Contrasting Performances

Sometimes an actor's greatness can be seen in just one performance (Brando in On the Waterfront, for example), but sometimes it takes seeing an actor or actress in more than one role to recognize how versatile and, perhaps, great they truly are. This is a thread to discuss such performances. What are some of your favorite instances when a performer showed his or her talent in two different roles? I'd prefer that we stick to films that were released fairly close together, but there really are no rules.

I'll start the ball rolling with one of my favorites: Dustin Hoffman. For years I thought of him as the greatest living movie actor. Although I can't say that I feel the same way now, I still hold him in very high regard. Two reasons are his performances in two of his earliest films: The Graduate and Midnight Cowboy. In The Graduate he gives a perfect depiction of disaffected youth, being very naive and unsure of himself, but gradually becoming more and more self-confident, even as he has no clear idea of his ultimate destination, other than his short-term goal of marrying Elaine Robinson. His role as Ratso Rizzo in Midnight Cowboy, released less than two years later, couldn't be more different. Here he convincingly plays a crippled third-rate con man. Dirty and broke, but with plenty of street smarts, he takes the naive lead character Joe Buck (Jon Voight) under his wing, guiding him through the urban jungle of New York City. Two great films; two great, but very different roles for one actor.

I remember a friend commenting that he thought Hoffman did a lousy job in The Graduate because he was obviously so unsure of himself.


The Graduate (1967)


Midnight Cowboy (1969)

That is funny stuff.

His send up of producer Robert Evans in Wag the Dog is hilarious. Of course it was an impersonation that he had been worked out years ago. At the end of The Kid Stays in the Picture, the documentary about Robert Evans that Evans narrates the credits role over an antic Dustin Hoffman doing the most hilarious impromptu impression of Evans during the filming of the Marathon Man.

__________________
Louise Vale first woman to play Jane Eyre in the flickers.

Very interesting!
I loved Hoffman's performance in Wag the Dog, but didn't know it was based on a real person. I thought he was doing a send-up of Hollywood moguls/producers in general.

You really should see The Kid Stays In The Picture. It's a wonderful documentary.

Gian Maria Volonté



Usually plays a psychopathic killer in spaghetti westerns.

In Christ Stopped at Eboli, he is a caring, exiled Doctor.

DiCaprio.

From this...



To this...

__________________

I'm not familiar with Volante other than in the westerns, but I'll put Christ Stopped in Eboli on my list

Leo is a great choice. He's a very versatile actor.

I'll look for it. Thanks.

This is a school-like eg, but Anthony Hopkins`s performance in "The elephant man" and in "The silence of the lambs" are totally contrasting (in something they are similar, depends what kind of view you have on Frederick Treves, anw...). In the elephant man, Anhony plays a doctor who whants only the best for John Merrick, helping him to have as much a normal life, as anybody else has, treting him as a normal person and with respect in the end, which is not the case in the begining of the film, where the two of them have just met. While, the role of infamous Hannibal Lector was in a sense more complex. and difficult, ut he played it well (great) and with calm through the whole film, wich is interesnting, at least for me. The two roles, are kind of similar in a way, but in another way, totally diferent and contrasting.

Hopkins is superb; one of the best actors out there. I love the quiet menace he brought to the role of Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs.

But he always plays, basically, an English gentleman. I realize the characters in the two movies were very different, especially in their motives, but was the way he played them so very different? I'm not disagreeing with you, necessarily, but honestly asking.

(In fact, I'm about to watch Remains of the Day on Netflix right now).

Nice choice, a great film. Maybe I wasn`t clear enough, English is not my mother tongue so I cant always say what I meant correctly (and sometimes understand clearly). I agree with you on that the characters were different, and that the way that he played both roles is similar (mostly the calmness, the suprise when he sees John for the first time, and when Clarice tells him the deal), but Fredy is good, and Hannibal is bad, that`s what I ment by contrast.

I think maybe it was I who may not have been clear enough in explaining what I was looking for. I wanted to discuss different performances, not necessarily different characters.

Remains of the Day was great, by the way.

The actor who made me think of this thread is James Stewart.
He is best known for playing a stammering, aw-shucks kinda good guy (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It's a Wonderful Life, Harvey, The Philadelphia Story, etc). The first time I saw him play against type was years ago when I first saw Flight of the Phoenix. His character, pilot Frank Towns, is just plain mean, and I was (and still am, for that matter) truly impressed. Since then I've seen Stewart in Vertigo, Winchester '73, and other movies where he plays characters who are at minimum irascible if not downright mean, and I've come to realize that he could play just about any character type. If you doubt it, check out Winchester '73 (one of the best Westerns ever made), or Flight of the Phoenix, Shenandoah, Vertigo, or The Greatest Show on Earth).

When greatest-ever actor lists are put together, Jimmie Stewart isn't always mentioned (and I know I'm guilty of that, too), but he should be.

Here Cary Grant went from a nerdy professor with some really bad luck...



to a super suave undercover agent...


than from cool spy to boozy loner...


And all equally handsome...

__________________

Mind-reader!
I had been thinking about Grant, but I hadn't thought about Father Goose, but rather his turn as a cockney ne'er-do-well in None But the Lonely Heart. This came, in Grant's career, between Arsenic and Old Lace and Notorious. Just further ammunition for your argument.

Thank you. But the funny thing is that Arsenic and Old Lace was actually filmed in 1941, but it wasn't released until 1944.

Interesting, but that doesn't change its place between those two films.

Another gem where Grant showed off his considerable talent was Charade, where he starred opposite Audrey Hepburn in "the best Hitchcock film Hitchcock never made." Charade was released one year before Father Goose, and showed Cary Grant at his charming, sophisticated best.

Charade is in my top five favorite movies and it is the first Cary Grant movie I ever saw.

AH, I always suspected you had good taste.