Entertainment For Lively Minds
The Anachronistic Acting Role
I caught a repeat of an episode of Yes Minister on one of those satellite channels that we collectively term in the Bisto household as The Effing Watersheds - i.e. the only channels that seem to have anything to watch at 9pm on those few occasions you sit down to watch something on the telly.
I was reminded as ever just how marvellous Nigel Hawthorne is as career civil servant Humphrey Appleby. I then caught something on another channel about Sandra Bullock's new film and I suddenly remembered she and Nigel Hawthorne appearing together in a ropey old Sly Stallone vehicle, Demolition Man, in which Stallone is cryogenically frozen in the present day and then unfrozen in the future to chase down Wesley Snipes' no-gooder, although throughout the film Sly's face seems to be permafrosted in one fixed expression. Boom tish.
So there is Sir Humphrey Appleby dressed in robes in the year 2032 stood next to Sandra Bullock chastising Sly Stallone in a place called San Angeles and it just feels odd, nay wrong. Although I can buy into the idea of the film that people can be suspended in animation my belief can't be suspended at the idea that Humphrey Appleby is on screen and not Nigel Hawthorne as Dr. Raymond Cocteau. I could accept Nigel Hawthorne as King George but not as Dr. Raymond Cocteau.
Another example is Ian McShane in Sexy Beast playing Teddy Bass. No it's not, it's Lovejoy playing Teddy Bass.
Who else suffers this fate when you catch them in 'another role'?
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Secret Diary Of A Call Girl
I saw one episode and turned it off traumatized by the thought that Rose had ended up on the game.
Any film at all featuring a cast member of Friends has this problem.
Starbuck
has turned up as a CTU operative in the new season of 24. And one of the Cylons is an evil arms dealer. This is more than my brain can handle! (Am only onto season 2 of BSG... so no spoilers please!)
King George
I read at the weekend that Nigel Hawthorne only acted in Demolition Man to raise his Hollywood profile so that they wouldn't object to him being in The Madness of King George.
It is a constant problem
Although not quite in the same vein as yours, which have a queasy feeling attached, these seriously interfere with my ability to "suspend disbelief".
Ian McShane, as well as Teddy Bass and Lovejoy, as the nasty brothel proprieter in Deadwood.
Joe Pantoliano morphing from Ralph Cifaretto in The Sopranos into a baddie in The Matrix.
Alex the FBI man in Prison Break turning up as the blonde skater's fur coat wearing evil millionaire father in Blades of Glory.
James Stewart, John Wayne, Frank Sinatra, etc. etc., playing basically the same character in every film is also there somewhere.
On the plus side, the nasty man who tried to kill Jack Bauer's daughter in 24 got his comeuppance when he was "offed" by Dexter
Joe Pantoliano
Perhaps it's just the way you phrased it, but surely you're not suggesting that Ralphie wasn't evil.
Certainly not
Ralphie was evil. Badly phrased!
Although Henry Fonda used that to good effect
by going against a lifetime's grain and turning up as a baddy in Once Upon A Time In The West.
(I now expect someone more knowledgeable than me to point out that I'm wrong!)
Charlie Wilson's War.
K&M made this point in their review..
Half way through and our heroes have set up a meeting with a shady arms-dealer. They turn up. It's not a shady arms-dealer. It's Ken Stott. They can't buy knock-off rocket-launchers from Rebus!
I can't get to grips with Ray Winstone in Big Films; he's a good actor but his American accent still has too much of a Plaistow twang and it doesn't work.
Joss Ackland in Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey. Not right.
Keanu Reeves in anything other than Bill and Ted. "Saft.. what lide fram yanner winner breaks, dude?"
"Isn't that the King of the Pixies?"
Watched Priscilla, Queen of the Desert just after seeing The Fellowship of The Ring. Sort of spoiled the gravitas for me. Agent Smith, fine - Mitzi, no.
Tackarama
in Mordor.
Oh and
by 'eck as like is it local villain Cliff Brumby who gets chucked off the Gateshead multi-storey by Jack Carter it's bloomin' Corrie grocer Alf Roberts!
Don't know his name but...
...the guy from the Orange Mobile Phone adverts in the cinema (most recently seen pushing Danny Glover through a window) turned up in the George Clooney film "Michael Clayton" and it got an unintentional laugh.
I've a few of these
Dan
from Eastenders is a good one. Did you not find that his London accent sounded false in that film even though he's probably from London?
Brian Murphy terrorising Oli Reed is a peach. I missed that one first time around. See also Yootha Joyce flirting with Warren Beatty in Kaleidoscope!
2001 - Space Odyssey
After the majesty of first seeing the space station, all to the beautiful soundtrack - one of the first people we see on board is Rigsby/ Reggie Perrin (whichever your preference), dear old Leonard Rossiter himself. Always breaks the spell for me as most of the other actors are not known outside of this film.
Stanley Kubrick's films must
suffer from this a lot, as he used talented British character actors, often better known for TV work in the UK. Barry Lyndon not only features Leonard Rossiter again, in 18th century Ireland, but also one of Basil Brush's other stooges, "Mr Billy" Boyle. And John Savident, the butcher from Coronation Street, is in A Clockwork Orange, as a smooth and posh psychiatrist.
similarly
in amidst the austere cerebral sci fi of Ziggy Jr's "Moon", up pops Dixon Bainbridge/Douglas Reynholm
John Savident
Also pops up as one of Sir Humphrey's Mandarin colleagues in "Yes, Minister"
I say...
John Savident also pops up as one of Sir Humphrey's Mandarin colleagues in "Yes, Minister"
Tom Baker
Showing his winkle in Pasolini's Canterbury Tales fillum. That got a guffaw from the Doctor Who fans in the cinema.
Guy Pearce and Jim Dale
No matter how good they are in Memento, LA Confidential, Ugly Betty etc there's a little bit of me singing 'Nee-igh- bours..'
This is really a curse afflicting all soap stars, but Guy and Jim have made a better fist of a Hollywood career than, well Madge or Harold.
I'm guessing
you mean Alan Dale who played Jim Robinson, not Jim Dale the erstwhile Carry-Onner :-)
An error
That confirms the point - he'll always be Jim!
Slightly different problem
Having never watched Neighbours, I had only become aware of Guy Pearce in "Pricilla, Queen of the Desert", so things like LA Confidential and Time Machine always suffer from the image of him as a drag queen in my mind.
Jim Norton
is a fine, highly respected Irish actor, with over forty years of stage, television and film work under his belt, but... whenever he pops up in anything, I just can't help but think "It's Bishop Brennan!" (from Father Ted).
Likewise, Mrs. Doyle recently turned up in Shameless, shagging Frank Gallagher. SO wrong. Although the temptation for the director to ask her to shout "GO ON! GO ON!" must have been immense.
of course, in my day it was Old Spice...
After a good six months of me banging on about how brilliant John Boorman's "Excalibur" is, a friend of mine caved in and watched it - I promptly got a text saying "It's got the bloke from Keeping Up Appearances, and he's riding around to the theme from The X Factor!!"
Ooh, just remembered
I caught Basic Instinct the other week, for the first time in donkeys' years. We get to the famous leg-crossing scene in front of the detectives at the police station. And who's at the head of the table, mouth agape?
Heeello New-man
First thing I think of when I see that fella
is Third Rock From The Sun. Which reminds me how odd it is to see John Lithgow in one of his many straight roles, when I know him first and foremost as Dick Solomon.
You probably don't want to see
Series 4 of Dexter, then...
And on the subject of Yes Minister
Is it disconcerting to see Mr Derek as Bernard Wooley or Bernard Woolley as Mr Derek?
He was married to Lesley Judd
I love such trivia.
I'm now imagining
Basil walking Ms. Judd up the aisle; he in top hat and tails, she in tank top and Blue Peter badge.
Travis Bickle and Tom Good
(Robert De Niro and Richard Briers) sharing a two-hander in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. That can't be right, can it?
Star Wars
I don't know if anyone remembers the awful 80s kids' TV show Jonny Briggs ("Ooh, owwer Jonny!"), but the fella who played his dad appears, briefly, in the first Star Wars film. Every time I saw it, I had an image of one of Darth Vader's henchman popping off to put the kettle on and do the crossword.
In a similar fashion, Mr Bronson from Grange Hill is Hitler in one of the Indiana Jones films. Except he isn't. He's Mr Bronson.
Mr Bronson
...is also in the Empire Strikes Back. Darth Vader does him over for losing the Millenium Falcon.
Bronson also turns up in
First series of Auf Wiedersehen Pet as German Building Site Manager Heer Grunwald. Gets headbutted/thumped by Michael Elphick.
Gets headbutted/thumped by Michael Elphick.
You mean 'Boon'?
Cliff Claven
driving a tank (or summat like that) in A Bridge Too Far. Well dodgy postal round that one!
And he's on all the Pixar movies, from Toy Story onwards
That is odd. Including the little clip they have on the end of Cars making fun of it. Having said that, not sure if he's in "Up".
The Fantastic Four sequel
Well, good evening Detective Pembleton! Sure you don't want a cigarette and to deflect a verbal barb from Munch? Oh well, please yourself.
Cosy sitcom Peter Barkworth tw*ts Dirty Harry Clint Eastwood in
Where Eagles Dare