Examples of re-use of unrelated footage of same actor when younger
June 19, 2013 1:23 AM   Subscribe

I'm looking for examples of movies or TV shows showing a character at two different ages by having the actor play the older version as usual and presenting the younger version by re-using unrelated footage of the same actor when younger.

I know of two examples:
  • Footage of Terence Stamp playing Dave Fuller in the film Poor Cow (1967) was re-used to show a young Wilson in The Limey (1999).
  • Footage of William Shatner playing Kenneth Preston in the TV show Studio One in Hollywood: The Defender (1957) was re-used to show a young Denny Crane in the Boston Legal episode "Son of the Defender" (2007).
Are there more?
posted by stebulus to Media & Arts (20 answers total) 6 users marked this as a favorite
 
In the Line Of Fire "The movie also uses digitized imagery from 1960s Clint Eastwood movies inserted into the Kennedy assassination scenes."
posted by anonymisc at 1:48 AM on June 19, 2013


Bill Murray's character sees himself acting in an old movie on TV in Lost in Translation. Not sure what real Bill Murray project the footage came from...
posted by hamandcheese at 1:57 AM on June 19, 2013


The Dealbreakers Talk Show episode of 30 Rock uses footage of Alec Baldwin in The Hunt for Red October. Jack walks in front of a high-def camera and the monitor shows a younger version of himself.
posted by embrangled at 2:11 AM on June 19, 2013 [5 favorites]


This is done in the Austin Powers Goldmember movie, with footage from an old Michael Caine movie used as a flashback.
posted by pasici at 2:31 AM on June 19, 2013 [1 favorite]


Sunset Blvd (1950) has a scene where the Gloria Swanson actress character wants to watch a movie from earlier in her career. They use footage of a younger Gloria.TVTropes says the footage is from Queen Kelly (1929).
posted by Stacey at 3:28 AM on June 19, 2013 [4 favorites]


I think the title sequence of Birds of a Feather is like this.
posted by tel3path at 4:03 AM on June 19, 2013


I've just spent a ridiculous amount of time googling the Birds of a Feather one. Can't find anything definitive, but Pauline Quirke and Linda Robson have been friends since they were small children.
posted by kjs4 at 4:11 AM on June 19, 2013


Iron Man doesn't use footage, but it does use some older pictures of RDJ for all those splashy Tony Stark media pieces from the past. (half-credit for this answer)
posted by whitneyarner at 5:30 AM on June 19, 2013


Pretty sure this is a plot point in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang as well--With Corbin Benson's character I believe? Though that "old" footage too may have been fake.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 5:33 AM on June 19, 2013


In Arrested Development, a flashback of Charlize Theron's character Rita uses a still shot of the actress in Monster.
posted by casualinference at 6:07 AM on June 19, 2013 [1 favorite]


Ooh, my favorite example of this is from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? According to TCM,
"For Jane's old movie clips in Baby Jane, Robert Aldrich used scenes from two of Bette Davis' actual films: Parachute Jumper and Ex-Lady (both 1933). For Blanche's old movie clips in the film, Aldrich used scenes from Joan Crawford's 1934 film Sadie McKee."
posted by Lieber Frau at 6:20 AM on June 19, 2013 [2 favorites]


I think there was a teeny bit of this in Party Down. There was an episode where people watch an old movie of Henry's, and it seemed like it was an actual clip from a younger Adam Scott.
posted by The corpse in the library at 6:45 AM on June 19, 2013


Nancy Marchand in the finale of The Sopranos!

She died before the end of the series. They reanimated her with old footage to appear in the finale.

And it didn't work very well.
posted by JimN2TAW at 7:29 AM on June 19, 2013


The Adam Sandler movie "Funny People," (not one of his comedy-of-stupidity movies, but a decent drama about a professional comic getting cancer) starts out with Sandler's character watching videos of a younger Sandler doing making prank phone calls. IIRC, it's the first thing you see in the movie.

A season 3 (2003-4) episode of "Scrubs," "My Friend the Doctor," showed J.D. (Zach Braff's character) watching the 1993 Harrison Ford movie "The Fugitive" when he spots a familiar face: an NYPD officer on the subway played by Neil Flynn. J.D. recognizes his nemesis, the hospital custodian known only as Janitor (also played by Neil Flynn), as the cop. He presses Janitor for information, and Janitor reluctantly admits that he did some acting when he was younger.

I suspect some Michael/Kirk Douglas footage was used in the flashbacks, cut in to appear to be 8mm home-movie, in the David Fincher movie "The Game." The home-movie stuff was used to establish how much Nicholas (Michael Douglas) was like his father (who looks very much like Douglas, and not at all like Nicholas's brother played by Sean Penn).
posted by Sunburnt at 7:45 AM on June 19, 2013


I can't say for sure they did this, but the makers of the U.S. version of "The Office" sure missed a golden opportunity if they didn't. The character "Creed Bratton" on the show was in the band the Grass Roots (again, within the show); he's played by actor Creed Bratton who *actually* was in the Grass Roots. There's lots of footage around of the real Creed performing the real Grass Roots that they could have used -- again, can't swear they did, but boy, what a pity if they didn't!
posted by orthicon halo at 8:41 AM on June 19, 2013


The title sequence for the TV show Parenthood has home movies of the adults when they were kids. I don't see any actual credits, but it looks to me like it could be actual home movies of the actors.
posted by CathyG at 11:56 AM on June 19, 2013


I'm pretty sure Community has done this with Chevy Chase (at the very least, there's a portrait painting in his character's house that looks like it was taken from something in the Caddyshack era).

And for a real-life example, when Gwyneth Paltrow hosted SNL a few years back, they put up an old picture of her with her childhood friend (and then-current SNL cast member) Maya Rudolph.
posted by psoas at 12:43 PM on June 19, 2013


season 1, episode 6 of Scrubs has a moment where Dr. Cox is watching footage of his and Jordan's wedding, and the footage is of actress Christa Miller's wedding to series creator Bill Lawrence.
posted by euphoria066 at 6:44 PM on June 19, 2013


I don't know if it counts, but in the episode "The French Connection" of Supernatural, Dean Winchester (played by Jensen Ackles), as Jensen Ackles (in the AU he's stuck in for most of this episode), is shown a YouTube video of a young Jensen Ackles (the real Jensen Ackles) acting in Days of Our Lives, which blows Dean's mind. Yes, extremely confusing to describe, but absolutely hilarious once you watch and understand the episode.
posted by WasabiFlux at 12:08 AM on June 20, 2013


In the TV show Castle, episode 2.17, Castle's mother, Martha Rogers (an actress) watches her younger self in an episode of The Incredible Hulk. It was actual footage from 1977, when actress Susan Sullivan (who plays Martha) appeared on the show.
posted by themissy at 9:03 AM on June 23, 2013


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