# Young & Old Actors playing same role in One Film **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 14, 2007, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640 "2007-10-14T03:09:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Sarahfeena](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sarahfeena/32/519_2.png) [@Sarahfeena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sarahfeena)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/41 "2007-10-17T07:13:47Z")
[QUOTE=Siam Sam] I dislike it when the two actors don’t look a thing alike. That’s one of my pet peeves, along with people in films still wearing underwear during sex. Of all the people I’ve known for years and years, not one looks THAT unrecognizable from earlier days. [/QUOTE] The most egregious example of this that I can think of is actually from television…LeVar Burton playing the young Kunte Kinte, and John Amos playing the character as an adult. I’m a white girl, and I look about as much like John Amos as LeVar Burton does. ---
**Author:** ![singular1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ba9def/32.png) [@singular1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/singular1)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 11:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/42 "2007-10-17T11:31:35Z")
Mila Kunis was a remarkably believable young Angelina Jolie in **Gia**. ---
**Author:** ![corkboard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9bcb4/32.png) [@corkboard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/corkboard)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/43 "2007-10-17T13:06:13Z")
[QUOTE=Siam Sam] But the son’s not very well known. [/QUOTE] You’re right, of course. I spaced on the point of the OP, realized it after the edit window closed, and thought it would be better not to draw any more attention to my post. This never happened. This never happened. ---
**Author:** ![BlinkingDuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eada6e/32.png) [@BlinkingDuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlinkingDuck)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/44 "2007-10-17T13:48:47Z")
Ms. Thompson in Back to the Future. ---
**Author:** ![OneCentStamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/13edae/32.png) [@OneCentStamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneCentStamp)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/45 "2007-10-17T14:07:19Z")
[QUOTE=BlinkingDuck] Ms. Thompson in Back to the Future. [/QUOTE] Isn’t that the opposite of the OP’s request, though? In _BttF_, Lea Thompson plays the young as well as the old Lorraine. ---
**Author:** ![Skammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skammer/32/143_2.png) [@Skammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skammer)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/46 "2007-10-17T14:13:16Z")
I don’t think anyone has mentioned Kate Winslet and Gloria Stuart playing, respectively, the young and old Rose DeWitt in _Titanic_. Both were quite accomplished actresses. ---
**Author:** ![BlinkingDuck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eada6e/32.png) [@BlinkingDuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlinkingDuck)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/47 "2007-10-17T16:24:47Z")
Crap…reading comprehension skills…must work on. ---
**Author:** ![justrob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a9adbd/32.png) [@justrob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/justrob)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/48 "2007-10-17T17:56:10Z")
[QUOTE=Clothahump] Remember the VISA check card commercial where Charlie Sheen is trying to cash a check? The clerk futzes around and around getting approval and when he finally comes back to the counter. Martin Sheen is standing there. Clerk: You don’t look like your ID photo. Martin: I did when I came in here. [/QUOTE] I think that is a pretty good commercial. I have always thought that those two should do a role like that someday. They did play a pretty believable father/son combo in Wall Street. 😉 They look so much alike and have such similar mannerisms that playing older/younger versions of the same character would come out really well. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/49 "2007-10-17T19:57:42Z")
[QUOTE=Leiko] I’ve seen Final Frontier exactly once, just to be able to say I saw it, and I’ve blocked it out of my mind so thoroughly that I don’t remember that scene. Or most of the scenes. I actually walked off and started browsing the internet while the movie was playing, so really I haven’t even seen the end. What film was the “different movie entirely”?.. [/QUOTE] Ye gods, I shouldn’t know this - the movie really _is_ crappy, after all. The flashback scene where Sarek snubs his newborn son is when Sybok does a mind-meld with his half-brother Spock to get at the source of his “pain” (totally ignoring the audience’s pain, but that’s of an entirely different order of magnitude). The “different movie” was Ken Loach’s 1967 directorial debut, _Poor Cow_, according to both Wiki and [IMDb.com](http://IMDb.com). Not what the OP was asking about, but still interesting, I think: it’s been suggested that Gene Hackman’s eavesdropping, paranoid, technophilic character in _The Conversation_ also appears, much older and under an assumed name, in the movie _Enemy of the State_. It’s a nice theory. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/50 "2007-10-17T20:27:59Z")
[QUOTE=justrob] I have always thought that those two should do a role like that someday. They did play a pretty believable father/son combo in Wall Street. 😉 They look so much alike and have such similar mannerisms that playing older/younger versions of the same character would come out really well. [/QUOTE] You mean like in post #22? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/51 "2007-10-17T20:41:45Z")
They don’t use famous actors very often, but in every single episode of _Cold Case Files,_ they have different actors playing younger and older versions of the persons involved in the case (except for the victim – they only need one, young-or-whatever actor for the victim). ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/52 "2007-10-17T20:46:10Z")
Noah Taylor & Geoffrey Rush in _Shine_. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/53 "2007-10-18T13:41:15Z")
Michael Gohlke paid a young T-Bag on a very creepy episode of Prison Break ---
**Author:** ![choie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/choie/32/7829_2.png) [@choie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choie)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/54 "2007-10-18T18:43:16Z")
Thought of a few more… Kirsten Dunst and Samantha Mathis as Amy March in _Little Women_ David Moscow and Tom Hanks as Josh Baskin in _Big_ (okay, Moscow isn’t that well known, but he did play the lead in a sitcom on the WB – as it then was – some years back) Mary Badham and Kim Stanley as Scout Finch in _To Kill a Mockingbird_ (I admit this is another stretch, since Badham’s only famous for this role, and Stanley is only in the film as narrator…) Freddie Bartholomew / Tyrone Power as the lead character whose name I forgot in _Lloyds of London_ If we’re allowed TV shows, then here are two from _Roseanne_… Sara Rue (lead in ABC’s “Less Than Perfect”) played Roseanne’s younger self in an episode; also, John Goodman played a grown-up version of D.J. (usually played by Michael Fishman) in a pseudo-“flash forward” tag in a later episode. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/55 "2007-10-18T19:48:55Z")
Also off-topic, but Rebel Alliance leader Mon Mothma was first played by Caroline Blakiston in _Return of the Jedi_, and then as her younger self by Genevive O’Reilly in the prequel _Revenge of the Sith_. ---
**Author:** ![priapus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@priapus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/priapus)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/56 "2007-10-18T21:08:50Z")
I’m not sure this applies,but Mickey Rooney plays Tom Edison as a boy.Spencer Tracy plays Edison as a man in a sequel. ---
**Author:** ![Leiko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Leiko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leiko)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2007, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/57 "2007-10-19T09:04:59Z")
[QUOTE=choie] David Moscow and Tom Hanks as Josh Baskin in _Big_ (okay, Moscow isn’t that well known, but he did play the lead in a sitcom on the WB – as it then was – some years back) [/QUOTE] Moscow might be a little more well known than a lot of people realize: he has a movie-specific fandom for his work in Newsies\*. Somewhere out on this crazy web, there’s a site that notes, quite sadly, that he is never in the shot during pelvic thrust-based choreography. \*Technically, specific two movies: Newsies, and the movie the “newsies” made called “Blood Drips Heavily On Newsies Square.” ---
**Author:** ![justrob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a9adbd/32.png) [@justrob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/justrob)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2007, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640/58 "2007-10-23T14:30:44Z")
[QUOTE=EJsGirl] You mean like in post #22? 😉 [/QUOTE] Sure, I read that one. Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez definitely have the father/son similarity of looks going on and I should check that movie out. The difference though is that I think Martin Sheen and Charlie Sheen are so strikingly similar in looks and mannerisms that it is kinda spooky. Emilio [http://images.eonline.com/eol\_images/Profiles/20060925/244.esteves.emilio.092506.jpg](http://images.eonline.com/eol_images/Profiles/20060925/244.esteves.emilio.092506.jpg) Martin [http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/3140626.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=34F6DC9BDA297B9E8478538C4682D687A55A1E4F32AD3138](http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/3140626.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=34F6DC9BDA297B9E8478538C4682D687A55A1E4F32AD3138) Charlie [![](http://www.screencaptures.net/s/sheen15.jpg) ](http://www.screencaptures.net/s/sheen15.jpg) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/young-old-actors-playing-same-role-in-one-film/422640.md?page=2)