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Good Actors in Horribly Miscast Roles
Self | December 1, 2012 | PJ-Comix

Posted on 12/01/2012 6:09:35 AM PST by PJ-Comix

Even good actors sometimes get horribly miscast in the wrong roles. The case most often cited is this first one in which John Wayne played an odd role for him...a Mongol warrior.

John Wayne: Miscast as Genghis Khan in "The Conqueror," the Duke had to utter lines like: "My blood says, take this Tartar woman."

Susan Hayward: Co-starring as the tartar woman love interest in "The Conqueror." Yeah, an Irish chick from Brooklyn as a Tartar woman on the Asian steppes. The closest thing about Hayward to a tartar is that she had a tart tongue.

Chuck Connors: Tall, blond, blue-eyed, Connors somehow was chosen to portray an Apache Indian barely five feet tall. Does not compute!

George Peppard: I really enjoyed watching "The Blue Max." My favorite aerial movie about WWI. However, one person just did not fit the role...George Peppard as Lt. Bruno Stachel. Peppard was simply too American to convincingly portray a German. Oh, and you don't have to be a German to portray a German since two English actors in the same movie were very convincing as German officers: James Mason and Jeremy Kemp.

Laurence Olivier: Yes, even actors at the top of the acting profession can be horribly miscast as Olivier was as General Douglas McArthur in "Inchon." Thankfully very few people have seen Olivier in his completely miscast role.

Leslie Howard: I recently saw "Gone With The Wind" again for the umpteenth time and noticed that Leslie Howard was quite long in the tooth to be playing the youthful Ashley Wilkes. And did Southern gentlemen talk with British accents?

Jimmy Stewart: Stewart was almost twice the age of the 25 year old Lindbergh when he flew solo across the Atlantic. Sorry, but mere hair dye does not make one convincingly youthful in "The Spirit of St. Louis." Actually, George Peppard would have been good in the role of Lindbergh...if he mastered Lindbergh's slightly sing-song upper Midwest accent.

Richard Burton: As Leon Trotsky in "The Assassination of Trotsky."

Charlton Heston: His miscasting in "A Touch of Evil" was so horrible that it was even referenced in "Ed Wood" when Wood ran into Orson Welles at a bar and after telling Welles about being forced to miscast roles, Welles replied: "Tell me about it. I'm supposed to do a thriller for Universal. They want Charlton Heston as a Mexican."


TOPICS: Music/Entertainment
KEYWORDS: actors
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Okay, I've given a few examples of good actors who were horribly miscast. Now give me your examples. Remember, the criterion is that it must be a GOOD actor who got stuck in a lousy role. That means, say, Pauly Shore in "Biodome" doesn't count. Got it?
1 posted on 12/01/2012 6:09:44 AM PST by PJ-Comix
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To: PJ-Comix

Gregory Peck as Dr. Mengale in “The Boys from Brazil.” A laugh fest anyway, with some ridiculous dialogue. “You fool! I AM a doctor!”


2 posted on 12/01/2012 6:12:55 AM PST by miss marmelstein
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To: PJ-Comix

I think Stewart got the role of Lindbergh in part because he was a flier, and because he would have been PERFECT for the part when he was 25.


3 posted on 12/01/2012 6:15:19 AM PST by Arthur McGowan (If you're FOR sticking scissors in a baby girl's neck and sucking out her brains, you are PRO-WOMAN!)
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To: PJ-Comix; miss marmelstein
Geriatric Robert Mitchum and Polly Bergen as the middle-aged leading couple in the miniseries "Winds of War." (I've been complaining about that one for 30 years now.)

I liked Gregory Peck in "Boys from Brazil." I don't see that as a miscasting, whatever one thinks of the movie otherwise.

4 posted on 12/01/2012 6:20:15 AM PST by Homer_J_Simpson ("Every nation has the government that it deserves." - Joseph de Maistre (1753-1821))
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To: PJ-Comix

Just look at any cheesy SYFY channel original movie and they’ll have a bunch of unknown actors with 1 or 2 good SYFY channel series stars reading really crappy scripts.


5 posted on 12/01/2012 6:22:08 AM PST by cripplecreek (REMEMBER THE RIVER RAISIN!)
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To: PJ-Comix

Funny you should mention “Inchon” in your writing. I was stationed in Korea when that was filming there and many of us soldiers were hired to play Marines as extras for the film. So, in effect, I was a stand-in for my late father who participated in the actual landing.


6 posted on 12/01/2012 6:23:37 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet (I'll raise $2million for Sarah Palin's presidential run. What'll you do?)
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To: PJ-Comix

Lemme think.......uhhhhh.... Horrible miscasting,
I think I remember.....Tony Danza as George Washington
in “Who’s the Boss?” the story of the American Revolution.
Oh, I forgot....they had to be good actors.....


7 posted on 12/01/2012 6:25:05 AM PST by supremedoctrine
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To: PJ-Comix
How about a small variation - a willfully and deliberately miscast that turns into a masterpiece.

I nominate Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher

I'm certain this was some liberal attempt at tweaking the noses of conservatives by having a liberal screwball play a conservative icon. And it blew up on them twice.

First, I guess Streep couldn't help herself and gave a bang-up performance.

Second, what the twisted liberal mind thought people would find appalling - Lady Thatcher's unbending and uncompromising will to do what was needed - resulted in every conservative like myself cheering with joy.

Damm do we need politicians like that today!!!

8 posted on 12/01/2012 6:25:25 AM PST by I cannot think of a name
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To: PJ-Comix

Micheal Keaton as Batman...

I pulled it off but I still think of him as Mr. Mom...


9 posted on 12/01/2012 6:28:55 AM PST by JZoback
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To: PJ-Comix

Worst. Evar!...Laurence Olivier in black face as the Mahdi, in “Khartoum” with Chuck Heston. Olivier couldn’t decide wether he was doing Othello or Amos and Andy. Can’t watch his scenes without cracking up!


10 posted on 12/01/2012 6:30:25 AM PST by PowderMonkey (WILL WORK FOR AMMO)
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To: PJ-Comix

Best actor in a miscast has to be the current empty suit in the white house. Really belongs on Broadway as Santa Claus


11 posted on 12/01/2012 6:37:42 AM PST by shadeaud (We need to learn to know what our enemies are truly creating)
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To: PowderMonkey

LOL....I had completely forgotten about that one and you are SO right. Heston was great as Gordon, but Olivier as the Mahdi was laughable.


12 posted on 12/01/2012 6:38:14 AM PST by RightOnline (I am Andrew Breitbart!)
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To: PJ-Comix

Arnold Schwartzenegger cast as anyone...


13 posted on 12/01/2012 6:38:24 AM PST by Paisan
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To: PJ-Comix
Robert Redford and Mia Farrow in Gatsby.

Gatsby was supposed to be this mysterious, enigmatic character who brooded at his window, pining for Daisy while sponsoring lavish parties for his guests who rarely if ever see or meet him. Redford comes across as too flighty, whimsical and extroverted for the role.

On the flip side, Daisy Buchanan was to be this flighty, reckless coquettish, high society party girl, and Farrow was too much the introvert to pull it off convincingly.

Curiously, Sam Waterston as Nick Carraway, in the very same movie, is for my money, one of the most perfect casting choices ever made by a Hollywood studio.

14 posted on 12/01/2012 6:40:05 AM PST by Joe 6-pack (Que me amat, amet et canem meum)
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To: PJ-Comix

Tom Cruise as Jack Reacher in the upcoming release of Rock of Ages


15 posted on 12/01/2012 6:40:31 AM PST by from occupied ga (Your government is your most dangerous enemy)
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To: PJ-Comix

‘The Iron Petticoat’ was on TMC a couple of nights ago

Katharine Hepburn plays pilot Captain Vinka Kovelenko, a character that defects from Russia.

Sat and watched most of it because of Bob Hope(love Bob Hope movies) but this one was bad. Her accent was terrible (from the Connecticut region of the Soviet Union) - the whole story was slapped together.


16 posted on 12/01/2012 6:42:17 AM PST by libertarian27 (Check my profile page for the FReeper Online Cookbook 2011)
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To: PJ-Comix

Obama as pissadent.


17 posted on 12/01/2012 6:45:45 AM PST by Mouton (Voting is an opiate of the electorate. Nothing changes no matter who wins..)
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To: from occupied ga

Cuban Gooding has been miscast in scores of movies. Reminds me of that David Chapelle episode where he had Wayne Brady play a bad guy. The problem was Brady did such a convincing job I could never look at him as the same nice guy that appeared on The Drew Carey Show after that. I think he committed career suicide that night...lol

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/bb6875cff8/chappelle-show-daves-night-out-with-wayne-brady-from-uploaderguy


18 posted on 12/01/2012 6:47:30 AM PST by jsanders2001
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To: libertarian27

Janet Leigh as a Russian fighter pilot in “Jet Pilot.”


19 posted on 12/01/2012 6:51:15 AM PST by PJ-Comix (Beware the Rip in the Space/Time Continuum)
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To: PJ-Comix

Eddie Murphy as a cop, did’nt work for me. He was good as a con though.(see 48hrs.)


20 posted on 12/01/2012 6:52:24 AM PST by John 3_19-21 (Stand for something or fall for anything.)
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