Bandit LOAF
Long Live the Confederation!
Not even your example makes sense -- The Majestic follows two hugely succesful Jim Carrey movies with him in 'serious' roles...
Wing Commander movie coming to terrestrial UK TV
- Thread starter Pedro
- Start date
Not risky? You lost any credibility with that remark. There are very few things in life that are risk-free my friend. You need to go to Hollywood so you can tell them how "proper auditioning" will eliminate risk. See you at the Oscars!Originally posted by Pedro
Its not risky if you audition them first to find out how well they can do the partd'uh
Nope, my interest is based on a target audience. How many Disney movies have you been to lately - well maybe you shouldn't answer that. Hey, Scooby-doo may turn out to be REALLY good, OSCAR quality even. Be sure to post your review.
I guess I missed the fact that Dr. Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) Me, Myself & Irene (2000) were Carrey's stereotype breaking roles. So, my example aside, you believe that a typecast actor could never hurt a movie's success?
Quarto
Unknown Enemy
It's not anywhere as risky as it seems. On the whole, most actors who suffer from typecasting are very eager to try different types of roles, and I have yet to see a movie where this doesn't pay off. I'd give you a whole bunch of examples of where a typecast actor in an unusual (for him/her) role gives a brilliant performance, but... well, my memory sucks. So, I'll limit myself to one - Bruce Willis in The 12 Monkeys.
Actually, wait, here's another. Ed O'Neill, who for years and years had played Al Bundy in Married With Children, suddenly puts on a great performance in The Bone Collector. And surprise surprise, nobody thinks, Gee, why is Al Bundy pretending to be a cop?
LOAF answers this point very well - you're ignoring Carrey's other movies. Take The Truman Show, for example. I mean, if Carrey's stereotype would negatively affect the success of any serious movie, you'd think it would affect the most the first serious movie Carrey does... but The Truman Show was a success. Ergo, the problem with The Majestic must lie elsewhere, and your point is groundless.
I haven't seen American Pie, so I can't comment about Biggs. But Mike Myers as Maniac...? Good choice! He should be able to fit the Maniac character very easily.
Bandit LOAF
Long Live the Confederation!
I fail to see how such semantics does anything for your point -- you know perfectly well that The Truman Show (1998) and Man on the Moon (1999) *also* both precede The Majestic.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait! Did I say that actors enjoy being typecast? Did I say that typecast actors couldn't do other things brilliantly? No & No. I believe that I did refer to Robin Williams didn't I? And I'll say it again, getting audiences to accept a typecast actor, outside his genre, usually requires good acting and/or good scripts * preferrably both * to make a successful movie. The Majestic point holds true as long as Carrey remains typecast - and isn't he? Ask someone the genre of movie they first think of for Jim Carrey - Comedy maybe? I don't think he's fully broken his typecast yet.
From yours/Pedros comments one would think that being typecast is not a big deal when you're trying to expand your depth/breadth as an actor.
From http://www.filmmakers.com/features/acting/acting7.htm
A fellow like John Wayne is the same in every picture. And Jimmy Stewart is always Jimmy Stewart, no matter what he's playing. And you like it. You like him. And personalities are very important. Director Paul Morrissey has similar thoughts on the matter, "The public likes the security of knowing the actor before he goes in. They like when Clint Eastwood is Clint Eastwood. If he tries to be someone other than Clint Eastwood, they resent it. In effect, Clint Eastwood has created that artist man, Clint Eastwood, on screen. As an artist, he has to be Clint Eastwood."
Being typecast is a problem that plagues actors today. Typecast means that a particular actor is known for and typically only considered for a particular type of role. Arnold Schwarzenegger for example, is known for his muscle man, robotic-type characters and is cast for many roles of that type. Examples of these films have been those action flicks such as Terminator, Predator and End of Days. Although he has been cast in family comedies such as Kindergarten Cop and Twins, these roles are rare and generally not as popular for audiences.
Okay - from the last sentence can't you somehow infer that cross-casting an actor introduces some risk?
I know, I was just yanking your chain for the earlier Corv. Sum. remark. As far as his performance in Truman, (I didn't see MOTM) I didn't see him acting that far outside his "comfort zone" - didn't he pretty much play a silly, loveable, kinda funny type guy? Okay, he cried at the end so I guess it's considered a drama
. I don't think he's fully broken his typecast. Here are some actors that I think have (at least partially) broken their typecast: Tom Hanks, Harrison Ford, Danny Devito. With these guys I can't pin down one particular genre. With Carrey it's *still* comedy, with Prinze teen romance for me. Still you're spending a lot of time picking apart one example and ignoring the point. Which is...You/Pedro/Quarto didn't answer my question: Do you think that a movie's success is immune to its star's typecast (either positively or negatively)? I think that typecast can affect a movie's performance tremendously. That is my point. I think that if you look, you'll see that it's no secret that casting agents have to be conscious/cautious of the typecast that a particular actor has.
Quarto
Unknown Enemy
The answer to your question is yes. The star's typecasting - in my opinion - has no noticeable influence on a film's success. It is only a frequently-used excuse when people don't feel like trying to work out what really went wrong.
Let's take an example of where typecasting could be assumed to have affected a film's success - Blade Runner (1982). Why was Blade Runner a failure as far as the public was concerned? Was it because Harrison Ford, known primarily for Star Wars and Indiana Jones was playing in a different genre? N O. It was because the film was not a standard action film, nor even a standard film noir film - it required a great deal of analysing, which does not appeal to the the public at large. Having a different actor, typecast or unknown, would not have made a difference. Blade Runner would have still been unpopular.
Pedro
Admiral
I've got to agree with Quarto there, and just look where Blade Runner is today 
While Wing Commander was edited to a far lower standard than its original intention (as was Blade Runner hence the directors cut) it wasn't that hard to grasp, I simply feel that it came at the wrong time, WWII films are not that popular at the moment and sci fi has lost the spotlight that it had been enjoying for a good five years or so previously, who knows maybe we'll see a Wing Commander Directors Cut sweeping the planet in the future, but I'm drifting from the point...
The majority of people don't go ohhh its got *insert name here* in it we can't see it Or ooohhhhhhhh it has got them in it (if it did the screaming girls would have made WC a hit), they look at the reviews, the adverts, and after those it all comes down to if its a genre they're intrested in and when the last time they went to the pictures was (Star Wars Episode 1 can not have helped WC, even if WC was far superior, heres hoping for Episode 2).
There is possibly one actor in the world who would define a film before going, I mean god can you imagine Sylvester Stallone trying to do a romantic comedy? I don't think he can even talk that much
When you take someone like Freddie Prinze hes just an actor, hes shown no signs of having difficulty stringing together sentances consiting of more than 2 sylball words, and while he might have been in teen movies in the ones I've seen his character hardly remains the same in each, I find it impossibly hard to see where you're coming from "Hes been in teen movies therefore the world is going to think that Wing Commander is a teen movie"?
While Wing Commander was edited to a far lower standard than its original intention (as was Blade Runner hence the directors cut) it wasn't that hard to grasp, I simply feel that it came at the wrong time, WWII films are not that popular at the moment and sci fi has lost the spotlight that it had been enjoying for a good five years or so previously, who knows maybe we'll see a Wing Commander Directors Cut sweeping the planet in the future, but I'm drifting from the point...
The majority of people don't go ohhh its got *insert name here* in it we can't see it
Or ooohhhhhhhh it has got them in it (if it did the screaming girls would have made WC a hit), they look at the reviews, the adverts, and after those it all comes down to if its a genre they're intrested in and when the last time they went to the pictures was (Star Wars Episode 1 can not have helped WC, even if WC was far superior, heres hoping for Episode 2).There is possibly one actor in the world who would define a film before going, I mean god can you imagine Sylvester Stallone trying to do a romantic comedy?
I don't think he can even talk that much When you take someone like Freddie Prinze hes just an actor, hes shown no signs of having difficulty stringing together sentances consiting of more than 2 sylball words, and while he might have been in teen movies in the ones I've seen his character hardly remains the same in each, I find it impossibly hard to see where you're coming from "Hes been in teen movies therefore the world is going to think that Wing Commander is a teen movie"?
Is this an example of an actor's typecast creating a (negative) preconcieved opinion of a movie?
Blade Runner/Unsuccessful *not due to* typecast therefore ALL movies that are unsuccessful *not a result of* typecast. Kind of overreaching isn't it?
I completely disagree with "no noticeable influence" on another level. An actor's typecast can either help or hurt a movie. Because of his typecast, people will go to see an Arnold/Van Damme/Stallone action movie because they know what to expect - heavy action, tidy ending, and so on. People will go to see a Meg Ryan romance because they have seen prior Meg Ryan romances and know what to expect. These are examples of helpful typecast that I hope we can agree on.
Pedro says that Stallone playing the lead would affect his decision to see a romantic comedy, but I'll wager he has seen him in more than one action flick. Yet he has done action, drama (Cop Land), and comedy. So out of all the actors in Hollywood, this one actor is THE ONLY case of typecasting affecting at least one person's (Pedro) desire to see a movie.
From yours and Pedro's posts, why then, do actors fear typecasting? If the "majority of people" aren't affected by typecasting why are actors constantly saying they don't want to be typecast? I mean hey, to listen to you guys, typecasting is not big deal. As you say, people are equally likely to go see *insert name here* in a sci-fi action thriller as they would go see him/her in a high school romance/comedy. What's the big deal (unless you're Sylvester Stallone I guess)?
Quarto
Unknown Enemy
I talked about Blade Runner to show how people claim typecasting wrecked a movie without bothering to consider the movie on a deeper level. Nothing more, nothing less - even though I do think Blade Runner is a *very* typical example of this.
I completely disagree. Have you ever considered why the idea of typecasting has appeared? Because some actors really are better in certain roles than in others. Van Damme for example is not an especially good actor apart from his martial arts skills - ergo, he's a pretty lousy choice for any genre other than action. Not because people would go "Oh, gee, it's Van Damme and it's not action, so I'm not going to see it." Simply because his performance would be bad, and the film would get bad reviews. Typecasting would be blamed, naturally. Of course, Van Damme could surprise us all and put on the performance of his life - in which case, like a million times before, typecasting would be proven not guilty, and the movie would be successful (assuming all the other ingredients are there).
How about the other actors you've mentioned? Schwarzenegger has already proven conclusively that he can act in other movies, and this does not hurt them (films like Kindergarten Cop are popular). So has Stallone. I don't know about Meg Ryan, because I haven't seen her in very many non-romance movies (I wonder why...), but judging from her performance in Top Gun, she's a great actress and could handle many more diverse roles.
Hehehe. Before jumping to conclusions, you should ask Pedro if he would consider viewing a romantic comedy in the first place - he wouldn't. That makes his opinion very much irrelevant, as he probably thinks all romantic comedies are ridiculous and not worth seeing.
Because - as you've shown - it's easy to fall into the trap of thinking typecasting actually affects people. Yes, you'd think that movie producers and directors would be smarter than that... but hey, nobody likes adventure games anymore, right? And the spacesim genre is dead, right?
Pedro
Admiral
Actually you've got that backwards, I like a fair number of Romantic comedies, its just been my misfortune to see Stallone in more than 1 movie, I won't see action movies with him in let alone something where he needs to say more than two words.
I brought him up as the one exception, he only gets away with being type cast because theoretically the action genre doesn't require any acting skills, although stallone is REALLY pushing that rule to its breaking point.
Hey, how about an actor working in one type of role exclusively before trying different ones? That’s the generally accepted most popular reason. He/she gets known for one type of role, ie typecast. Most actors are very careful to avoid this today. However, I just can’t help but think that your example of Van Damme sounds like you are influenced by his typecast. You’re expecting him to do poorly in a romantic comedy. Maybe his TRUE talent is in comedy but he just hasn’t had the right opportunity to show it – by writing him off like you are doing you’re falling victim to his typecast. Look at Arnold – is he a great actor? I really don’t think you’ll find too many that say he is. But he has made some pretty funny comedies. Who’s to say that Van Damme can’t do the same? It sure sounds like you have.
Apparently, he does watch romantic comedies.
Are you listening to yourself? All of Hollywood is wrong and you’re right? Is this your opinion or are you going on something concrete? So being typecast is just a misconception in Hollywood? All those poor deluded actors are irrationally afraid of being typecast? Directors/producers are misguided? Please!
Gilligans Island, Brady Bunch, Sally Struthers, Mark Hamill, and on and on. These are well-documented cases of actors having trouble getting work because they were typecast. People just had problems seeing them in any other role. Or, I guess you'll say that this reason was just made up. Nobody ever actually asked a viewer. Ever watch the celebrity biographies on the E! Channel? I’ve found it to be very entertaining. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard “audiences just weren’t ready to accept *insert name here* in a different role”. I swear I’m not making it up. I think it’s incredibly narrow-minded to think that the people who make their living in Hollywood are all completely wrong just because YOU believe differently. Okay, maybe 70% of movie-goers don’t pay attention to typecasts. Maybe more. But for you to claim that it’s all a misconception and exclude the possibility that, yes, there could be a significant number that ARE affected…