Mulitple TV cameos- same show/different characters?
 

While watching "Seinfeld" DVD's and TBS re-runs over the past couple weeks, my wife and I noticed that Christa Miller (Jordan on "Scrubs") appeared in the show twice, playing different characters. She plays the woman who confronts George for touching her after his interview to be a bra salesman, and, IIRC, one of Jerry's girlfriends. Technically, they could be the same character. However, IMDB lists two different character names:

- The Doodle (1995) TV Episode .... Paula
- The Sniffing Accountant (1993) TV Episode .... Ellen

Did this happen other times during Seinfeld's run (other than with the use of Larry David's voice)? Did/Does it happen with other shows?

And, does it bother you when shows do this?

Garrett Dillahunt did it in "Deadwood". He played Wild Bill's killer and George Hearst's agent. I think he did a damn fine job on both.

many, many times on Law & Order. Sometimes with a guest star who later becomes a series regular. Ice-T was first a drug dealer and then a cop. The police captain on the regular show was a witness or something before. I just remember she was a real bitch.

Jerry Orbach was a defense attorney before he was Lennie

Diane Neal played a woman who raped a male stripper with 2 of her friends on SVU before she was Casey Novak

James Cromwell has multi characters in Star Trek TNG series - so does another actor/actress.

Harry Morgan (well known as Col. Potter in MASH), he first appeared in MASH as Major General Steele 2 years before he joined MASH as main character as Potter.

Annie Parisse played a stripper in a previous episode before her run as ADA Borgia on L&O.

For Law & Order, it's actually harder to find repeat guest-stars who play the same character. :lol:

Would you count Shawn Ashmore appearing in Smallville as a freak of the week before his twin brother Aaron was cast as Jimmy Olson in Season 6?:)

Star Trek TOS -

William Campbell: The superbeing (brat) Trelane and Klingon Captain Koloth (in TOS and DS9).

Mark Lenard: Romulan Commander in Balance of Terror and Sarek in Journey to Babel (and 3 of the movies and a couple episodes in TNG). He also played the Klington captain at the beginning of ST:TMP.

THE BRADY BUNCH:

The prospecter that locked them up in the ghost town and Mike's boss who played pool against bobby were both played by Gilligan's Island's Thurston Howell.

June Gable had a recurring role on Friends as Joey's agent, Estelle, and
she also played a nurse in the season 1 episode, "The One with the Birth".

Rob

What about Paul Rudd on Friends? I think he was another character for an episode or two prior to when he came on regularly as Phoebe's eventual husband.

The college TA on Veronica Mars played the janitor in the season before.

There was a thread on this a long time ago.
Anyway, as I recall,

Ted McGinley played the imaginary husband of Peggy, Norman Jablonsky in the It's a wonderful Life parody episode on Married with Children. He came back a few years later as Jefferson D'Arcy.

Giovanni Ribisi played someone who dropped a condom in Phoebe's guitar case in The One with the Baby on the Bus on Friends and then came back to play Phoebe's half brother.

Jon Lovitz played 3 separate characters on "NewsRadio". The first being "Fred" whom Bill McNeal befriends in a mental institution(Season 3). He returned in Season 4 to play a suicidal man who threatens to jump off the WNYX building. Finally, he shows up as Max Lewis, Bill McNeal's replacement, to finish out the show in season 5.

Rachel Dratch on "30 Rock" immediately came to mind.

and let's not forget Mako who played about a half dozen characters throughout the years...everything from Korean to Chinese to American.

Wayne Alexander played a number of different characters on Babylon 5, and there are probably half a dozen actors who have played multiple aliens/creatures on the various Trek and Whedon-verse series.

This isn’t exactly on topic but munch from Law & Order: SVU plays the same character as he did on Homicide: life on the street, Ned Beatty & Michael Michele who also starred on Homicide appeared as guest stars on L&0:svu as different people which fucks everything up.
The episode was directed by former ER cast member Eric La Salle who played Michael Michele’s love intrest on ER starting in Season 6 of ER.


Eric also made a guest starring role in without a trac (it was a really good episode)

i guess they thought fans wouldn't remember at the time, i saw that on the dvds cause i did start watching MWC on tv till season 7.

Not Cameos but following have played different characters in multiple TREK shows and movies. I'msure there are more actors who've don this on Star Trek shows but I think these are the big ones. If you dig deeper some have even done different character voicework for videos games. I guess teh cool thing about these is the fact that they didn't just play different humans, they played different races. :lol:

<b>Majel Barrett</b>
Computer Voice
Christine Chapel
Deanna Troi's Mother

<b>Jeffery Combs</b>
Commander Shran
Weyoun

<b>Gary Graham</b>
Vulcan Ambassador Soval
Tanis

<b>Tony Todd</b>
Adult Jake Sisko
Kurn

Adam Goldberg
Friends-as Eddie-Chandler's crazy roomate when Joey moved out
Joey-as Jimmy-Joey's best Friend from High School

Joe Gannascoli in Sopranos
S1 - Guy in the pastry shop
s2 or s3-s06-Vito

It happened another time on Seinfeld. Suzanne Snyder was a neo nazi in the limo in one episode, and then later Jerry's date (the woman who wanted him to eat the pie) in "The Pie."

Just because I'm a big fan of Combs' Trek work, here's a bunch more:

Krem
Penk
Brunt
Tiron
Officer Mulkahey

I think Vaughn Armstrong even beats out Combs for the number of Trek characters he's played.

Frank Adamo appeared on 24 episodes of the Dick Van Dyke Show, each time as a different character. A few of his more memorable rolls were as Usher, Dry Cleaning Man, Delivery Man, Partygoer and Headwaiter. He was Dick Van Dyke's assistant and stand-in.

Bill Idelson played Herman Glimscher, Sally's boyfriend, on five episodes of the Dick Van Dyke Show, then played the bellhop in the 4th season episode "Never Bathe on a Sunday".

Lucy Lawless played a different character on Hercules before she was cast for the 3 episode arc that would launch her into Xena.

Sean Gunn, who plays Kirk on Gilmore girls was "Mick" the handyman, then an unnamed delivery man in early episodes. I think it was his 3rd appearance where he got the name Kirk.

A lot of this goes on in the Ten Thirteen shows but the "big one" is that Nicholas Lea played a one-off character in "Gender Bender" in the first season of "The X-Files" prior to appearing as Alex Krycek in seasons 2-9.

Cool! I knew he did tons of stuff but I was too lazy to look for everything he did. :lol:

Vito Scotti - Gilligan's Island

added a couple roles

Kurtwood Smith also had a role on Voyager and was the president in ST6
Renee notgonnatrytospellhislastname played Colonel West in ST6 and Odo
Michael Dorn played what is assumed to be Worf's grandfather or great grandfather in ST6
Patricia Tallman had a few ST roles
Tim Russ played what looked to be a regular human, I think on the Enterprise B in Generations and was one of the terrorists stealing trilithium in an episode of TNG

Almost any long lasting show ends up with lots of these as the directors and producers end up liking a particular actor so they keep bringing them back
At least in ST they can make them different aliens and hide in.
Cromwell for example played a lot of roles that I didn't immdediately recognize as being him

Archie Kao played a casino security guy (or whatever you call the guys who watch the eye-in-the-sky feeds) before moving into the video tech spot at CSI.

I remember the character's name being on his shirt in his debut episode, and it certainly wasn't Johnson, which is his name at CSI.

Anne Baxter appeared in the '60s Batman series, first as a magician named Zelda, and in the third season, played Olga, Queen of the Cossacks.

Ron Glass appeared on "Sanford and Son" as a card shark who swindles Lamont, and later as an ex-con. Another is Margueritte Ray, who played Fred's cousin's wife and also a prospective tenant for the Sanford Arms apartment. The show tended to re-use a lot of the same actors in various bit parts.

Jeffrey Tambor had several roles on Three's Company (he's credited with 4 different characters, one of which joined the spin-off "The Ropers" cast). Three's Company did this a lot. Not all are well-known, but you see the same faces pop up over and over again.

Rene O'Connor was one character in Hercules, then became Gabrielle when Xena was spun off from it.

Nero Wolfe is the best example I can think of.

I remember 2: his 'Ropers' character and the one where he played a shrink. I don't doubt that he played a couple other guest characters.

I also remember a couple where he played this rich obnoxious guy who was trying to get Cindy to marry him. There may have been another character thrown in there too :)

Actually Detective John Munch may have the title of most cameoed character. Here is all I can remember.

Homicide: LotS
Law & Order (Homicide cross overs)
X-Files
The Beat
Law & Order: SVU
Law & Order: Trial by Jury
Arrested Development

From IMDB's page on Belzer:

This happens on Scrubs quite a bit. For example, Mike Schwartz (also a writer on the show) has played Lloyd, a man with an injured hand, a bed pan delivery man and a patient who got his peeps stuck in a flashlight where the batteries go to name a few.