Have A Seat On The Casting Couch

shouldazagged said:
Topol as Tevye in "Fiddler On The Roof"--one of the few older musicals that doesn't look dated and hokey to watch again.

Gary Cooper in "High Noon".
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Zero Mostel made the part of Tevye on broadway, and he was put out when Topol got the part. If somebody can do it better than Topol I'd like to see it.

Gary Cooper in 'High Noon' Yup.
 
Good way to get strung up

Texas Star said:
Notice that Van Cleef's character left his rifle in the saddle boot on his horse outside the saloon. That happened in a lot of Westerns. I always wondered if any rifles were stolen that way. Maybe more people were just honest then.
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I don't think people were more honest but messing with a guy's gear or horse wasn't just common thievery, people lives depended on their stuff and it was taken VERY seriously. Also, approaching a camp or a house without hailing for permission to come over was grounds for justifiable homicide.
 
Texas Star said:
John Wayne was not only a parody of himself as Genghis Khan; he played a Roman officer in a blibical movie who was simply out of place.
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It was a crucifixion scene in, I think, 'Ben Hur'. I was expecting his line to read:

"Truly this man was the Son of God... pilgrim"

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Correction: It was "The Greatest Story Ever Told"
 
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rwsmith said:
Zero Mostel made the part of Tevye on broadway, and he was put out when Topol got the part.
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About a hundred years ago I saw Mostel on some TV show do a number as Tevye--"If I Were A Rich Man", as I recall. He was great. But though I was a fan of Mostel, Topol absolutely nailed the role. I think the movie may have been filmed in Yugoslavia, or somewhere in that area. It was a beautiful setting, wherever it was, and looked an awful lot like how a Russian shtetl must have looked.
 
Texas Star said:
John Wayne was not only a parody of himself as Genghis Khan; he played a Roman officer in a blibical movie who was simply out of place. He had a very limited range of plausibility and simply should have avoided roles that were clearly beyond him.
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How about that movie with him as a seaman? Oy....:rolleyes:
"Long Voyage Home" I think?


Anybody mentioned Jack Lemmon & Walter Mauthau in "The Odd Couple?"
 
Fishslayer said:
How about that movie with him as a seaman? Oy....:rolleyes:
"Long Voyage Home" I think?


Anybody mentioned Jack Lemmon & Walter Mauthau in "The Odd Couple?"
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Or Jack Lemmon as Ensign Pulver in "Mister Roberts", with Henry Fonda as Roberts, and James Cagney hilarious as the captain.
 
rwsmith said:
It was a crucifixion scene in, I think, 'Ben Hur'. Correction: It was "The Greatest Story Ever Told"
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It was "The Greatest Story Ever Told" that had The Duke as a Roman Centurion. But if you look at the cast in IMDB, it was another one of those movies with practically every star in Hollywood who wasn't working at the time.

Has anyone mentioned Richard Boone as Paladin?

CW
 
Louis Gossett Jr. as Fiddler in "Roots". And Levar Burton as the young Kunta Kinte.

Roy Scheider in "Jaws" and "All That Jazz".

Bruce Weitz as Belker ("Lady, could you pass that test?") and Daniel Travanti as Capt. Furillo in "Hill Street Blues". Loved that show.
 
Australian actors

Texas Star said:
BTW, the hot chick who played the Navy Lt. on that sub show was an Australian. It's surprising how many are here, passing as American. I think they can do a US accent better than Americans can do Aussie. Not that I recall an American actor having to pass as Australian...

Did you know that two of the main actors on, "Without a Trace" are Aussies? Anthony LaPaglia sounds just like the Italian New Yorker he played. And the blonde female agent was an Aussie. It wasn't until I saw LaPaglia on Leno that he spoke in his normal voice and mentioned going home to Australia for the holidays that I realized that he wasn't a native New Yorker. I already knew about Poppy Montgomery, though.
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Australian actors? Bryan Brown in 'Breaker Morant'. Edward Woodward would be mentioned except he is really English, but plays a good Australian.
 
rwsmith said:
Australian actors? Bryan Brown in 'Breaker Morant'. Edward Woodward would be mentioned except he is really English, but plays a good Australian.
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Yeah, they were good. I liked Woodward's role as the ex-CIA guy who helped out people who were being bullied. What was the name of that show?

BTW, I mentioned Peter McCaulay earlier, on The Lost World. He is not an Aussie. He's from N.Z. But he evidently wasn't affected by the tax issue that caused American Jen O'Dell and Canadian David Orth to have to miss some Third Season episodes of the show, because the producers had to pay excess taxes or fees to employ foreign actors in more than a certain number of episodes per season. They hired Lara Cox largely to have a scantily-dressed hot chick to fill in for Jen while she was away for awhile, because Lara is Australian and could work without added fees. When Jen returned, they hit it off well and the characters became virtual sisters. But there were questions about how long Lara's character would remain. She was never listed as a regular star; just a continuing Special Guest Star. I think she was getting paid quite a bit less than the other core characters. Finances had become a serious issue, and the show ended when a major investor pulled out, saying that he wasn't making enough from the venture.

Personally, I think Lara was the most versatile actress of the three in the big treehouse, and McCaulay the best male actor.

And Lara did such a good job that for me, all of the other episodes seem incomplete without Finn.
 
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I would add......

Straightshooter2 said:
It was "The Greatest Story Ever Told" that had The Duke as a Roman Centurion. But if you look at the cast in IMDB, it was another one of those movies with practically every star in Hollywood who wasn't working at the time.

Has anyone mentioned Richard Boone as Paladin?

CW
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Richard Boone as Grimes in 'Hombre'. Gads what a mean _____!
 
rwsmith said:
Australian actors? Bryan Brown in 'Breaker Morant'. Edward Woodward would be mentioned except he is really English, but plays a good Australian.
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Seems to me that Brit and Aussie actors are better trained in accents than most of ours. Several key characters in "Band Of Brothers", including Damian Lewis, were British. Lewis was so convincing that for some time a few of the crew didn't believe he wasn't American.

Bob Hoskins, Eddie in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", is a Brit. Kenneth Branagh can do American very well, and Peter Ustinov could do several regional American accents.

Of course we have Streep, who can nail any accent they ask of her.
 
Andy Griffith in "A Face In The Crowd"--really chilling.

Mark Harmon as Ted Bundy in a made-for-TV, and Tommy Lee Jones as Gary Gilmore ("Executioner's Song"), both scary as hell.
 
Jeremy Brett & either David Burke or Edward Hardwick as Holmes & Watson. All three were perfect. Burke and Hardwick played Watson as a distiguished brave ex army surgeon not a bumbling comic relief sidekick like Nigel Bruce did the Basil Rathbone movies.

Speaking of Rathbone,he did one of the best sword fights I've ever seen on film in a comedy w/ Danny Kaye (The Court Jester). Rathbone was an international level competitive fencer in real life. Remember that "The flagon with the dragon contains the brew that is true"? :)

Darren McGavin as Karl Kolchak in the made for TV movie The Night Stalker.Chris Sarandon & Roddy McDowell -Fright Night.
 
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Sorry fellas, the best casting ever was John Astin in "Evil Roy Slade". Now that was a classic especially the train whistle and when he talked to the vultures that raised him.
 
James Cagney in everything, he did it all, sing, dance.

Bob Crane/ Col. Robert E. Hogan
John Banner/ Sgt. Hans Georg Schultz
Werner Klemperer/Col. Wilhelm Klink

James Arness/Marshall Matt Dillon
Milburn Stone/Dr. Galen 'Doc' Adams
Amanda Blake/Kitty Russell
Ken Curtis/Festus Haggen
Dennis Weaver/Chester Goode
 
shouldazagged said:
Heath Ledger as the Joker.
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That was simply both a brilliant casting choice and a brilliant performance.

I used to "know" an anti-gunner in usenet who, personality wise, was the spitting image of the Ledger "Joker".

The singular component of his personality was what the Germans call "schadenfreude". His only "joy" in life was vicariously savoring harm to others, and little else. The day after 9/11, he was telling 9/11 "jokes". He used to haunt a couple of the chronic pain support newsgroups, swearing at and bullying little old ladies with cancer and other ailments and telling the unsophisticated that they needed no anti-virus software. He actually called somebody's employer to try to get them fired for what they posted in usenet. He had an all-consuming hatred and contempt for everybody other than himself. Fortunately, (as far as anyone knew) he never managed to put that into any tangible practice.

Between "Dave" and my predecessor at my last job, who's literally stolen from EVERYBODY he's ever worked for or with, I've met some real psychopaths. Ledger's performance was spot on. It makes you wonder what he could have done had he lived.
 
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