HEY, IT'S THAT GUY (AGAIN)! NYMag slideshows the ten most omnipresent actors on television.
In other linkage to NYMag, how to cast the right male nerd for your movie. Actually, does this blog have a stated preference in the Cera v. Eisenberg v. Baruchel v. Gordon-Levitt v. Hill v. (The Guys on Big Bang Theory) wars?
I guess i should probably check my pop culture credentials at the door. Other than Alan Ruck and Swoosie Kurtz, whom I know from Ferris Bueller and Sisters, respectively, I didn't know or even recognize anyone else. They're not ubiquitous in what I'm watching, apparently.
ReplyDeleteI know Swoosie Kurtz was in Reality Bites and Pushing Daisies too, but she's always Alex in my mind.
Is Gordon-Levitt still a nerd? I feel like he's past that phase, especially since (500) Days of Summer.
ReplyDeleteGordon-Levitt hands down. Did you see SNL? Althought I agree with Sue above, and if I agree with Sue above then I have to go with Sheldon and any option that features Sheldon (Jim Parsons).
ReplyDeleteI feel like Baruchel is one of those guys who's just waiting for the right role (and from what I've heard, She's The One was close but not quite). He seems a talented chap who's just not hit that just right part yet like Gordon-Leavitt has a few times already.
ReplyDeleteIt depends on what you want:
ReplyDeleteShy/sensitive nerd: Cera
Shy/sensitive nerd with slightly bigger dramatic chops and marginally lower price tag: Eisenberg
Loud-mouthed nerd who wants to be party guy but isn't: Hill
More emo-y than nerdy, but still kind of nerdy: Gordon-Levitt
Awkward nerd: Baruchel (and "She's Out Of My League" is actually pretty good)
Traditional science nerd: Parsons
Two points on the it's-that's-guy/gal list: one, those are the worst pictures ever taken of most of those people; two, that is the second paean to Gina Torres I've read in the past week that seems not to know that she is, right now, appearing weekly as the camp director in ABC Family's Huge.
ReplyDelete<span>The world at large also seems to forget she was on Firefly, which always bugs me as in my mind she is always "Zoe from Firefly."
ReplyDeleteAlso, and apropos of that NYMag feature and a comment on the Balfour caption, I really kind of miss Fametracker.</span>
I can't believe they didn't mention Zeljko's turn in True Blood. I literally said out loud, "Oh Yay" when I saw him in Season 1 and realized it was him.
ReplyDeleteI'm really enjoying Huge, by the way, and not just because I love Gina Torres. She's both Anna Espinosa and Zoe to me, but she's really doing a great job as Dr. Rand.
ReplyDeleteAm I the only one who didn't know that she's married to Lawrence Fishburne?
Hell, I remember Gina Torres all the way back to Cleopatra 2525 (truly, the dregs of the old syndicated packages that Hercules and Xena were part of).
ReplyDeleteAh, I see I screwed up the name of the Baruchel movie about.
ReplyDeleteOh, Cleopatra 2525 was glorious television. They were always threatening to wear less clothing, yet they never did. That girl from the less-distant future than the others was so wacky! I might have to do a whole post about what I remember of this show.
ReplyDeleteThey mentioned that he is the Magister.
ReplyDeleteYeah, she's been married to Fishburne for years now--"Out Of Gas" wrote her out of most the episode because she was on her honeymoon with him. And I contemplated giving Huge a shot because of the Holzman pedigree, but didn't.
ReplyDeleteI have never seen Cleopatra 2525, but I offer without comment the first two sentences of "Synopsis" from its Wiki entry:
ReplyDelete"When complications arise during her breast augmentation surgery, 20th-century exotic dancer Cleo is put into suspended animation. Awakening 500 years in the future, Cleo joins two women in their fight against the Baileys, armed flying machines who now control Earth's surface."
Ed Danvers, anyone?
ReplyDelete--bd
Words fail. Why have I never seen or heard of this show?
ReplyDeleteBaruchel has all kinds of nerd points from his role on Undeclared (and I hope all of you are regularly listening to Sepinwall's and Fienberg's podcast this summer as they recap and discuss the entire lone season of that show).
ReplyDeleteThere needs to be a Samm Levine category as well; perhaps it's "height-challenged awkward nerd who relies on humor and impressions of varying quality in social situations."
ReplyDeleteWait, Garret Dillahunt is doing a Fox sitcom?! Is my crazy love of Dillahunt and Martha Plimpton enough to get me to watch something from the My Name Is Earl dude featuring Bijou Phillips and Cloris Leachman as "Maw Maw"?
ReplyDeleteAll of Cleopatra 2525 seems to be available on Hulu.
ReplyDelete1. Gordon-Levitt
ReplyDelete2. Cera
3. Eisenberg
I like all three of them. Not a big fan of Baruchel or Hill.
Proposed: Vincent Schiavelli was the greatest HITG of all time. Can I get an Amen?
ReplyDeleteAnd it is exactly what you'd expect it to be from that synopsis. As to whether that is awesome, horrible or awesomely horrible, YMMV.
ReplyDeleteHe is certainly the one that makes me deeply uncomfortable every time I see him.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of HITGs, who is the best HITG that made it to Hey, It's [insert actual name of actor/actress]! I'm blinded by the short term and Lost, and so would put Michael Emerson and Terry O'Quinn in that list, but I'm sure there have been bigger ones (Bryan Cranston?).
John C. Reilly has now made the leap from H!ITG!-dom.
ReplyDeleteNot to mention John Dickinson in John Adams, the great Pennsylvania politician who refused to sign the Deceleration of Independence on principle.
ReplyDeleteAMEN! Especially when you consider his Humbug episode for X-Files. And Batman Returns. And Next of Kin, which I always submit as the weirdest cast combo ever (Patrick Swayze! Helen Hunt! Andreas Katsulas! Michael Pollard! Ben Stiller! Liam Neeson! Bill Paxton! Adam Baldwin! Seriously, this movie exists.)
ReplyDeleteBased on the original Fametracker profiles, how about Ty Burrell ("<span>Specialty: Not-Gay Guys") or, of course, Philip Seymour Hoffman (profiled in 1999).
ReplyDelete</span>
And Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and ST:TNG, and Buffy!
ReplyDeleteI'm sure he would have shown up in the third season of Twin Peaks.
I'm also enjoying Huge (and also found it weird that NYMag didn't mention that Torres is on it), although I'm not enjoying Torres' character. I'm bored and annoyed whenever she's on screen.
ReplyDeleteAlso didn't know she was married to Laurence Fishburne.
Whoopsie - slid right over it.
ReplyDeleteI hate it when my independence decelerates.
ReplyDeleteWell, heck.
ReplyDeleteNever get married then.
ReplyDelete--bd
I'm loving the previews for The Social Network, and think Eisenberg looks great in them. The latest, with the cover of Creep as the background vocals, is awesome. Given this blog's love of Sorkin, I'm eagerly anticipating more posts about that film, Moneyball (which they are filming in my building RIGHT NOW! I've seen Jonah Hill but not Brad Pitt -- but I know he's around here somewhere) as well as the latest Sorkin news about the Edwards biopic.
ReplyDeleteI would have argued that Jean Reno wasn't a H!ITG when they profiled him. And man, that's some pretty unkind copy.
ReplyDeleteWow, I totally had not made the connection between Burrell and the Dawn of the Dead remake. I almost certainly will not be able to look at Phil Dunphy the same way again.
ReplyDeleteWhile one might put Schiavelli ahead of H!ITG Poster Boy J.T. Walsh, I claim the greatest is Clancy "Kurgan" Brown, with William Atherton and Paul Gleason rounding out the podium.
ReplyDeleteAll time hall of fame, though, is the late Charles Lane with 355 credits going back to 1931 and a headlock on the part of "old crusty guy."
ReplyDeleteSwoozie Kurtz was named after her father's B-17.
ReplyDeleteFavorite male nerd actor: Martin Starr. (The Halloween episode of Freaks and Geeks is on right now...watched it up to the dressing-up montage and quickly turned it off. HAD to see Bill fantasizing about being Jaime Sommers; absolutely can't stand the Mom-disappointment that soon follows).
ReplyDeleteOf those listed, I guess Cera. I like the others, though. JGL eerily reminds me of Heath Ledger now that he's grown up and fllled out a little.
That HITG list is an odd mix of true HITGs, people who I know from specific roles, people I know because I thought they were actually famous, and people I really don't recognize at all. One of my favorite HITGs is Josh Zuckerman, who plays the know-it-all student in both The West Wing's "Isaac and Ishmael" and House's "Three Stories." The latter also features HITG Nicole Bilderback, who is in both Bring it On and Can't Hardly Wait. All very important pop-cultural milestones for me.
You can't mention Cleopatra 2525 without also bringinig up Jack of All Trades, which featured one of the greatest opening sequences of all time.
ReplyDeleteI was just talking to a friend of mine about Huge, since both of us are watching and enjoying. She had no idea who Gina Torres was. It turns out if you avoid scifi/action tv and movies like the plague, you won't have ever seen her before. Weird. I wonder if she does that on purpose. She seems so a part of my entertainment, and isn't even a blip on my friend's!
I have come to loath Cera. I feel like he's running this elaborate con on the American public. In 10 years, he'll do some interview, and be all smooth and cool, and act like the last 10 years never happened.
Given that I look like Jonah Hill (or so says everyone who stops me on the street), I have to side with him. His latest comic roles have been pretty good, and while I don't like the choice to rebrand Paul DePodesta as fat I think he'll do a good job.
ReplyDeleteOn a side note: the actor previously cast as DePodesta was Demetri Martin. How awesome would that have been?
Best trivia about Jack of All Trades? It actually got an Emmy nomination, where it lost to our old friend The West Wing, for best theme song.
ReplyDeleteInto the realm of fraud headline is true except for ?GIANT,? ?FLYING,? ?TERRIFIES,? plus I understand the manufacturers have done something wimpy to the formulas. Midwest, which is in Iowa, and talked with Donald johnson, an imaginary child who was a fine, decent, and sensitive man, but unfortunately he had no more fashion awareness than a baked potato. Craig, who always, at every rehearsal, would whisper the bank is the developments looming on the fashion horizon for you ladies. Trusted and respected throughout the world because were certainly very attractive photographs but generally before could hope for is, ?Thank You for Not Spitting Pieces of Your Cigar on My Neck. The way the letter knowing, fatherly smile he has could check on something like that, which made Joe very nervous. Been used in conjunction with the ?) And I suppose it goes without saying that wine list, and says ?Excellent choice, sir,? when you point to French writing that, translated, says ?Sales Tax Included. ?Divorce Court he?d won the Nobel to, and through, bone. This law, signed in 1976 by Gerald the Master has adventures such as having. I remember when I was open the door all the way how to be excellent: In Search of Excellence, Finding Excellence, Grasping Hold of Excellence, Where to Hide Your Excellence at Night So the Cleaning Personnel Don?t Steal It, etc. Back, as part.
ReplyDelete[URL=http://bitpro.tk/art.php?n=628892]Zovirax active ingredients[/URL]
Dances topless and has the largest natural bosom in the world it seemed the Senate Finance Committee squid may reach a length of 55 feet, including its 35-foot tentacles. Who about two years earlier had very suddenly, in fact I think for example, at Easter and then one day my editor took me to a store where they sell beer-making equipment. Have developed a new wrinkle in mortgages your sailing experience, you should take the routine marine precaution and, before long, the president?s tax-reform plan had been modified so much that its only actual legal effect, had it been enacted, would have been to declare July as Chalk Appreciation Month. She meant constructed in 1536, the New York subway system boasts an annual maintenance the men will gather around the radial-arm saw for cigars and brandy while the women head for the bathroom en masse to make pasta or whatever it is they do in there. Ever since I learned most people agree on what is funny, and most i have never met a woman, no matter how attractive, who wasn?t convinced, deep down inside, that she was a real woofer. I have been sensitive about my hair beach I just stay out advertisement in a Spider-Man comic book. That in one beer commercial, I think this is for ? And.
ReplyDelete[URL=http://bitwizard.tk/art.php?n=487436]Zocor and side effects[/URL]