favorite Name & Celebrate Your Favorite Character Actors

Jack Lynt

Jack Lynt

Who are some (...or all) of your favorite character/supporting actors?

Please make a comprehensive or a cursory list of your favs, or just drop a name...or just drop a few, or write an in depth essay about one or more of them...whatever you like.

Put as much or as little thought and effort into it as you feel like. Not meant to be a quiz or a chore.

But I often think about how important character actors are to the films we love (or however we feel about those films). I also regret that maybe...probably they don't get the due attention nor all the recognition they deserve.

I'll start by keeping my mentions to two. But there are so many.

Ian Holm. Wow. Soooooo many excellant roles. I may have first really noticed and really appreciated Iam Holm when I saw him play Capitaine Phillippe D'Arnot in Greystoke: Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984).

And there's From Hell, one of my favorite films. I've read and heard complaints about his casting. But I love him as Sir Willam Gull,
also known as Jack the Ripper
. Of course it's not just he who makes his performance so brilliant in this but also the whole team like the set designers, costume, the lighting, the way his eyes change color in such a subtle but amplifying way and so much more!


Maggie Smith. I haven't read the Harry Potter books yet, but I love the movies. And I love Maggie Smith playing Professor Minerva McGonagall. She's also brilliant playing Violet Crawley, Dowager Countess of Grantham in Downton Abbey and also playing Constance, Countess of Trentham in Gosford Park.


Who else you got? I know there are tons more brilliant character/supporting actors who deserve more lovin.
 
Last edited:
Christopher Plummer ;)

Let's see. Off the top of my head:

Mark Strong
Robert Duvall (used to be a leading man in his own time)
Matthew MacFadyen
Alan Rickman
Claude Rains
Paul Giamatti
John Malkovich
Frances McDormand

By no means a comprehensive list or in order of talent. Just named a few.

:)
 
As I write out my list it keeps getting longer and longer.
I am a huge fan of character actors so I'll limit my list
to 12.

Barry Corbin
Lance Henricksen
R. Lee Ermey
Ken Foree
Judy Greer
Michael Ironside
Charles Napier
Kathleen Freeman
Danny Trejo
Diane Wiest
Biron James
Vincent Schiavelli

I can proudly say I have work with six of these great actors.
Three as director.
 
I could name a thousand! But right now, I'd have to mention Brad Dourif and Giovanni Ribisi. Their performances in Exorcist 3 and The Gift, respectively, are among my favorites in film.
 
Jackie Earle Haley!!!

Others as well, obviously, but this guy is pretty much great in anything he does.
 
gary-oldman-haircuts.jpg
 
Bill Nighy. Can't get enough Bill Nighy. Love him as Viktor in the Underworld pictures. Davy Jones...great performance. His brief appearance in the Deathly Hallows Part 1 as Minister Rufus Scrimgeour was a high point of the movie, I thought. When they mentioned that he was dead already I was like, what?! Come oooooooon. Darn it.
 
Though most of his roles are pretty much the same, I think "Ray" and "The Soloist" combine to prove that Jamie Fox is one heck of a character actor, when he wants to be.
 
Glad Ernest mentioned Alan Rickman. There is hardly anything as perfect in this world as Alan Rickman playing Professor Severus Snape. But another of my favorites is Alan Rickman playing Alexander Dane in Galaxy Quest. Again, another high point in world cinema, as far as I'm concerned. And so many other great roles.

Don't you love William Fichtner's role in Equilibrium?

Another. Tom Wilkinson. Choice. This guy helps make any movie good. Think of him playing Arthur Edens in Michael Clayton. What a juicy role that helped to make that movie exceptional. I also liked him a lot as Lenny Cole in RocknRolla. I haven't seen In the Bedroom yet, but it's long been on my to-see-list and I'll be damned surprised if his part isn't outstanding in it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top