Loads and Loads of Roles: Difference between revisions

 
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{{trope}}
[[File:LoadsAndLoadsOfRoles 6451.jpg|link=Peter Sellers|rightframe]]
 
There's [[Acting for Two]]. Then there's acting for twenty.
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For the animated equivalent, see [[Talking to Himself]]. [[You Look Familiar]] is this trope carried over the life of a TV Series. [[You All Look Familiar]] is the video game character model equivalent.
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== Film ==
* ''[[Kind Hearts and Coronets]]''. [[Alec Guinness]] plays about eight different characters.
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== Live-Action TV ==
 
* Irish comedy ''[[wikipedia:Killinaskully|Killinascully]]'' has its writer [[Pat Shortt]] play five major characters (one of whom is female), frequently appearing in the same scene as himself.
* There are five actors who have played seven or more different characters over the course of various ''[[Star Trek]]s'': Vaughn Armstrong, Thomas Kopache, [[Jeffrey Combs]], J.G. Hertzler, and Randy Oglesby. Most of them started out playing a series of one-shot characters, then were given frequent recurring characters of their own. Jeffrey Combs was even supposedly going to make the [[Promotion to Opening Titles|jump to actual cast member]], but ''[[Enterprise]]'' was canceled a season too soon.
** Honorable mention to [[Majel Barrett]] for playing several major characters: Number One (original pilot), Nurse Christine Chapel (Original Series), Lwaxana Troi (Next Generation), and Federation starship computers from ''TNG'' onward, including ''Enterprise'' (one-episode cameo) and the latestlast ''Trek'' movie made before she died. This makes her the only person to be involved in every incarnation of the franchise during her lifetime. Of course, she ''was'' Gene Rodenberry's wife.
*** Technically, [[Robert Picardo]] should be on that list. He has played dozens of ''different'' incarnations of the Emergency Medical Hologram. (Identical in that they have the original base program, but different in that they have had different life experiences, if only subtly.) Not to mention playing the designer of the EMH, and a few holograms that aren't EMHs, but ''look'' like the EMH.
*** And then there's [[Brent Spiner]], who's played three different Soong-type androids (Data, Lore, and B-4) and two different Soongs (Noonien and Arik). The crowning achievement is in the episode "Brothers", where he plays Data, Lore, and Noonien Soong in the same scene ''at the same time'' (with the help of [[Chroma Key]], of course).
* On ''[[The Mighty Boosh]]'', dozens of prominent - and minor - characters are played by Noel Fielding, Julian Barratt and Rich Fulcher. Fielding (as well as playing the major character of Vince Noir) fills notable roles such as the Hitcher, the Moon, Old Gregg, Tony Harrison, Montgomery Flange, the Spirit of Jazz and Spider Dijon. Barratt (who plays Howard Moon) also plays Rudy van DiSarzio, the Crack Fox, Mr Susan, Dennis the Shaman, Bryan Ferry, Sandstorm, and Jurgen Haabermaaster. Rich Fulcher, who is best known for playing Bob Fossil, has given ''many'' other very memorable performances over the course of the series, including Lester Corncrake, Kodiak Jack, Tommy the Cheese Priest, the Ape of Death, The Betamax Bandit, Alan (the Blue King of Xooberon) and "Eleanor", among others.
** Dave Brown really deserves a mention too. Although his only recurring roles are Bollo the gorilla and Joey Moose, he plays a fair few minor parts - Black Frost, the break-dancing Mutant, Naan Bread, Extreme Sports Calender etc.
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* In the Japanese Nippon TV dub of the ''[[Twilight (novel)|Twilight]]'' saga, [[Kenji Nojima]] voices over Jasper Hail, Caius and Jared.
* ''[[Dick and Dom in da Bungalow]]'': the multi-talented Dave Chapman and Ian Kirkby played tens of characters each- all kinds of impressions ([[Formula One|Murray Walker]], [[Bruce Forsyth]], [[The Crystal Maze|Richard O'Brien]], [[Morecambe and Wise|Eric Morecambe]]...) and also original creations like [[British Coppers|Harry Batt]]. Melvin O'Doom had slightly fewer characters, but was also an all-purpose dancer. Even the hosts also played several recurring charaters each.
* In ''[[Jul Paa Vesterbro|Jul På Vesterbro]]'', [[Anders Matthesen]] plays every single character who has talking roles in more than one episode. In other words, he plays 11 main and recurring characters, 3 one/two episode characters as well a cameo [[As Himself]].
* ''Orphan Black'' resides on the premise of a con woman adopting the identity of what she initially assumed was a suicidal doppelgänger and later discovered was just one of apparently dozens of clones created as part of a conspiracy, all of them played by Tatiana Maslany. She appeared as five regular characters, plus eight others sporadic ones, all of them with distinctive appearances, personalities and speech patterns.
 
 
== Tabletop RPG ==
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== Theatre ==
 
* This trope taken to the extreme can be found in the theatrical adaptation of the [[Alfred Hitchcock]] film ''[[The Thirty-Nine Steps]].'' The show has over 100 roles. There are four actors.
{{quote|'''[[Big Bad]]:''' *is shot, with Hannay, a police officer and the girl looking on* There was only supposed to be a cast of ''four!''}}
** The lead man plays one role, the lead woman plays four, and the remaining two actors play ''all of the other roles'' between the two of them. [[Hilarity Ensues]], as does much switching of hats, when four or five of these characters are in the same scene. It prides itself in [[Lampshading]] everything about this trope.
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* All minor characters in [[Little Shop of Horrors]] are played by the same actor, according to the official script.
* In ''First Date'', the four ensemble actors, as well as the waiter, play all of the [[Flash Back]] characters, with on-stage costume changes.
 
 
== Web Original ==