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21 actors who played against type and killed it

As much as they like to insist that they can portray any person, animal or tree, even the best actors can get carried away a certain type of character because they are just really good at it. Angelina Jolie will usually be a combination of sexy and scary. Jason Statham He’s usually bald, sweaty, and shooting at someone. And sorry, Emma Stone, we just don’t see you as a villain. We want to go shopping with you too much.

That’s not to say she couldn’t surprise us – the woman has two Oscars, after all. And many actors who were frozen in the public consciousness as male types have broken out of their conscious cages.

“I think of the funny Robin Williams, who played the scary photo technician in the film One hour photo and did a damn good job,” user beastinsideabeast told r/Movies. “Perhaps not surprising to you if you follow Robin Williams’ career and have seen most of his films, which show that he has a whole range of possibilities, but I basically just imagined Robin Williams as a comedian. And of course he had some drama to offer, but I hadn’t seen him do as well in any other film as he did with the role of Seymour Parrish.”

Then they asked, “Which actor surprised you by taking on a role they don’t normally play and doing it very well?”, and true to form, Reddit provided all sorts of interesting answers.

Daniel Craig

Bruce Willis

Anthony Michael Hall

Tom Cruise

Olivia Colman

Emily Blunt

Liam Neeson

Tom Hanks

Matt Damon

Will Ferrell

Charlize Theron

Henry Fonda

Leslie Nielsen

Bryan Cranston

John Lithgow

Neil Patrick Harris

Colin Farrell

Heath Ledger

Jeff Daniels

Joe Pesci