"just show up"

[terebi_me]

Inspired by this hysterical email sent to me by Shawna at the end of the work day yesterday (we were both punchy, I guess, because I usually am, and she was wired on coffee):

(on the subject of Robert Downey, Jr.)
"I worry that in another few years he will bore me to tears with his patented RDJr brand of fabulousness. He walks in, acts like his

Comments

Well it's not awesome

[xaos23]

but I've always thought that Tom Cruise tended to play himself (in an uber-man style though)....
Actually I've had thoughts recently that that is what most actors (American?) seem to do these days...they are hired for their personality not for their ability to play other roles....but maybe I'm watching all the wrong movies. :-)

Re: Well it's not awesome

[terebi_me]

Actually - and this is not meant as an endorsement of Tom Cruise in any way - he actually does play characters not as much himself now and again, especially these days - witness MAGNOLIA and COLLATERAL. Also, the "Tom Cruise brand" is surprisingly flexible and allows for quite a bit of complexity, because he's totally playing himself in WAR OF THE WORLDS and EYES WIDE SHUT, but those are very much two separate people because of the context of the film they're in.

Full disclosure: I utterly loathe Tom Cruise as a person, but I think he's actually a pretty good actor and he's impressed me several times. I will not financially support any film that he does (last one I paid money to see was EYES WIDE SHUT, and that's because it's Kubrick) but he definitely has cinematic talent. I think he'd be terrible on stage.

[the_automatik]

HAHAHA! So true.

[terebi_me]

oh Christophe Lambert - my second-favorite cross-eyed actor (my very favorite is Karen Black, of course, followed by the sublime Jennifer Coolidge). What IS M. Lambert up to these days? Did someone beat him senseless with a VHS copy of TARZAN: THE LEGEND OF GREYSTOKE?

[the_automatik]

James Spader, for sure.

[pennyann]

In the "same character every time ie. himself" category (but not necessarily the "it's fabulous acting and just show up" category): Norm McDonald, Ben Afflek, Adam Sandler, Tim Robbins...

And, love him or hate him... Sean Penn. I wanted to like MYSTIC RIVER, but I couldn't ever get past Tim Robbins and Sean Penn playing themselves with Boston accents.

What's also funny to me about this phenomenon is that it seems like it is male actors that end up in this category, but not as much female actors. At least, it seems that way to me. I tried to think of a female that was this way and had a hard time coming up with one... maybe Julia Roberts? But then there's ERIN BROKOVICH... hmmm.....

OH! Dennis Quaid, too. Man I could probably make a pretty long list. In fact, the list of widely varied roles where you lose the fact that X named actor is playing that role is probably shorter.

[terebi_me]

Ooh, and Harvey Keitel, especially in THE LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST.

I like Tim Robbins, but yeah, he's pretty limited.

You're right about the "disappear the actor in the character" factor; it's unusual. A lot of them are some of my favorite actors, though - Hugh Jackman, David Bowie, Christian Bale, Cate Blanchett, Emily Watson, Alfred Molina, Gary Oldman, Toni Colette, Forest Whittaker, Emma Thompson, Ben Kingsley, Cillian Murphy, etc.

But I also like the ones who are always fundamentally themselves, or at least their "acting" personas - Brad Dourif, Edward James Olmos, William H. Macy, Adrian Pasdar, Edward Norton, Hugo Weaving, etc. etc. I could go on for hours.

[pennyann]

Oh and also... I wonder what Chris will be like in HAIRSPRAY as John Travolta's husband...

He was on the Daily Show last night in all his fabulousness and I totally thought of you and giggled.