Go Ahead Make Me Laugh: Dramatic Actors Doing Comedy

Daniel Day-Lewis's comedic potential is vastly understated. Even going back to his early days, the guy's capacity for comedy has been in force. He's a stuffy riot in A Room With A View, he shows great comedic timing in dramatic parts like Gangs of New York, There Will Be Blood and Lincoln, and of course he puts on a veritable clinic in Phantom Thread.

Maybe because those weren't seen as much relative to what people know him for I guess. I personally think he's hilariously goofy in the TV show Modern Family btw for those who've seen that episode.

These roles are precisely why I didn't pick Bale.

Pitt is primarily comedic, as far as I see him. So discounting Pitt, I choose Norton... who I also see as primarily comedic, what with Fight Club and Moonrise Kingdom being what I associate with the guy.

Only comedy I've seen from Washington was Much Ado About Nothing, where his job was to look sexy and be charming. He delivered in spades, but it wasn't really a comedic role so much as a really good piece of furniture in a comedy.

I have a mixed assessment on some of these guys - DiCaprio has all of a sudden gotten quite funny quite fast - in the 2010s he's added a ton of skills to his toolbox that before I didn't see tbh. He's gotten funny AND improved as a dramatic actor - quite a neat trick when you look at it.

Pitt & Norton I agree with your comments on but Bale, DDL and Washington are a strange crew in this regard. To me American Psycho was a black comic triumph for Bale, and The Big Short was rather daring too imo - and could have been seen as not funny and offensive even - and he got a deserved nomination for it which not many of the guys here have done for comic work...........I agree with what stephen said about DDL in comedy and because he did so little work overall he avoided it overtly after the failure of Stars and Bars and Eversmile, NJ it looks like it's missing........ though he incorporated it slyly - so slyly people miss it a bit even too.

Washington is "somewhat" like DDL but not as much imo  - I don't think he's pulled off comedy that well in overt comedies and he has a few.......but he hasn't big time failed at it either and slips it in at times with his drama roles too - sometimes riotously (Training Day).

His problem is more his peers in their 60s rather than himself - his peers all had big success with overt comedy or at least clearer noticeable success with it (Penn, Hanks, Spacey, Bridges, Cage). I think Washington would like another crack at a true comedy actually if he sees a script that catches his eye.

I still maintain that he's a very fine straight man in Stars and Bars (a movie absolutely owned by Glenne Headly), but yeah, Eversmile, NJ was an utter dumpster fire that even he couldn't save.

Can confirm, Norton is great/hilarious in Glass Onion.

To me DDL used comedy far more effectively than Denzel or Phoenix - at the end of his career.

But TWBB and especially Phantom Thread imo are really funny and etched with odd and memorable comic touches - though I don't see either as "dark comedies" the way some people do........he's funny within the drama of both movies.

Overall I don't think DDL was that adept at comedy or didn't show it much anyway - if he was I'd rank him higher on "the GOAT list" personally - but he was a different actor - or showed it - at the end than he was at any point prior for me in this way......that's what makes acting fun and why you never know what an actor can or will do:

.........prior to Phantom Thread I'd call him often (not always) incomplete as an actor - not usually funny, not particularly memorable opposite a female .........and he did both of those spectacularly in a completely rounded way in Phantom Thread.....he confounded you there and was harder to figure out and to assess.

and then ...........he left ........

Damn, the propaganda that Denzel never did anything significant in comedy really was successful on this board , especially considering he has  become part of one of the most increasingly well regarded Christmas Romantic Comedies Of All-time as the lead with The Preacher's Wife . Ranked #25 in Rolling Stone's Greatest Christmas Movies Of All Time.


Washington took on the challenge of Cary Grant, the greatest male romantic comedian of all time, nailed it, and helped create a classic rom-com of his own. And weirdly never seems to get enough credit for it, because he didn't milk it and keep making rom-coms of increasingly depreciating value Matthew McConaughey style, even though it's obvious he can do the genre effortlessly based on The Preacher's Wife.

Denzel's a hoot in The Preacher's Wife. Part of the reason that film has staying power.


Would love to see him in a few more rom-coms before he calls it a day, because he's a natural.