Toronto By Stone

Costello has done many bit parts in films and TV since the late 70's. His first was as Earl Manchester in AMERICATHON - a barely seen 1979 John Ritter comedy. Appearances followed in likewise obscure works like the British one seasoner sitcom Scully, as inept magician Rosco de Ville in the film NO SURRENDER (both by Alan Bleasdale), and rounding his '80's acting oeuvre out was a cameo as Hives the Butler in Alex Cox's (REPO MAN) odd thin-tie punk opus STRAIGHT TO HELL which had a bevy of cult musicians in small parts (Joe Strummer, Courtyney Love, members of the Pogues and Circle Jerks, etc.) These appearances were way under the radar mind you, Costello was heading towards the mainstream in the 90's starting with:

The Larry Sanders Show (HBO, 1992-1998) Garry Shandling's satirical talk-show within-a-show featured just about everybody in the business doing exaggerated versions of themselves and Costello was no exception. He appeared first in an episode in the third season - "People's Choice" (aired: 7/20/94). In one of his long time backing band's (the Attractions) last TV appearances, Costello performs "13 Steps Lead Down" complete with "Radio Radio" coda before storming out of the studio leaving a trashed dressing room behind in reaction to bad back stage treatment. The next appearance in "Everybody Loves Larry" (aired: 11/13/96) - also titled "Duchovny's Crush - Hank's Lemon" - involves Elvis selling a supposed classic car to Sanders' co-host Hank (Jeffrey Tambor) which turns out to be a lemon - man, I love stating the obvious. While he performs a beautiful solo acoustic "Little Atoms" from "All This Useless Beauty", Hank dons glasses in a weak attempt to mock Costello. SPICEWORLD (Dir. Bob Spiers, 1997) I've already written about this cameo before in the post "20 Great Modern Movie Cameos" - so I won't go on about it again.

AUSTIN POWERS : THE SPY WHO SHAGGED ME (Dir. Jay Roach, 1999) Because of his vintage brand of swinging pop Burt Bacharach has appeared in all three AUSTIN POWERS movies tinkling the ivories in a downtime romantic setting. Since it coincided with Bacharach's collaboration with Costello "Painted From Memory" - it was expected that Elvis would show up to sing to Burt's accompaniment. Elvis said of the scene: "It's the 1960's, not to give away the plot, but in some sort of magical way we end up in the 1960's doing a song." (Late Night With Conan O'Brien 11/23/98) Austin Powers (Mike Myers) breaks that ole fourth wall by introducing Elvis and Burt as if they were his guests on a talk show and they do a smooth (mimed and lip synched of course) rendition of "I'll Never Fall In Love Again". Austin attempts to woo Felicity Shagwell (Heather Graham) by way of Comical dancing as the song flows.

200 CIGARETTES (Dir. Risa Bramon Garcia, 1999) The soundtrack to this late '90's take on a 1981 New York New Year's Eve is filled with what they used to call New Wave (Blondie, Joe Jackson, Nick Lowe, Ramones, etc.) so of course Elvis would not only be heard with his definitive cover of Nick Lowe's "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding?" but also appears in a cameo as himself. After a night of mishaps and drunken revelry Janeane Garafolo wakes up to find Elvis's glasses and she realizes she slept with the man in question. PRISON SONG (Dir. Darnell Martin, 2001) As big an Elvis Costello fan as I am I was not aware of this film until I began this post and am surprised that it has him playing 2 roles - Public Defender/Teacher. Again I'll defer to the mighty Wiki - "The film was originally intended to be a full-fledged musical, but this tested poorly with audiences, so most of the musical numbers - except the most essential to the story - were cut. This helps explain the mysterious appearance of Elvis Costello in two roles in which he does very little." 3rd Rock From The Sun (NBC 1996-2001) The final episode (aired: 5/22/01) of this beyond silly sci-fi sitcom starring John Lithgow had the family of aliens holding a farewell bash. They hire Elvis Costello who still in full crooner mode sings "Fly Me To The Moon". I guess this could confirms a lot of pop pundits belief that Costello is the punk rock Sinatra. The Simpsons (1989-forever) Of course this would be mentioned here - I mean, have you met me? In the episode "How I Spent My Strummer Vacation" (aired: 11/10/2002) Homer goes to a Rock 'N Roll Fantasy Camp run by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards with Tom Petty, Lenny Kravitz, Brian Setzer and yep, our man McManus as instructors. When Costello tries to discourage the guitar as instrument of choice to the aggressive students, Homer storms his tent calling him "nerdlinger" and knocks off his glasses. Elvis exclaims "my image!" Frasier (NBC Sitcom 1993-2004) Maybe a contender for the best Costello cameo - the man appears, not as himself for a nice change, as Ben - a coffee house folk guitarist with a heavy Scottish accent. Frasier (Kelsey Grammer) and his brother Niles (David Hyde Pierce) take immediate offence at Ben taking up performer residence at Cafe Nervosa in the episode "Farewell, Nervosa" (aired: 4/22/03). Costello is hilarious as he performs exaggerated amped up versions of "Wild Rover","Tie Me Kangeroo Down", and especially when he announces that he's selling CDs (not his own recordings - mind you) outside during a break in his performance - "10 dollars is still the best price for 'Quadrophenia'!" DE-LOVELY (Dir. Irwin Winkler, 2004) Credited as "musical performer" Costello appears back in crooner mode on stage at a costume party singing "Let's Misbehave" in this somewhat surreal Cole Porter bio-pic. Though he's given a few close-ups, Costello is mostly seen in long shots or heard in the background as Porter (Kevin Kline) and his wife Linda (Ashley Judd) have a plot-point moment. TALLADEGA NIGHTS : THE BALLAD OF RICKY BOBBY (Dir. Adam McKay, 2006) From reports he filmed this cameo in one day and it shows - he didn't have any actual lines of dialogue. There were just shots of him having tea with Mos Def at Will Ferrell's title character's rival driver Jean Girard's (Sacha Baron Cohen) mansion. Too many Costello songs to fully note have been in movies over the years but HIGH FIDELITY (Dir. Stephen Frears, 1999) must be singled out because it was named after a Costello song (see also LESS THAN ZERO AND CLUBLAND) and it had "Shipbuilding" featured on its motion picture soundtrack. Now on to the show: Elvis Costello and the North Carolina Symphony @ Booth Amphitheatre, Cary, North Carolina Sept. 13th, 2007 "Me doing a romantic song is like Steve Buscemi playing the George Clooney role in a movie." - Elvis Costello introducing "She" 9/13/07 The best concert I've ever seen was Elvis Costello and the Attractions on the "Brutal Youth" tour in Raleigh on June 19th, 1994. I was a casual fan up to that point but witnessing the man's vocal range and attention to melodic detail made me a hardcore fan. Since then I've collected his many discs and absorbed his many styles but always preferred the rocking stuff. Well the prospect of Costello singing with an orchestra might have raised my eyebrows at first but there was still the possibility that the man under any circumstance could still rock. Rock he did - viciously strumming an acoustic guitar he and longtime Attraction/Imposter cohort pianist Steve Nieve offered up a number of Costello classics ("Accidents Will Happen", "Green Shirt", "Veronica") that pleased the audience but the real focus of the evening was the embellished arrangements of the more challenging genre exercises of his canon. "Watching the Detectives" was given a complete workout with mighty percussion and sax involvement and the obvious but still vital "Alison" had a significant rephrasing and affecting as Hell addition of Smokey Robinson's "Tracks of My Tears" added in its coda. Costello bantered with the audience in a casual and amusing manner even when mentioning "the war" - he brought that up when introducing his Oscar nominated (for COLD MOUNTAIN) song co-written with Allison Krause "Scarlet Tide" and of course when performing Nick Lowe's immortal "What's So Funny 'Bout Peace Love and Understanding". A song that I stupidly didn't even anticipate - the gorgeous Chet Baker arranged "Shipbuilding" fit the agenda beautifully as well. I know I'm not alone in my rocking preference - when Costello mentioned his album with the Brodsky Quartet - "The Juliet Letters" he got scant applause but a mere reference to his co-writing a song with Paul McCartney got people to roar. The bottom line whatever the genre, arrangement, or setting is - the man can seriously sing. You have to see him perform live to fully appreciate that I believe because the man's pipes can't be contained on a CD or in your iPod's earphones. So yeah, when it comes down to it - the man rocked. Postnote - for a complete setlist of the show go here. Okay! Thanks for indulging me for my birthday week pop music in the movies postings. Next time out - actual recent movies in theaters and on DVD. Stay tuned. More later...

The Beatles Music In The Movies (Not their own movies, mind you)

"My dear girl, there are some things that just aren't done, such as drinking Dom Perignon '53 above the temperature of 38 degrees Fahrenheit. That's just as bad as listening to the Beatles without earmuffs!" - James Bond (Sean Connery) in GOLDFINGER (Dir. Guy Hamilton, 1964)


As it has been well reported all over the internets the soon-to-be released ACROSS THE UNIVERSE (Dir. Julie Taymor, 2007) is fully comprised of Beatles music - all cover versions sung by the actors who all have names (Jude, Lucy, Lovely Rita, Jo Jo, Sadie, etc. - wait where's Michelle?) based on Beatles songs in scenes thematically suggested by Beatles material - yep, the Fab Four through and through. I know Beatle fans who are opposed to the project - and yeah it looks like it could be cringe-inducingly cheesy but I'll reserve judgement for now. In the meantime let's take a look at the Beatles music as it has appeared in soundtracks in the almost 40 years since they disbanded.

The catalogue is mostly owned by Michael Jackson who after famously outbidding Paul McCartney for ownership of ATV Music Publishing in 1985 has angered hoards of Beatle purists time and time again. First with his licensing of "Revolution" for the Nike spots of the late 80's and most recently for the currently running "All You Need Is Love" Luvs diaper ads. 

The use of an original Beatles recording in a movie can be incredibly expensive - that's why so many cover versions have appeared throughout the years. Even the Simpsons had to resort to using a sound-alike cover band for a HARD DAY'S NIGHT parody scene. Actual Beatles music has appeared sporadically over these last several decades but that have been some notable uses in the movies starting with:
SHAMPOO (Dir. Hal Ashby, 1975) Set in 1968 with a soundtrack full of 60's gold (Beach Boys, Jefferson Airplane, The Monkees, Simon & Garfunkel) 2 major Beatles tracks appear - “Sgt.Pepper's Lonely Heart Club Band” and “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds”. I guess the rights weren't as expensive pre-Jackson era. Either that or Warren Beatty and Hal Ashby had more clout than previously believed. Check out this Shampoo Montage somebody made on YouTube to get some of the flavor of said film.

I WANNA HOLD YOUR HAND (Dir. Robert Zemekis, 1978) There's more than a little of that coming-of-age in a single day AMERICAN GRAFFITI thing going on here. With the premise that the single day in question is February 9th, 1964 - the Beatles' Ed Sullivan American TV debut. An ensemble cast of teenage fans (including Nancy Allen, Wendie Jo Sperber, Bobby Di Cicco and Marc McClure) all scheme to get into CBS-TV Studio 50 to see the historic broadcast. The soundtrack of the film contains 17 Beatles songs (including "She Loves You" twice) and since, of course, none of the actual Beatles were involved - stand-ins were used as Wikipedia best puts it:

"Stand-in Beatle-look alike doubles, dressed in identical attire and holding the same type of musical instruments in a similar manner, were seen mimicking the group's performance of the song from that show while being shown on the stage floor, albeit from a distance so as not to see their identities, while the actual footage of The Beatles on The Sullivan Show of 02/09/1964 was revealed from the camera operator's point-of-view. These two elements were combined together, along with reactions from the studio audience to recreate a brilliant moment in time."

A brilliant moment in time indeed. Sorry, just became James Lipton there. Incidently the IMDb doesn't give credit to the stand-ins but this cool UHM post revealed that the "George" was filled in by monster mask-maker (he designed the Captain Kirk mask used in the HALLOWEEN movies), actor, and horror-movie director Bill Malone - seen above between director Zemekis on the right and an unknown "Lennon" on the left.


THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP (Dir. George Roy Hill, 1982) In the opening credit sequence as "When I'm 64" plays a baby is bounced upwards into the clear blue sky in slow motion. McCartney's soothing nursery rhyme vocal is perfectly suited here to the baby's (Infant Garp credited to Brandon Roth - not to be confused with Brandon Routh - the new Superman) happy expressions. This may be the best and most original scene in the canon of Beatles-synched cinema. But, wait what about:

FERRIS BUELLER'S DAY OFF (Dir. John Hughes, 1986) After somehow commandeering a parade float in downtown Chicago to lip synch to Wayne Newton's "Danke Schoen" Ferris (Matthew Broderick) gets down to the Beatles cover of Phil Medley and Bert Russell's immortal "Twist And Shout". The entire crowd dances as a marching band provides horns that weren't on the original recording. Despite the fact the song re-entered the charts at #21 that summer (also because of its use in the Rodney Dangerfield college comedy BACK TO SCHOOL) McCartney criticized the addition of horns to the track. Pretty picky Sir Paul - I mean it was a parade!

WITHNAIL & I (Dir. Bruce Robinson, 1987) Now is a good time to bring up George Harrison's Handmade Films. Formed in the late 70's to back Python related projects, Handmade made a handfull of interesting films in the 80's and 90's. One of the best was WITHNAIL & I - a hilarious cult classic mostly taking place around a country cottage with Richard E. Grant and Paul McGann at their tawdry best. At one point a portion of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" is heard - it's safe to assume that since George was one of the producers it seems like this was probably given some kind of significant discount.

BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE (Dir. Michael Moore, 2002) Can see why Moore would pay the extra buck to get the original song - no other would do the same job. As I wrote in a post about Moore's movies as a baby-boomer era hit song "The Beatles' 'Happiness Is A Warm Gun' made an obvious point". Lennon's vicious vocal snarls in such a manner that benefits a montage of kids with guns, a blind man with an assault rifle, and a smattering of public execution-style killings.

Some Other Honorable Mentions in the Beatles Music in the Movies Sweepstakes:

COMING HOME (Dir. Hal Ashby, 1978) - "Hey Jude" and "Strawberry Fields Forever".
MASK (Dir. Peter Bogdanavich, 1985) Although the soundtrack in this under rated biopic about Roy L. "Rocky" Denis (played by Eric Stoltz) who suffered from a cranial enlargening disease was dominated by Americana like Springsteen, Bob Seger, Gary U.S. Bonds, and even 4 Little Richard songs - there were 2 seminal Beatles standards present - "I Want To Hold Your Hand" and "Girl".

FIVE CORNERS (Dir. Tony Bill, 1987) "In My Life" plays during the end credits - again, Harrison's Handmade hook-up helped out. He was executive producer to be more exact.

PRICK UP YOUR EARS (Dir. Stephen Frears, 1987) - "A Day in the Life."

CAN'T BUY ME LOVE (Dir. Steve Rash, 1987) Can't remember what song was featured in this one but man I bet it was effective!

A BRONX TALE (Dir. Robert Deniro, 1993) An impressive - obviously Scorsese influenced (as if that's a bad thing) soundtrack to Deniro's directorial debut includes the Kinks, Wilson Pickett, Miles Davis, various Rat Packers, etc. But the inclusion of the original "Come Together" gives it full cinematic cred.

So - that's all for now. One day I'll get around to the Beatles covers in the movies - especially since ACROSS THE UNIVERSE adds to the universe of soundtracks full of Beatles covers like the infamous flop - SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND (I've given many shout outs to Nathan Rabin of the AV Club's Year Of Flops series but particularly his entry on Sgt. Pepper's should not be ignored) and I AM SAM - a horrible movie but a good Beatles cover oriented soundtrack all the same.

More later...

INLAND EMPIRE Burlesque

“I was watching everything go around me as I was standing in the middle. Watching it like in a dark theater before they bring the lights up.” - Nikki Grace (Laura Dern) 

INLAND EMPIRE (Dir. David Lynch, 2006)

I was surprised when I got the latest David Lynch film (released on DVD August 25th) from Netflix to see on the envelope that it was 172 minutes. Now, I've had a 'love/WTF?' relationship with the films of Lynch for a long time so I was a bit ambivalent about spending nearly 3 hours with Lynch's particular brand of operatic weirdness. It turned out to be more than that of course, because I re-watched many parts in a futile attempt to really understand what exactly was going on. As many critics have said really understanding it is not the point. It's supposed to wash over you or something like that. So let's let it wash: 

Writing about a David Lynch film can be one of the most intimidating tasks a critic can have. No straight plot description or analysis can be made and working out character motives or the real from the imaginary will leave one’s mind tangled up in Jungian knots. But I’ll roll up my sleeves and at least put on the table what I could decipher. One narrative thread emerges early on out of the chaotic kaleidoscope of dream like imagery. It involves Lynch regular Laura Dern as an actress who accepts a part in what she and fellow actor Justin Theroux are told is a remake of a never completed Polish film named 47, never completed because the two leads were murdered. 

After that premise is established the film disintegrates, or melts rather, into an endless seemingly random series of dream-like sequences. In arguably the most abstract film-within-a-film in history the actors and the film itself become one another and the entire thing turns inside out and back again. Oh, and throw in a living room set with people with large rabbit heads with a laugh track, and then another room with ‘60s décor in which nine casually dressed women (models/prostitutes?) who after some simplistic girls-talk, break out into a spontaneous, but still well choreographed, dance, and lip synch number to “The Loco-Motion.” Oh yeah, there are also scenes interspersed from what looks like a orange-hued Foreign film. Whew! That’s the best I can do!

Dern (who co-produced) does probably her best work here, and that’s saying a lot for a project that mostly appears to require her to run around re-interpreting Munch’s painting The Scream in every actorly variation there is again and again. Grotesque Fellini-esque extreme close-ups dominate, non-sensical soundbites seep in from every corner of the screen (“it had something to do with the telling of time,” somebody says at one point - uh, thanks) and while it was filmed on digital video the film nicely lives up to Lynch’s previous aesthetics.

One can not casually watch INLAND EMPIRE - that would be like casually visiting somebody in prison. So when the question comes down to whether I liked or disliked it, well trying to figure that out feels like deciding whether to give “thumbs-up or thumps-down” * to a Rorshach test. I can only say I found parts of it intensely absorbing, and I cared about what was happening even if I didn't always *get* what was happening. Still it was a bit much and perhaps should have been edited down a tad. Of course though, that would probably be like cropping sections out of a Jackson Pollack painting. 

* “Thumbs up-thumbs down” is a registered trademark of Disney-ABC Domestic Television. 

More later...

5 Multiple Role Movie Masters

There are not many actors that can truly pull off playing more than one part in a single movie (hence this being a top 5 and not a top 10 list). It can be a scene killer and movie deal breaker if it’s not a convincing second character, or in some cases 3rd or 4th or 15th character (see # 3 on the list). In making this list I wanted to avoid when actors play their twin brothers or sisters (or other family members for that matter – but that rule was meant to be broken) or when they are clones, robot copies, or their primary character in disguise. Also tried to weed out the one timers – I mean Sir Alec Guinness was fantastic as 8 different people in KIND HEARTS AND CORONETS but in the end that didn’t make the cut over those whose careers are almost based on their multi-tasking personas. Especially like this guy's :

1. Peter Sellers (1925-1980) Tops the list because he's the only actor ever to be nominated for the Academy Award for playing 3 different parts * - Captain Lionel Mandrake, President Merkin Muffley, and the title character in DR. STRANGELOVE. He was even originally going to play a 4th character - Major T.J. 'King' Kong but he was uncertain of his ability to do a Texan accent so the role went to Slim Pickens. Sellers came from a sketch comedy radio background as a member of the Goons (with Spike Milligan, Michael Bentine, and Harry Secombe) so he was well equipped early on to handle tons of assorted dialects. 9 out of the roughly 35-40 movies he made (depends on which filmography you read) had him playing over 25 different parts. The range of accents, change of genders and ethnic makeovers throughout his career makes it difficult to know how his real voice (if there actually was one) sounded and what he really looked like in real life - though to him there probably was no such thing as "real life".

The most notable of the films in which the master inhabits more than one personage is THE MOUSE THAT ROARED (3 characters), LOLITA (2 characters), the original 1967 CASINO ROYALE (just 2 characters but one was James Bond!) and the little seen SOFT BEDS, HARD BATTLES in which 2 of the 6 parts he played were Hitler and the President. His final film - the dismal THE FIENDISH PLOT OF DR. FU MANCHU had him play 2 characters - the villain of the title and who he considers his "worthy adversary" - Dr. Hayland Smith. Not the greatest exit in cinema history but at least he went out doing what he did best.

2. Eddie Murphy - I'm sure many readers will be cynical about Murphy being this high on the list but just consider this : he's played more characters in a fewer amount of movies than Sellers and he has convincingly portrayed an entire family (aided by CGI) through 2 incredibly profitable if not acclaimed films (THE NUTTY PROFESSOR & NUTTY PROFESSOR II : THE KLUMPS). It worked so well in a movie as cheesily charming as COMING TO AMERICA that I can overlook the device in such crap as VAMPIRE IN BROOKLYN and NORBIT. So even if Murphy spends the rest of his days doing the Donkey in future SHREK sequels or resurrecting Axel Foley every now and then for a fast buck he's still got his multi-tasking part playing skills to fall back on.

3. Monty Python (1969-1983) - Okay so many readers wrote me to say that they felt the Python players (Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin) got short shrift in my 10 Definitive Films-Within-Films and 10 Movie Moments That Broke The 4th Wall posts so I’m giving them full due here. Part of the powerful charm of the original BBC Flying Circus program, which was heavily inspired by the Goons (Sellers again!), was that each of the 5 performing members played a bunch of parts in various sketches every episode. Even animator Terry Gilliam, so not an actor, put in a few memorable moments. When it came to their movie work no other films in comedy movie history were as peopled by, well, the same people over and over. I’m not going to list everybody’s exact standing in multiple role-dom but just for example’s sake here’s the most popular Monty Python member John Cleese’s stats :

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT (1971) - 15 characters.
MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL (1975) - 7 characters.
MONTY PYTHON’S THE LIFE OF BRIAN (1979) - 6 characters.
MONTY PYTHON LIVE AT THE HOLLYWOOD BOWL (1982) – 12 characters.
MONTY PYTHON’S THE MEANING OF LIFE (1983) - 9 characters.

Whew! That’s 49 different characters in just 5 movies – quite a run, huh? Figure in all the other Python players and their plethora of parts and you’ve got the biggest tally of multiple characters in cinema history. Can’t tell you the exact tally though – too lazy to do the math.

Postnote #1 - Maybe it seems lame to have the Python troupe under one entry but a list where each member was given their own slot would have been tedious - therefore lamer - so I opted for a one for all entry.

Postnote #2 - Carol Cleveland : From Flying Circus to Meaning Of Life she was the unsung female reparatory member. For a list like this that should be noted.

4. Lily Tomlin - Sure, she hasn't been in as many movies where she plays multiple roles as some of the others on this list but for 3 solid reasons she makes the top 5 - 1.) The only highlights of the dire mostly unfunny sci-fi spoof THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING WOMAN (Dir. Joel Schumacher - go figure! 1981) was in addition to her playing the title character and neighbor the pursed lipped Judith Beasley there was the bringing to the big screen the classic Tomlin character Ernestine - the persnickety telephone operator from Laugh-In. 2.) This list is way too male dominated and we need Tomlin to break up this sausage party. 3.) It's her BIRTHDAY Damnit! She was born in Detroit on September 1st, 1939 - to be exact. So let's give her props, okay? Though I didn't want to include when someone played their own sibling on this list - she did that duty in BIG BUSINESS (Dir. Jim Abrahams, 1988) with Bette Midler playing her own twin sister as well. Also since I made the exception with the Pythons on sketch films and live performance movies - Tomlin's THE SEARCH FOR SIGNS OF INTELLIGENT LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE (Dir. John Bailey, 1991) has her performing 5 different character pieces. So I believe she fully qualifies. Happy Birthday Lily!

5. Mike Myers - The shadow of Peter Sellers hangs over just about everybody on this list. But it practically burns through the work of Mike Myers. Especially in the AUSTIN POWERS trilogy (AUSTIN POWERS - INTERNATIONAL MAN OF MYSTERY ('97), THE SPY WHO SHAGGED ME ('99), and GOLDMEMBER ('02) which all echo with swinging Sellers as much as they do the swinging '60's London scene. The obvious concept of playing the hero and the villain (Dr. Evil) as well as the bumbling demeanor also present in supporting characters Goldmember and Fat Bastard (also played by Myers) is pure Sellers derived through and through. From the springboard of early 90's SNL Myers has been blending Sellers methods with his own 2nd generation slacker stoner charm in his movie material and has pulled off some tricky double and triple duty so he slides right in at #5.

Honorable Mention :

Mel Brooks - Throughout the movies he directed and starred in that were mostly genre spoofs (BLAZING SADDLES, HIGH ANXIETY, HISTORY OF THE WORLD PART I, SPACEBALLS, ETC.) Brooks usually played 2-3 characters each time out. They weren't truly different from one another and that was precisely the joke - maybe not the greatest joke but hey - what can you do?

Meg Ryan - Okay so this violates the rule * that it can't just be somebody playing their sibling (which I know already got broken with Lily Tomlin above) but in addition to sisters Angelica and Patricia Graynamore, Ryan also plays Tom Hanks' office co-worker Dede in the 1990 surreal comedy JOE VS. THE VOLCANO. In his entry on this film Case File #40 of My Year Of Flops Nathan Rabin of the Onion AV Club writes "now normally the phrase 'Meg Ryan in multiple roles' is enough to send shivers down the spine or suggest a fate worse than death. And while it pains me deeply to write this, Meg Ryan is adorable!" I concur so let nobody ever say film babble never gave a shout out to Meg Ryan! Now let's move on.

* Also the rule that the actor needs to have been in more that one film playing multiple parts but ah...sue me!

The Kids In The Hall : BRAIN CANDY (Dir. Kelly Makin, 1996) Not quite up to Python standards, oh Hell not even up to SCTV standards the Canadian comedy quintet (Dave Foley, Kevin McDonald, Bruce McCulloch, Mark McKinney, and Scott Thompson) had a good run on TV so why not a full fledged feature with each member playing multiple parts? Sounds great! Wait - key member Dave Foley doesn't really want to take part? Oh okay, he'll do a few bits but won't contribute to the writing? Hmmmm, maybe the whole project should be scrapped - what everybody wants to do it anyway? Okay, It might work. What? It didn't? Damn. Kind of like the last season of Flying Circus in which John Cleese didn't participate, BRAIN CANDY has some good bits but nothing classic. The Pythons though regrouped with HOLY GRAIL - doubt the Kids will ever pull off something like that.

Also according to Wikipedia : "Lon Chaney played dual roles in several films, using the elaborate makeup that became his trademark." I'll take your word for it Wikipedia!

Okay, so that's all I got for now. So before you say Martin Short - I know there are lots and lots of multiple part players I missed so shoot 'em on over!

More later...