemble cast of Richard Pryor’s dreadful variety show featured Robin Williams, Sandra Bernhard, Tim Reid and Marsha Warfield.
Howard Cosell’s “Saturday Night Live” ensemble featured several guys who’d eventually be stars of NBC’s “Saturday Night Live”: Billy Crystal, Christopher Guest, and a pair of brothers: Bill Murray and Brian Doyle Murray.
COLUMBO is pretty terrific for this: you’ve got Kim Cattrall getting seduced by her professor, Bruno Kirby as a cadet illicitly brewing hard cider, Jamie Lee Curtis slinging hash as a young waitress, Jeff Goldblum protesting outside an embassy, Katey Sagal working as a secretary, Vic Tayback as a money-hungry artist, Dabney Coleman as a no-nonsense cop, Marc Singer as a young actor playing a young doctor – even Blythe Danner as the killer’s unsuspecting wife, with Pat Morita as her Asian houseboy!
A single episodeof Law & Order from 1991 featured, as guest actors, Samuel L. Jackson, Gil Bellows and Phillip Seymour Hoffman (in his first screen role). That’s got to count for something
I remember seeing a long list of actresses who appeared on Seinfeld before becoming famous elsewhere, such as Teri Hatcher, Mariska Hargitay, Lauren Graham, Wendie Malick, Debra Messing, etc. There’s a longer list on Wikipedia.
If we stick to Oscar winners, the following actors appeared on the cop show “Naked City”:
Robert Duvall
Jon Voight
Gene Hackman
George C. Scott
The Outer Limits had lots of future stars, as did The Twilight Zone. They had lots of already-known stars, too.
Outer Limits in its initial run had
**Robert Duvall
William Shatnet
Leonard Nimoy
Martin Landau
Donald Pleasance
Robert Culp** (three times!)
** David McCallum
Sally Kellerman
James Sikking
Dabney Coleman**
Twilight Zone featured:
**Jack Klugman
Jonathan Winters
William Shatner
Burgess Meredith
Billy Mumy
Lee Marvin
Cliff Robertson
Fritz Weaver
Dick York
Martin Landau
Martin Balsam
Ross Martin
Jonathan Harris
Warren Oates
John Fiedler
Vic Perrin** (The “Control Voice” from the Outer Limits!)
**Donna Douglas
Burt Reynolds
Elizabeth Montgomery
**
and lots of recognized stars – Agnes Moorehead, Charles Bronson, J. Past O’Malley, etc.
How about Michael Douglas, in Streets Of San Francisco? Wiki says the show was good for Tom Selleck, John Ritter, James Woods, Stefanie Powers, Martin Sheen, Nick Nolte, Meredith Baxter, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mark Hammill, and everyone else from a pre-Happy-Days Tom Bosley and a pre-Eight-Is-Enough Tom Bosley to a pre-Starsky-and-Hutch Glaser and Soul…
I also remember a young Rashida Jones, now on Parks and Recreation in a couple episodes.
Bracken’s World–In the first season, studio head John Bracken was heard but not seen. In the second season, he was played by Leslie Nielsen.
Ditto for the 1985 remake of the series. It featured early, before-they-were-famous appearances by many actors:
Bruce Willis
Terry O’Quinn
Eric Bogosian
Fred Savage
Michael Moriarty
Morgan Freeman
James Cromwell
Nana Visitor
Brent Spiner
Ethan Phillips
Terry Farrell
Andrew Robinson
Tim Russ
Interestingly, the last seven of these all went on to become noted Star Trek alumni, and with the exception of James Cromwell, are best known for these roles. One has the impression that the Trek casting directors spent a lot of time watching The Twilight Zone…