The technology for doing it keeps improving, but casting one actor to play multiple characters in the same movie is a trick that goes back at least as far as the days of Lon Chaney and Douglas Fairbanks. This week’s Roundtable looks at some of our favorite examples that pulled it off.
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TV shows are allowed too.<\/p>\n
Many actors have played dual roles, but how many performers have played eight \u2013 that’s right, eight! \u2013 separate parts in the same movie? Anyone able to accomplish that Herculean feat would have to be one of the greatest actors of all time… and he is. Sir Alec Guinness played eight different roles in the 1949 comedy classic Kind Hearts and Coronets<\/a><\/em>, a gloriously dark British romp about an aristocrat (Dennis Price) who’s been disowned by his wealthy family because his mother married a man well below her social standing. Her dying wish is to be buried in her family’s crypt, but when the request is denied, her outraged son decides to become the Duke of D’Ascoyne (a.k.a. head of the family) so he can honor it. The only trouble is that there are eight eccentric family members ahead of him in the succession line. What’s a devoted and bitter son to do? Why, kill them all, of course! <\/p>\n Guinness plays all the unfortunate victims, including one woman, in a gimmick that’s both uproarious and inspired. Mass murder was never this much fun, and Guinness gives one of the great comic performances in cinema history. Kind Hearts and Coronets<\/em> has remained a film favorite over the years, even spawning a recent Tony Award-winning Broadway musical, A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder<\/em>. See it if you get a chance; it’s hilarious! Better yet, see the film!<\/p>\n It’s rare that our Roundtable topic gives us a chance to pay homage to a daytime television actor, but this week’s does exactly that. I hope I’m not the only one who remembers the late, great David Canary’s dual role as twin brothers on the now-defunct ABC soap opera All My Children<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n Canary joined the cast back in 1983, and just a year later it was revealed that his character Adam Chandler had a meeker, innocent twin named Stuart. Canary would play the hard-edged Adam and the much softer Stuart for the next 25 years and won five Emmys for his portrayals.<\/p>\n He may not be the best actor in this week’s Roundtable, but few other actors can claim playing two characters over such a long period of time.<\/p>\n Outside of some obvious bests (Dr. Strangelove<\/em>) and worsts (Alien: Covenant<\/em>), rewatching Jumanji<\/a><\/em> recently slightly blew my mind. I watched the movie a ton on VHS as a kid, but I think I had only seen it maybe once since the early 2000s. Watching it again earlier this year with the family, I must have been at least halfway through before I realized that the same actor, Jonathan Hyde, plays Sam Parrish (featured early) and Van Pelt (pretty much the chief antagonist). It’s not very in-your-face casting, but the way that I missed it for all those years and only just noticed it still has me a little shocked.<\/p>\n When you think of the romantic comedy as a genre, there’s an excellent chance that the first two faces you picture are those of Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. And while your thoughts almost certainly turn towards the colossally successful likes of Sleepless in Seattle<\/em> or You’ve Got Mail<\/em>, their first time co-starring together didn’t exactly set the box office on fire.<\/p>\nShannon Nutt<\/span><\/h3>\n
Brian Hoss<\/span><\/h3>\n
Adam Tyner (DVDTalk<\/a>)<\/span><\/h3>\n