There has to be a perfectly rational explanation. Maybe there's more than one Leslie Nielsen in Hollywood!note
"Dying is easy. Comedy is hard."
— Edmund Kean
The casting opposite of Tom Hanks Syndrome. With this trope, a successful actor with a history of dramatic roles plays against type and stars in a comedy, playing it for laughs and generally acting silly. And it works. Unlike Tom Hanks Syndrome, the change will rarely be permanent: the actor will still dip into serious roles, and may even bounce back and forth from comedy to drama like a rubber ball. But sometimes, the actor finds a new niche (and a new career) as a comedic performer.
Named after actor Leslie Nielsen, who, after a long career in the fifties, sixties, and seventies as a dramatic lead, turned to comedy in the 80s and thereby rejuvenated his career to the point that, these days, more people know him for his work in Airplane! and Police Squad! than they do for any of his prior dramatic or romantic roles.
Often related to The Comically Serious. See also Playing Against Type. Note that this trope is not about serious performers who have done comedic work here and there. It is about people who once were well known for serious work, and now are primarily doing comedy. If the previous Typecasting is sufficiently exploited, Adam Westing may apply as well.
Examples:
- The Trope Namer is Leslie Nielsen. Prior to Airplane!, Nielsen had a long dramatic career that spanned television and film. He often played military commanders and police detectives, with the occasional medieval king or Roman senator thrown in for good measure. Offers of leading roles had pretty much petered out by the 1980s, so he deliberately branched out into comedy with Airplane!, playing The Comically Serious. After that, he experienced a career renaissance as a comedic actor.
- Like Nielsen, Lloyd Bridges ended his career better known for his roles in Airplane!, the Hot Shots! movies and other comedy films than for his earlier dramatic work.
- In an interview, Jeff Bridges said the producers of Blown Away were hesitant to cast Lloyd as his uncle in the film, thinking he was a solely comedic actor as a result of the above.
- Believe it or not, Jim Carrey sort of qualifies. While he did appear in a short-lived sitcom in The '80s (The Duck Factory), auditioned to be an SNL cast member (which he didn't get), and had an ongoing stand-up career, most of his early film roles were serious rather than comic (i.e., the alcoholic son in Doing Time on Maple Drive and the ill-fated rocker in The Dead Pool). Ironically, Carrey's later serious roles like The Truman Show were seen as Playing Against Type.
- Terry Crews first tried building a career in action films like The Sixth Day but turned towards comedic roles after stealing the show in White Chicks.
- Back in The Golden Age of Hollywood Jean Harlow first got famous for playing Ms. Fanservice roles in Hell's Angels, The Public Enemy (1931), The Secret Six etc. After The Hays Code cracked down on sexual content in movies, Harlow switched up her image to be more of a Dumb Blonde - and she appeared as such in all subsequent films.
- Charlie Sheen was first known for roles in Wall Street and Platoon... and then landed the role of Ricky "Wild Thing" Vaughn in Major League. Hot Shots!, Spin City, the Scary Movie franchise, Two and a Half Men, and Anger Management would all follow.
- Christopher Walken won an Academy Award for a dramatic role (1978's The Deer Hunter), but nowadays seems to do more comedies and gimmicky comedic cameos more often than not. He's even got his own Best of Saturday Night Live collection, despite never being an official cast member. Basically, his onscreen persona has experienced so much Memetic Mutation that he's decided to embrace it, and his career is now largely based around Self-Parody (but none the worse for it).
- Alec Baldwin has seldom been seen near dramatic works as of late, thanks to 30 Rock and his frequent hosting gigs on Saturday Night Live (hosting so many times that he dethroned Steve Martin as the show's most frequent host, and essentially becoming a Fake Guest Star in Season 42 when Donald Trump, whom he'd been portraying in skits surrounding the presidential election, actually won). Heck, he's even doing comedy commercials.
- Chris Hemsworth hit the mainstream as the stoic Thor and built his initial career on dramatic roles. But supporting appearances in films like Vacation and Ghostbusters (2016) showed the world that he is actually downright hilarious and adept at improv. Thus, Thor: Ragnarok made the character more comedic and won rave reviews for the new direction.
- Anne Hathaway surprisingly qualifies, and even went through this more than once in her career. Before she was famous she was in a short-lived drama series called Get Real, with a smattering of other dramatic roles, before her Star-Making Role in The Princess Diaries, which typecast her as a Girl Next Door comedy star. Then in 2005 Brokeback Mountain marked a departure back into drama while establishing her as a reliable actress for Oscar Bait, leading up to a Best Actress nomination for Rachel Getting Married. Then a 2008 guest-host appearance on Saturday Night Live reminded people that she could still do comedy, and since then she's specialized in comedy, particularly Romantic Comedies, and has even done voice acting in animated films and on shows like The Simpsons and Family Guy. And oddly, the trend became more pronounced after she actually won an Oscar. These days it's almost feels like she's Playing Against Type when she appears in a drama.
- Robert Downey Jr. started out doing comedies (and he was a cast member on Saturday Night Live in the mid-1980snote ), then went into dramatic work before falling victim to his drug problems. He relaunched his career with a comedy buddy movie (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang), and now juggles between doing comedies and doing action films. Hell, he's at his funniest in his serious roles.
- William Shatner is best known for the overly dramatic Captain Kirk, as well as his intense performances in several episodes of the The Twilight Zone (1959), a supporting role in Judgment at Nuremberg and other serious roles. These days, however, he has made a name for himself as a loveable comedic actor, through things like the iconic Priceline commercials, Boston Legal, and $#!+ My Dad Says.
- Joanna Lumley was famous for playing dramatic roles until she played the outrageous Patsy in Absolutely Fabulous. She commented that her fan mail went from retired colonels telling her she was the perfect English Rose to drag queens asking her where she got her clothes.
- John Cena initially attempted to branch out from wrestling with the usual collection of action movies many pro wrestlers use to try and achieve mainstream success to diminishing returns. Then, he played a wannabe tough guy in a Transparent Closet in Trainwreck and people realized he had a flair for comedy. This allowed him to try out different roles and bring his physicality and comedic skills together in roles such as Blockers, Daddy's Home, and Peacemaker in DCEU features like The Suicide Squad and the eponymous series.
- John C. Reilly was mostly known for serious roles, but had a hard time getting lead roles due to his unconventional looks. Then he got mixed up with Will Ferrell (Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby and Step Brothers) and Judd Apatow (Walk Hard) and experienced a career jolt as a successful comedic actor. Still to this day, he regularly drifts between comedic and serious projects and is one of the few actors alive who can get away with it (case in point: We Need to Talk About Kevin was filmed concurrently with episodes of Check It Out! With Dr. Steve Brule).
- Kitty Carlisle made her career as an operetta soprano (she was the female romantic lead in A Night at the Opera), but lasted longest as a panelist on the Game Show To Tell the Truth.
- Attempted by Deborah Kerr. As she moved into the 1960s, she starred in far more comedic roles in comparison to her earlier dramatic ones. These days however her more dramatic roles - The King and I, From Here to Eternity, The Innocents etc. - would be far more remembered.
- Jamie Lee Curtis first established herself as a horror movie Scream Queen, playing the Final Girl in films like Halloween (1978), Prom Night (1980), Terror Train and Road Games. Ever since Trading Places, however, she's been best known for comedies like A Fish Called Wanda, Fierce Creatures, Freaky Friday (2003) and True Lies (which, while a Schwarzenegger action vehicle, also had strong comedic overtones). This is reflected in her starring role in the show Scream Queens (2015) - a horror comedy.
- Gene Wilder had an abbreviated version of this trope. Although he considered himself a serious actor when he started out in live theatre (and appeared in a television staging of Death of a Salesman), he only got one such film role, a supporting part in Bonnie and Clyde, before co-starring in The Producers and launching himself as a comedic actor.
- Robert De Niro had already cemented his legacy as an acting legend by the end of the 1990s thanks to his collaborations with Martin Scorsese. He closed the millennium with Analyze This, a comedy that sent up his mob archetype. Next year came The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle and Meet the Parents. With the blockbuster success of Analyze and Parents, DeNiro found a second wind in his career as a comedic actor.
- Patrick Troughton: The second actor to play the lead in Doctor Who was known for dramatic roles both before, during, and after his role as The Doctor. He was television's first Robin Hood, a radio version of 1984's Winston Smith, as well as the priest from The Omen (1976). And he played Adolf Hitler on stage. He played his Doctor as more of a clownish hobo figure in comparison to his more serious predecessor and successor, both of whom, in a way, qualify for Tom Hanks Syndrome.
- In a rare instance of an example being applied to a writer/director, Blake Edwards got his start with "private eye" material — on radio, TV and film — before he directed the war comedy Operation Petticoat. This wasn't a big catalyst, but after The Pink Panther (1963), the majority of his output was comedic, although he continued to do drama here and there.
- His radio scripts for Richard Diamond, Private Detective are early examples of his comedic wit, while being very good detective stories as well.
- Spencer Tracy gradually shifted to comedy with Father of the Bride, but Adam's Rib really provided a bigger catalyst for the shift. Though also well respected for his dramatic works, he rounded off his career with It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.
- Alan Reed first played supporting roles on radio dramas but shifted largely to comedy by the 1950's. By the way, The Flintstones is a comedy.
- Fred MacMurray had both this and Tom Hanks Syndrome; he was known for "nice guy" roles in movies like Alice Adams and Trail Of The Lonesome Pine, played against type as a "heavy" in movies like The Caine Mutiny, The Apartment and Double Indemnity, then switched over to often Disney-connected family-friendly roles like The Absent-Minded Professor, The Shaggy Dog and as a TV dad in My Three Sons.
- Rose Byrne was best known as a dramatic actress at the outset of her career, notably with Troy, 28 Weeks Later, and the lead in sleeper hit Insidious and FX drama Damages. She's gained a lot more recognition as of late as she's gone into more comedic work, with well-received turns in the smash hit Bridesmaids, along with Get Him to the Greek, Neighbors, and Spy. Her role as Moira McTaggart in the X-Men Film Series keeps her in some drama however.
- James Marsden gradually shifted to comedy during the late part of the Turn of the Millennium. At the beginning of said decade, he is known playing the Only Sane Man in action and heavy drama films (X-Men, The Notebook, Superman Returns). Starting the late 2000s, he's mostly seen in romantic comedies or dramedies (Hairspray, Enchanted, 27 Dresses), along with being foil to animated characters (Hop, Sonic the Hedgehog).
- Candice Bergen got her start as a dramatic film actress, working very hard at trying to crawl from under her famous father Edgar Bergen's (think the '50s version of Jeff Dunham here) formidable comedic shadow by sticking to serious dramas. Playing Sydney Biddle Barrows in the TV movie The Mayflower Madam led to a second time hosting SNL. Her performance that night got her cast as the eponymous protagonist in Murphy Brown.
- Jackie Chan early in his career deliberately went for funny movies and adopted a comedic fighting style to differentiate himself from Bruce Lee.
- Roy Atwell dove headfirst from a dramatic actor into a comedic one when he nervously flubbed a line during his first time on Broadway (he was supposed to say, "It is spring and all the little birds are twittering in the tree tops," but it came out as: "Tis ting and the twits are birdering in the tree flops." ). From then on, stumbling over words became his trademark.
- Vince Vaughn's first few roles were in the likes of The Lost World: Jurassic Park, the remake of Psycho and Return to Paradise. In the 2000s he became far more famous for comedies - DodgeBall: A True Underdog Story, Film/Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), Wedding Crashers, The Break Up, Couples Retreat etc. While he does flirt with the occasional dramatic role - Into the Wild, True Detective - he's known primarily as a comedian.
- Kate Hudson's first film was a light-hearted drama Almost Famous. Afterwards she became associated with romantic comedies - with the exception of Nine (musical) and The Skeleton Key (horror). As of Good People and Deepwater Horizon she seems to be approaching drama again.
- Jennifer Garner debuted as an action heroine in Alias and Elektra. After 13 Going on 30 proved a surprising hit, she moved onto romantic comedies. While some of the films are dramatic, with the exception of Dallas Buyers Club they're still quite light-hearted - such as Juno. The Nostalgia Chick even commented on how much better suited she was to comedy when reviewing Elektra.
- Jennifer Lopez got her start in dramatic roles such as Selena, Enough, Anaconda etc. After her music career took off, she found a lot more success in romantic comedies such as The Wedding Planner, Maid in Manhattan, Monster-in-Law etc. She's far more likely to do comedy than drama these days.
- Alyson Hannigan's Star-Making Role was as Willow on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. While light-hearted at times, Buffy was known for its Tear Jerker moments, and Hannigan's character was a huge Woobie. After Buffy she found success in out and out comedies American Pie and How I Met Your Mother.
- Terence Hill started his career in dramas like The Leopard and straightforward Spaghetti Westerns like Ace High and a Django sequel. Then he was cast alongside Bud Spencer in the Western spoof They Call Me Trinity, redefining Hill as a comedian.
- Jack Elam had one of those faces that made it guaranteed he'd end up playing a lot of villains, and he did just that for most of his early career. But in 1969, he was cast as the Bumbling Sidekick in Support Your Local Sheriff. His comedic timing and his ability to deliver entire pages of dialogue with nothing more than his facial expressions meant that he was almost never cast as a villain ever again — unless it was a bumbling incompetent villain in a comedy. According to his good friend James Arness, at first Elam hated only being offered comedies, but soon realized he was becoming more famous as a comedian than he ever had been as a heavy, and started intentionally seeking out comedic roles.
- Channing Tatum first got into films doing either gritty indie projects (Coach Carter, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, Stop-Loss), action films (G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Haywire) or romantic leading roles (Step Up, Dear John, The Vow). With the successes of Magic Mike and 21 Jump Street he has carved out a niche as a comedic actor - and delights in playing his tough guy image for as much laughs as possible. That being said, he also flirted with Tom Hanks Syndrome in the dark drama Foxcatcher.
- Haley Joel Osment shot to fame as a child actor in dramatic films like Forrest Gump, The Sixth Sense, and A.I.: Artificial Intelligence. As he grew up, he transitioned to working primarily in comedic roles in works like Sex Ed, Entourage, and Silicon Valley.
- Annette Crosbie was mostly known for highbrow drama, until she was cast as Margaret Meldrew in One Foot in the Grave which became her signature role and led to a lot more comedic parts.
- Emma Thompson started shifting from drama to comedy in the 2000s - transitioning from The Remains of the Day, In the Name of the Father and Sense and Sensibility to Love Actually, Nanny McPhee, Stranger Than Fiction etc. These days she's more likely to show up as "that funny English lady" in various films. Even in Saving Mr. Banks - which is a drama biopic - she's playing The Comically Serious.
- Leighton Meester got famous for a Teen Drama like Gossip Girl but pursued comedy films and sitcoms afterwards.
- Gary Cole mainly did drama roles before Office Space (and before that, The Brady Bunch Movie, kind of) brought him into the comedy genre that he now does alongside his drama roles.
- Melora Hardin generally did drama until she took the role of Jan Levinson on The Office. While Jan began as a Comically Serious character, Hardin received praise for her performance once Jan started turning into more of Cloudcuckoolander, and since then she's added a lot more comedy to her resume.
- Gérard Depardieu had this starting with Inspector Blunder (he played in about forty movies before that, with starring roles in about fifteen of them since Les Valseuses). He's played an even mix of comedies and dramatic roles ever since.
- Brazil offers a musical case: Utopia was a rock band whose dreams of fame fit well with their name. They noticed the jokey stage banter was earning bigger responses than their songs, reinvented themselves as the outright comedy rock group Mamonas Assassinas and had a meteoric rise to fame, being ubiquitous best-sellers for six months before dying in a plane crash. It even led to them delivering some vengeance, as once their hometown who declined Utopia a concert in the municipal arena now was begging for Mamonas to play there, the eventual gig had as an opening act... the band doing a serious set as Utopia!
- Patrick Stewart was primarily known as a dramatic Shakespearean actor who further ventured into science fiction with his portayal of Capt. Jean Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Since the 2000's, he's successfully transitioned into comedic roles, most notably Deputy Director Avery Bullock in American Dad!
- Frank Launder (half of the Sidney Gilliat and Frank Launder duo) was primarily known as a dramatic auteur, with powerfully dramatic films like I See a Dark Stranger and The Blue Lagoon (1949). But after The Happiest Days of Your Life (1950), he eventually focused entirely on comedy, culminating in the triumph of The Belles of St. Trinian's (1954).
- Ichiro Mizuki, known as "the Emperor of Anime Songs", had a long career as a singer having being active since the 1960s. However, after an appearance on Gaki no Tsukai ya Arahende's 2006 "24-hours No Laughing Police" special, he learned he quite enjoyed being a large ham (his appearance being especially effective due to Playing Against Type) and so began doing more variety show appearances alongside his still active singing career. His "ZETT!" catchphrase and wearing of a red scarf came from his appearance on that special.
- David Alan Grier was initially known as a dramatic actor in his early career in works such as Streamers, Dreamgirls, A Soldier's Play (as well as its film adaptation), among others. Then he would become a cast member on the sketch comedy series In Living Color!. This would ultimately redefine Grier as a comedic actor, in which he's done more light-hearted work ever sense.
