This is the most memorable part of the movie, and he steals the whole memory of the movie from far better and hammier actors. Lemon, Pacino, Spacey and Pryce were also in that movie.
Heath Ledger was always going to steal the movie with Dark Knight and the Joker because the Joker is a meaty and hammy role. How utterly unlike any other Ledger performance and how strange was unexpected. But what doesn’t kill you makes you stranger.
The Fugitive was the first one that came to mind for me too. Harrison Ford is pretty good in it, too, but his character just isn’t at interesting.
In TV, Jack and Karen were supposed to be secondary characters on Will and Grace, but I think they were what most people watched the show for.
Oh, TY for the reminder - I keep meaning to order that on DVD and forgetting.
Arguably, he’s a scene-stealer in Trainspotting too, and that’s even with a lot of other brilliant actors. I found him genuinely terrifying, and he’s so mild-mannered in most of his other roles (that I’ve seen, anyway).
What always comes to mind are Bronson Pinchot’s (remember cousin Balky?) two minutes on screen as Serge in Beverly Hills Cop (the first one). To steal a scene from Eddie Murphy takes some doing, and he did it twice.
It’s not a very well known film, but in the movie My Life Without Me, there’s a doctor played by Julian Richings, who has a just haunting sympathy for the main character.
I would also argue that the last scene in Heat of Val Kilmer and his wife stole the entire movie, and effectively rendered what was supposed to be the big climactic end between Pacino and De Niro, superfluous. The movie drags after that point, not because it’s any slower than the rest of the movie had been, but because they just can’t top the drama of that one scene.
I was going to jump right in and say Robert Carlyle also, but expand it to any show or movie that he has ever been in. He just owns the screen in everything he does going back to the early parts of his acting career. I’m glad it’s not just me who appreciates how great he really is!
I’m not sure I agree with the definition of scene stealer being used here. The star of a movie (like Depp in Pirates) can’t steal a scene because he owns a scene. If the scene is written to focus on a character (like Huston’s) he is not stealing a scene either. Stealing a scene is when the audience focuses attention on a subsidiary character who is not the point of a scene - famously dogs and kids.
I never watched “Happy Days” but I bet Winkler stole the scenes he was in in the early shows, which is why he got more screen time.
I also first thought of Heath Ledger in the Dark Knight. He walks in, steals the scene, steals the movie, and walks off leaving everyone in shock. And to think I thought Jack Nicholson had done the unbeatable Joker act.
He deserved the Oscar even had he lived, though I rather doubt he would have received it.
I’d also say Vin Diesel in Pitch Black. They basically re-wrote the ending for him to live because he had out-acted the script and made Riddick more than just a somewhat redeemed villain/hero.
Elsa Lanchester petty much walked off with any scene in which she appeared in Bell, Book, and Candle. Of course, dust motes can steal a scene from Kim Novak, but it’s a little tougher to steal from Hermione Gingold and Jack Lemon.
In the old Bewitched TV show, Marion Lorne as Aunt Clara walked away with every episode she appeared in. One could argue that ALL of Samantha’s relatives were designed to be scene stealers, but watch the later episodes with Alice Ghostley’s Esmerelda doing the same shtick and you’ll immediately see the difference.
She actually makes me forget, momentarily, the actual main storyline that I’ve been loving. She’s more interesting than the admittedly beautiful Joseph Fiennes and whatsername. For a few glorious moments, I’m watching a movie about Queen Elizabeth I. And then she’s done, gone, poof, and I’m once again watching a movie about Shakespeare and his lady love.
While she may have had the most lines in her scenes, I do not think that the scenes as written were meant to star her in that way. Certainly the movie as a whole does not star her. It was meant to be a movie about the actors, and the play and the romance, not about the queen.