Six Character Actors Who Made Brief Sidelines Into Playing Lead
The Visitor
Ernest Borgnine, Marty (1955): After reliable supporting turns in From Here to Eternity, Johnny Guitar and Vera Cruz, the rotund, crazy-eyebrowed Borgnine suddenly found himself an unlikely romantic lead. As a Bronx butcher who finds love, Borgnine scored an Oscar. But instead of riding the coattails, he--like so many character actors after him--went right back to supporting or co-star work.
Udo Kier, Blood for Dracula (1974): You might recognize Kier as the fey German guy in My Own Private Idaho, Ace Ventura, Blade and numerous Lars Von Trier outings. The very symbol of Eurotrash, he spent his younger days giving Klaus Kinski's Nosferatu a run for the creepiest vampire of the '70s in his Andy Warhol-produced desecration of Bram Stoker.
Paul Dooley, A Perfect Couple (1979): Paul Giamatti and Philip Seymour Hoffman would be nowhere without Paul Dooley. Best known as Molly Ringwald's befuddled dad in Sixteen Candles, Dooley played lead but once in Robert Altman's underrated comedy about a neurotic older man putting the moves on a traveling singer many years his junior.
Harry Dean Stanton, Paris, Texas (1984): Appearing in more than 150 movies, Stanton played lead only twice: sharing Repo Man with Emilio Estevez and, the same year, headlining this, Wim Wenders' valentine to America, as a wounded man who spends the first half-hour catatonic.
Philip Baker Hall, Hard Eight (1997): Hall accrued a small but passionate following after playing Richard Nixon in Robert Altman's Secret Honor. More than a decade later Altman fanboy P.T. Anderson cast him in a stunning performance that, alas, ensured Baker not a lifetime of lead roles but just more prominent character actor work than usual.
Richard Jenkins, The Visitor (2008): A welcome presence in Sea of Love and Six Feet Under, Jenkins deserved a better lead graduation than this rote white-man-learns-about-minorities saga.
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