Christopher Guest in The Princess Bride.
Dan Aykroyd in Nothing But Trouble (one of the worst movies I have ever seen – not worth anyone’s time or money).
John Lithgow would fall on the Walken side of the ledger. He was born to be terrfying, but he has a remarkable gift for comedy.
Not to mention John Candy playing a woman villain(!!!) in Nothing But Trouble. I agree about it being a bad film, but at least it was supposed to be a comedy.
Michael Keaton also played the bad guy (really well, as a matter of fact) in Pacific Heights. Not sure if he’s really a comedian (I don’t know how he started out), but I’m certain he was in several comedic movie roles before playing this villain.
Bob Newhart (!!!) in Cold Turkey
I believe he did start as a comedian. He was also in the forgettable Desperate Measures a while ago. He was a dangerous-as-Hannibal Lecter wannabe character (even going so far as to rope him into a chair so he wouldn’t attack anyone).
Aesiron. I must have missed that thread, otherwise I wouldn’t have opened this one. I think continuity eror is right, also.
Bill Murray as a mob boss-stand-up, with Robert DeNiro as a meek police photographer) in Mad Dog And Glory.
Rodney Dangerfield as the Psycho Dad in Natural Born Killers; arguably Woody Harrelson’s star role in that movie, too.
John Goodman as Big Dan Teague, klansman in O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Mmmmaybe Eddie Murphy as Quick in Harlem Knights.
Michael Palin in Brazil. Bloody scary he was, too.
John Lithgow (third rock from the sun) as some neonazi in some Denzel Washington movie… and was he in cliffhanger?
Jay Mohr in Jerry Maguire.
Taylor Negron in The Last Boyscout
Paul Reubens in Buffy The Vampire Slayer
wolf in second hand clothing. You’re thinking of Ricochet.
Tom Hanks in Road to Perdition. (Hey! He started out on Bosom Buddies.)
What role did Paul Reubens play in Buffy?
The Good Life – old BBC sitcom about self sufficiency in suburbia came up in the Bad ideas thread recently – Richard Briers, who played the eponymous Tom Good, has played some very nasty old men recently. One I remember as particularly creepy was an episode of ** Morse** in which he sexually blackmails the young American wife of a fellow don.
This may not count, since it was before his famous comedy role, but the 1972 movie To Kill a Clown has a psychotic Vietnam vet tormenting, torturing and trying to kill a young hippie couple.
The psycho? Alan Alda.
In the movie version, he’s Rutger Hauer’s chief henchman. He also has a fine comedic death scene.
Adam Sandler in Punch-Drunk Love. Although the psychotically angry outburst is part of his general comedic schtick, in PDL he was genuinely disturbing.
Good call, threeorange; I totally agree. I remember seeing Punch Drunk Love and thinking, Wow, that’s what an Adam Sandler character might be like in real life, not in a movie played for laffs.
And he’s the guy holding up the store that shoots Harrison Ford in Regarding Henry.
Jackie Gleason as Minnesota Fats in The Hustler. Not a psycho, but definitely a bit of a badass.
Dan Aykroyd again, as a hit man in Grosse Pointe Blank.
Robbie Coltrane as a Russian Mafia don in a couple of the Bond films.
Danny DeVito as verious nasties in, oh, a bunch of things, including Heist and Ruthless People.
While others have mentioned the Batman films and Jim Carrey, no one has explicitly mentioned his turn as The Riddler. So I will.
That’s all I can think of at the moment.
Bobcat Goldthwaite in the Police Academy movies.