Directors who re-use the same actors

Coen Brothers:
John Turturro, John Goodman, Frances McDormand, the little round guy who played the 'Pansey Salesman' in The Man Who Wasn't There and Caspar in Miller's Crossing.

Frank Capra:
Jimmy Stewart, Beula Bondi, Thomas Mitchell.......

Alfred Hitchcock:
Jimmy Stewart, Carey Grant, Grace Kelley........

Woody Allen:
Diane Weist, Alan Alda, Mia Farraw, Diane Keaton, Rob Reiner......

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Good times, noodle salad.

That portly fellow is Jon Polito, AKA "Mr. Bumstead." I like 'im.

Why is this being dicussed in here? This forum, I mean.

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Most directors tend to use a stable of actors over and over again. This was even more prevalent in the old Studio System, where everybody was under contract to one studio or another, so there was only a certain pool of talent to choose from to begin with. Plus, if an actor and director had a hit or two together, the studio would naturally want to pair them again. John Ford's "stock company" was one of the most famous from this era, but virtually any name director used lead and supporting players multiple times.

In this day and age it is still quite common. If everyone gets along together and you've had successes, why not continue to work together? Even more common though less recognized by the general filmgoing public is that directors use the same basic crews behind-the-camera for years at a stretch, from project to project.


But is the point of this thread just to make lists?

First of all, for the Coens you forgot Steve Buscemi, who's been in five of their films (Miller's Crossing, Barton Fink, The Hudsucker Proxy, Fargo and The Big Lebowski). Jon Polito was also the impatient appointment in The Hudsucker Proxy, the private detective in The Big Lebowski and the Studio head's right-hand man and whipping boy in Barton Fink. Then there's a whole other group of actors with two appearances in flicks directed by The Coens.

Marty Scorsese:

• Bobby DeNiro (Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, New York,New York, Raging Bull, The King of Comedy, GoodFellas, Cape Fear, Casino)
• Harvey Keitel (Who's That Knocking at My Door?, Mean Streets, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, Taxi Driver, The Last Temptation of Christ)
• Diahanne Abbott (Taxi Driver, New York,New York, The King of Comedy)
• Victor Argo (Boxcar Bertha, Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, New York,New York, After Hours, The Last Temptation of Christ, "Life Lessons")
• Joe Pesci (Raging Bull, GoodFellas, Casino)
• Frank Vincent (Raging Bull, GoodFellas, Casino)
• Illeana Douglas ("Life Lessons, GoodFellas, Cape Fear)
• Catherine Scorsese (It's Not Just You, Murray, Who's That Knocking at My Door, Mean Streets, Italianamerican, The King of Comedy, GoodFellas, Casino and many other cameos with no lines)
• lots of others with two appearances, including Nick Nolte, Rosanna Arquette, Jodie Foster, David Carradine, Barbara Hershey, Daniel Day-Lewis, and Barry Primus.

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"Film is a disease. When it infects your bloodstream it takes over as the number one hormone. It bosses the enzymes, directs the pineal gland, plays Iago to your psyche. As with heroin, the antidote to Film is more Film." - Frank Capra

Moved it to this forum since it's more appropriate here...

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"I was walking down the street with my friend and he said, "I hear music", as if there is any other way you can take it in. You're not special, that's how I receive it too. I tried to taste it but it did not work." - Mitch Hedberg

Indeed. The Coens do a whole lot of this, which I like. I barely remember The Big Lebowski--it's probably worth a second.

The purpose of this is more that just list-making....it's fun.

Definitely re-visit The Big Lebowski ASAP. Like all of the movies written and directed by Ethan & Joel (and any good movie for that matter), your appreciation will deepen with every viewing. The Coens work is so fast-paced yet also subtle, it demands multiple viewings.

Kurosawa... Toshirô Mifune, Takashi Shimura

PT Anderson... John C Reilly, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Philip Baker Hall, William H Macy

Milos Forman... Vincent Schiavelli

Woody Allen... Mia Farrow, Diane Keaton and Woody Allen

James Cameron... Bill Paxton, Michael Biehn

Ron Howard... Clint Howard

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I couldn't believe that she knew my name. Some of my best friends didn't know my name.

Let me just start by saying this thread rocks the house--I love directors who have a "stable" of reliable actors, especially the aforementioned Coens and Scorsese. I have a few to add...

How about David Mamet?

- Joe Mantegna - Things Change, House of Games, Homicide, Lakeboat (directed Mamet's script),
- Bill Macy - Oleanna, Homicide, Things Change, State and Main
- Rebecca Pidgeon - Homicide, The Spanish Prisoner, the Winslow Boy, State and Main, Heist, Catastrophe, Diary of a Young London Physician (basically everything he's written and/or directed since they got married--no nepotism there)
- Ricky Jay - Things Change, The Spanish Prisoner, House of Games, State and Main, Heist
Honorable Mention: J.T. Walsh (a favorite character actor of mine, we'll miss him) - Things Change, House of Games

No coincidence here: Mantegna and Macy were members of "Mamet's Mafia"--the group of actors that Mamet preferred to use for his plays on the stage.

And who could forget John Carpenter?

- Kurt Russell (he's a stable all by himself ) - The Thing, Escape from New York, Escape from LA, Big Trouble in Little China
- Donald Pleasance - Halloweens I and II (4, 5, & 6 don't count), Escape from New York
- Jamie Lee Curtis - Halloweens I and II (H20 don't count), The Fog, and her voice was in Escape from New York

Of course, there's Quentin Taratino and Paul Thomas Anderson, but they've only made three movies apiece as of yet...

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You were a demon and a lawyer? Wow. Insert joke here."

Absolutely, you can always tell a Mamet by his actors. If not that, you can tell him by the very careful dialogue:
"The committee?"
"Yes, the committee."

Absolutely! If it's rapidfire, monotone, and too precise to be real, it's Mamet.

I love that guy. He should have a "f*ck" button on his keyboard; it'd save him time.

Definitly Kevin Smith, look at the people who are frequently in his movies:
Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Chris Rock, Jason Mewes, Jason Lee, Joey Lauren Adams, Jeff Anderson, Brian O'Halloran, and of course, Smith himself.

God I love when someone talks about Mamet...

Holden will probably lynch me for mentioning this movie again but it goes without saying, GlenGary GlenRoss, is the best Mamet movie IMO.

Spacey & Mamet & Pachino & Lemmon & Baldwin...get any better?

Wes Anderson (Bill Murray, Luke/ Owen Wilson, and many other minor characters)

David Fincher (Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman)

David Lean (Alec Guiness in most of his films)

In Wes Anderson's whopping total of three feature films (all brilliant in my book BTW), other than Luke Wilson, the only actors to be used in all of those projects are a few of the supporting players you didn't name: Dipak Pallana, Kumar Pallana and the "other" Wilson brother Andrew. Screenwriting partner Owen Wilson, Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman and Seymour Cassel have been in two of the three movies each.


Morgan Freeman has only been in the one of Fincher's five features. Pitt and Jared Leto have each been in two of his five, and I believe they are the only featured players to appear more than once. If Fincher's building a stock company, he's doing it very, very slowly.


Alec Guinness was in six of Lean's pictures (Great Expectations, Oliver Twist, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago and A Passage to India). That's an impressive list, and they are among Sir David's most renowned and popular works. But as Lean had about sixteen features total, six isn't quite "most". But he's definitely the one actor most identified with Lean's films, I'll give you that.

Oh...it reeks, doesn't it?

What two Wes Anderson films did Jason Schwartzman star in, Holden?


And we're forgetting Tim Burton. Johnny Depp is his alter-ego and Lisa Marie is in almost every Burton movie too.

That's so true.

Steven Spielberg has used Tom Hanks in Saving Private Ryan and the upcoming film The Road to Perdition

I still want an answer to this...