10 Actors Who Are (Almost) Identical To The Real-Life Figures They Played

There are moments in Stephen Frears' The Program that are downright spooky. It's nothing like a horror film - The Program is just a run-of-the-mill biopic of Lance Armstrong, with the focus on the disgraced cyclist's days as a serial Tour de France winner and secret doper. It's having Ben Foster in the role of Armstrong, however, that gives the film its almost creepy edge. Foster is so physically similar to Armstrong in the part (check him out in the trailer above), and has clearly studied the man's behavior and mannerisms so closely, that in certain shots you could be convinced it's Armstrong himself. It's art imitating life, in a way that reminds you of just how rarely biopics get it exactly right, of how infrequently the actor truly goes beyond uncanny valley when it comes to looking like the real-life subject they're portraying. There have been a few notable cases where the casting director got it just right, at least in terms of outward appearance. Those are the cases in which the actors came to the role with no makeup or enhancement required to look the part (that excepts the likes of, say, Ben Kingsley in Gandhi or Charlize Theron in Monster); effectively, appearance-wise, it was the part they were born to play. Here, then, are ten examples of actors playing real-life figures that they are virtually already identical to. 10) Jamie Foxx As Ray Charles (Ray) I'm already somewhat breaking the rules here, as Jamie Foxx did use prosthetics to help him play musical legend Ray Charles in Taylor Hackford's Ray. However, said prosthetics amounted merely to devices that kept Foxx's eyes shut, to give him a sense during the shoot of living Charles' blindness. That aside, the look of Ray is all down to Foxx. Staying true to his name, Hackford doesn't bring a great deal of artfulness to his workmanlike biopic. Nonetheless, like The Program, Ray is elevated significantly by a spellbinding lead performance, given by an actor that uncannily recalls the figure they're playing. Foxx is a dead ringer for Charles in his younger days across the board, visibly a close match in manner and make-up, while the voice is pure, bang-on Ray. 9) Adrien Brody As Salvador Dali (Midnight In Paris) It's amazing what a thin black mustache alone can do to transform an actor. For a particularly strong example, see Midnight In Paris, a high-concept fantasy comedy from Woody Allen which takes rakishly handsome Oscar winner Adrien Brody, adds a pencil moustache, and gives you a young Salvador Dali in all his crazed glory. Woody Allen didn't really need to find actors who closely resembled their historical counterparts for a film like Midnight In Paris - indeed, it's like he wasn't even trying when he cast Corey Stoll as Ernest Hemingway. Still, he struck gold by selecting Adrien Brody to take on Dali. In portraying the eccentric artist, Brody plays up his less Dali-esque features (the eyes protrude as though madness has already set in) and lets genetics take care of the rest. 8) Ashton Kutcher As Steve Jobs (Jobs) As most of us know by now, Michael Fassbender gives a sterling performance playing the title role in Danny Boyle's Steve Jobs. Still, there's no escaping from the fact that he looks nothing like Jobs. In fact, it's probably the one time you can actually say he was beaten in something by sitcom star and Wrigley's spokesman Ashton Kutcher. If we're going on appearance alone, we've already had the definitive cinematic Steve Jobs in Joshua Michael Stern's Jobs. Kutcher may be flat in it, doing a decent impression without ever suggesting there's much inner life, but the resemblance is undeniable. It's in the probing dark eyes and almost sinister half-smile, while in Stern's film - unlike in Boyle's - the makeup department actually helped by giving their star a Jobs-like hairstyle. 7) Andre Benjamin As Jimi Hendrix (Jimi: All Is By My Side) You'd be forgiven for never realizing that Outkast's Andre Benjamin had a look of the great Jimi Hendrix about him - for most of his career, Benjamin (or 3000, if you prefer) had kept himself keenly groomed under a number of hats only stylish celebrities can get away with wearing. When All Is by My Side director John Ridley popped Benjamin in an afro wig and some 60's counterculture threads for his Hendrix bio, however, the resemblance was suddenly clear. Though Benjamin isn't the greatest screen presence, he easily nails the mumbling, spacey patter and playfully dazed look of Hendrix for All Is by My Side. The only potential problem is the hair department didn't tousle Benjamin's wig up enough to give it Hendrix's perpetual "I just got out of bed" look, but otherwise the similarity is spooky. 6) James Franco As James Dean (James Dean) Back in a time when James Franco wasn't everywhere at all times, he was more selective in choosing his roles. In 2001, pre-fame (he hadn't even made Spider-Man yet), Franco gave one of his better performances in playing the one famous person he resembled most: live-fast-die-young Hollywood icon James Dean. While Dane DeHaan needed the aid of prosthetics and a wig to more closely resemble Dean in Anton Corbijn's recent Life, Franco needs no assistance in the TV movie James Dean. Going the extra mile by nailing the mumble and the charismatic awkwardness, Franco didn't really need to do anything to convince as ol' Jimmy Dean - the likeness is all in the squinting, purse-lipped features and curly mop of hastily flicked-back hair. 5) Jared Leto As Mark David Chapman (Chapter 27) This is intended as a compliment: Jared Leto - when grossly overweight - looks a hell of a lot like Mark David Chapman. Yes, according to Jarrett Schaefer's Chapter 27, Chapman was just a haircut and a gym membership away from looking like one of the prettiest actors/rock stars on the planet. And vice versa, Leto is just weeks of Ben & Jerry's binges away from looking like John Lennon's mentally disturbed murderer. In an early hint of the way Leto was heading with his acting, the sometime Thirty Seconds to Mars frontman went full method, gaining 67 pounds and emerging unrecognizable in preparation for Chapter 27. It's the blank eyes, cheap haircut, and over-sized glasses - on top of the doughy, babyish features - that complete Leto's transformation into one of history's most infamous killers. 4) Val Kilmer As Jim Morrison (The Doors) Remember when Val Kilmer was a star? Yeah, maybe not - but sources assure us this is the case, and that was apparently in large part down to his spitting-image portrayal of Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors. Time hasn't been easy on the film's critical standing, but Kilmer's performance remains note-perfect. If Kilmer makes it look easy, know that it wasn't: he was so dedicated for The Doors, that he lost weight and spent six months learning Doors songs by heart (he eventually memorized 50). So the actor doesn't coast through the film and his role on his looks alone to convince as Morrison - though with those similarly piercing eyes and that maddeningly perfect bone structure, he probably could have. 3) Toby Jones As Truman Capote (Infamous) No offence to the late Philip Seymour Hoffman, but he never had the right look to truly capture Truman Capote. He lacked the correct frame and facial features (Hoffman had to lose a huge amount of weight just to play the part), while in order to make him appear closer in height to the diminutive author, director Bennett Miller had to shoot Hoffman at different angles just so he looked smaller. Hoffman gave a fantastic performance all the same in Capote, but if the Oscar had gone to the actor who most closely resembled the In Cold Blood writer, it would be in Toby Jones' hands now. Petite, and with thin sandy hair and a smug, facetious grin, Jones didn't need a lot of work to step into Capote's shoes for Douglas McGrath's Infamous. Hoffman is better, but Jones is more visibly Capote-like. 2) Vincent D'Onofrio As Orson Welles (Ed Wood) Though Christian McKay captured Welles' all-round spirit and character better than anybody else has so far managed in Richard Linklater's Me and Orson Welles, no one has come closer to looking like Orson than Vincent D'Onofrio. He only makes a brief cameo in Tim Burton's Ed Wood, as a great director offers advice to a terrible one, but his few minutes remain memorable for the "holy s**t it looks just like him"-ness of it all. It's the single arched eyebrow, the slick side-combed hair, the chubby-cheeked baby-facedness of it all - D'Onofrio just looks inescapably like one of history's greatest filmmakers. You can't quite say D'Onofrio was 'born to play' Welles, seeing as how they ended up having to dub over his higher-pitched voice with that of an impressionist's to make it work, but the look is right on the money. 1) Ben Foster As Lance Armstrong (The Program) The latest actor to fulfil his destiny and play the notorious figure he resembles most, Ben Foster must be counting his lucky stars that he was at the right age (i.e. not too old to play Armstrong in his 20s, old enough to convincingly pass for Armstrong in his early 40s) around the time they were looking to cast someone in the Lance Armstrong biopic. You might by now have heard of the lengths Foster went to for The Program, undergoing a physically strenuous regimen while also taking some of the performance-enhancing drugs Armstrong preferred. It all helped Foster to get into the cyclist's mindset, no doubt, and it shows - but really, he could have just turned up to set and been himself, and there still would have been a powerful result. The only defining trait that Foster doesn't share with Armstrong is a mild receding hairline, but if you're going to let that get in the way, then you're really just nitpicking.