Open Forum Friday: Do You Like It When Directors Use The Same Cast In Every Movie?

Posted by on September 28th, 2007   Filed under: Movies, Open Forum Friday

Here’s something I’ve been thinking about recently, in part because of this great Wes Anderson article that Croft pointed me towards, and also because it was just announced that both Bill Murray and Jason Schwartzman will also be involved his next film The Fantastic Mr. Fox. There are certain directors who like to work with the same cast and crew for every movie they do. Wes Anderson is one of them; other names that come to mind are Judd Apatow, Kevin Smith and Tim Burton. Clearly you develop strong working relationships and confidence in these people when the movies turn out well, and it makes sense that you would want to continue to collaborate. But on the other hand, I think it can also be limiting because these filmmakers refuse to step outside their comfort zone.

Critics are starting to realize that Wes Anderson’s movies are all very similar, and some people (myself included) are anxious to see him break out of the holding pattern he’s in. However, the old adage “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”, also seems to apply. I think there’s something to be said for a filmmaker whose work is very recognizable and closely related stylistically, but I also happen to admire versatility in a director. What do you think? Are you a fan of directors who “keep it in the family” so to speak? Does it make their work stronger or weaker as a whole? Is Wes Anderson becoming too predictable? Give us your thoughts here on Open Forum Friday.



  • scoville

    I think much of this has to do with the director’s ability to use the cast in different ways.

    Look at Scorsese’s carreer. How many different types of characters has Deniro been able to pull off under his direction? Even now with DiCaprio, the same type of thing is going on.

    Scorsese uses many of his cast over and again, but it doesn’t get nearly as stagnant as what Anderson’s out put has gotten.

  • Yeah, that’s a good point. I’d say Tim Burton has also managed to get a lot of different performances out of Johnny Depp.

  • Nemesis

    I think some directors/actors just have a good respect for each other’s vision & it brings out the best in both of them, maybe some of it is luck. If it works, dont fix it. Some of them just seem destined 4 each other:
    Carpenter/Russell
    Scorsese/De Niro
    Lumet/Pacino
    Siegel/Eastwood

    Though having a whole career with roughly the same actors is something else…If the director churns out the same type of movie over & over again it can get stale after a while..

  • Goon

    sometimes its okay, sometimes its not. Depp/Burton is annoying, and Mann is getting too cozy always using Jamie Foxx now. Even as much as I dont mind Wes Andersons casting, the way he used Anjelica Huston in way too similar a role was not good.

  • Back when I was in my major Kevin Smith-obsessed phase in high school I enjoyed the repeat players in his movies. I like Johnny Depp and Tim Burton’s films. Carpenter and Russell, too. I never really thought about this topic before, but I guess I’m a fan of recurring actor/director combos. So long as the movies are good I could really care less who’s involved in making it.

  • Liz

    I’ve actually found that I actually come to appreciate certain actors more once they’ve developed mutually beneficial creative relationship with a director like this. Didn’t appreciate Johnny Depp until I saw him in a Tim Burton film. I liked Leonardo DiCaprio well enough in general (come on, I was fourteen when Romeo and Juliet came out, it was considered a crime if you didn’t like Leo), but it was only after I saw the work he did with Scorsese that I became completely obsessed with *both* their bodies of work. I think nurturing creative relationships like that where the actors become more like collaborators with the directors can really, really help the film.

    I think what they need to beware of is not necessarily the risk of becoming stale or complacent but of the creative burn out that can come when you’re working too closely with someone. Look at De Niro and Scorsese: they didn’t work together for seven years between The Last King of Comedy and Goodfellas because making King of Comedy was so emotionally gruelling for them. Maybe that time apart actually helped Goodfellas be what it was.

  • Burton rules, and he has used several actors other than Johnny Depp, like Jeffrey Jones, in several movies. And he has avoided him at times. It all depends on wether or not the script has a part that fits the general description of the actor people have worked with before.

    In the case of writing stuff for specific actors because you know them, like Kevin Smith or Wes Anderson, it seems a little lazy and uncreative I have to say. But nobody is going to argue that Tim Burton is a better director than either of these two, and has gotten significantly better performances out of both his regular cast and other actors.

  • These are good points. I do think, however, that there’s a distinction between a working relationship between one actor and one director (Burton/Depp, Carpenter/Russell, DeNiro/Scorsese) and a director who constantly casts ALL of his buddies in his films over and over again.

    I don’t blame these directors necessarily, because working with your friends is a lot of fun. But like Henrik said, it’s a bit lazy, and also can weaken the movie when you insist on casting friends in parts that maybe they can’t actually handle.

  • I hate to be topical and popculture-related but Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen are another example of just establishing a small group and jerking themselves off on screen for as long as people are giving them the benefit of the doubt.

  • “…and has gotten significantly better performances out of both his regular cast and other actors.”

    Estella Warren in Planet of the Apes, Depp in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – two of the worst mainstream movie performances I’ve seen the past decade.

    “….jerking themselves off on screen”

    take a look at how many movies Apatow is involved with, and how many of those same movies Rogen is involved with. Not that many, it just so happens that two of them were released this summer (and Apatows involvement in Superbad was WAYYYY overblown for the sake of marketing). Apatow has directed two, count em, two movies, mixing some people from other projects in with a hell of a lot of new people. He deserves a lot more slack here.

    I mean, what are you going to say next, that Christopher Guest sucks because he uses the same people? Whats he supposed to do, start fresh with every movie with a troupe of people who dont know how to improv yet?

  • The other thing I wanted to bring up is that its really weak for me to hear people call someone ‘uncreative’ if they use people multiple times. I can agree it can seem annoying to see the same people if you dont like the movies, ESPECIALLY in the leads, but Wes Anderson has the same style in every movie, Scorsese uses music similarly in every movie, etc, etc.

    I just think its ridiculous for anyone to flat out across the line call it ‘lazy’ to work with your friends and forgive everything else that returns to the directors style. Is it lazy if a director uses the same crew behind the camera? same editors, same cinematographers? How do you know they dont put together a movie with what the cinematographer could do with it in mind? I’m sure some directors actually do pick their friends because they’re lazy, but I’m just as sure that the majority of people pick their friends becuase they’ve established successful relationships that make their work both fun and productive.

    “jerking each other off” – i mean, fuck that. Should Peter Jackson use ILM instead of WETA because its predictable and ‘lazy’ for him to use his own people in his own production company? Would it be ‘lazy’ for him to use Andy Serkis again to mimic animals/creatures?

  • Well there is a difference between making a movie that requires a performance from a CGI creature, and then hiring somebody who you worked with before, and writing the CGI creature in to be able to work with the person again. It’s the latter that can seem a little lazy and uncreative in certain regards.

    Obviously every movie requires a crew behind the camera and you might as well pick people who you know are talented and nice, but when you start shaping the content just for the sake of safety it seems uncreative. I don’t think Judd Apatows movies are necessarily the worst in that regard, I’d say Kevin Smith would be the prime example, but going back to his TV days it seems to be the direction it’s going in, and seems to a big part of what people like about them. Untill they get tired of it, which of course will happen eventually.

  • As for Tim Burton, I didn’t mean to say that ALL performances in all of his movies are necessarily amazing, but he at least has gotten some memorable performances out of both actors he works with often, and actors he doesn’t.

    And even though he works with Johnny Depp alot, and like I said among others, Jeffrey Jones, it’s not like you know what you’re getting in the same way as Anderson or Smith or whomever else you might mention. All of the movies are significantly different and so are the characters. Sure there is a style element that doesn’t go away but for better or worse, the content is way more varied than any of the other examples that has been brought up.

  • I can see where you’re coming from, but personally I’ve detested every Burton film in the past 10 years, and since Depp has been in almost every one of them, couple that with my general dislike of Depp (I find him too much of a ham)… you know how when a movie loses you and you start nitpicking all the things you dont like? well because of that Ive got a large collection of things that now bother me about Burton that he shoves into everything he does…

    we all forgive repetition so long as we enjoy what we’re watching. a mediocre band puts out the same album every time, and they disappear off your radar. but theres other bands who put out the same thing every time and the fans eat it up… there is no across the board rule.

  • “you know how when a movie loses you and you start nitpicking all the things you dont like?”

    I never do that.

  • Henrik:

    Tim Burton has made almost three times the amount of films Anderson has, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. Many would argue that he’s gotten some amazing performances out of Bill Murray, Gene Hackman, Luke Wilson, Jason Schwartzman and so on.

  • Goon

    …not only that, his films pretty much MADE half a dozen acting careers.

  • TheSnowLeopard

    I agree with Goon: Depp’s performance in Charlie And the Chocolate Factory is embarrasingly bad.

    I think Burton is way over-rated.

  • I just want to add that I also think that Burton is ove . Charlie and chocolate was really bad and I think Big Fish was also not really as good as people say Tim Burton is.

  • Goon

    Leopard – it feels with so many of Depps movies that he’s doing an impression of someone else. we all know the Keith Richard impression as Jack Sparrow, he was channeling Michael Jackson in Charlie, and being Jon Lovitz in Ed Wood more than acting like Wood himself. Now doing impressions can be good sometimes, but with Depp I find them too obvious and that they take me out of the character. (even though I liked the Ed Wood performance)

  • Well I think the strongest performances from Johnny Depp, of the movies I have seen, are:

    3. From Hell
    2. Edward Scissorhands
    1. Sleepy Hollow

    I’m curious if you see impressions in any of those? Allthough I guess his Ichabod Crane is really an impression of Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween.

  • Goon

    I really didnt mind him so much in Sleepy Hollow. While I didnt consider that a great movie in any regard, I dont think it outright sucked either. Im just ‘meh’ about it in the way that makes me think I’ll end up seeing it again one day.

    Edward Scissorhands for the most part is almost a Mr Bean semi-mime role. He’s good at it, he HAS to ham it up to make a generally silent character more emotive.

    Havent seen From Hell. just doesnt grab me.

  • You guys are crazy. Tim Burton overrated? Planet of the Apes aside, I think he’s got a pretty solid filmography. He’s not as cutting edge as he used to be, but Beetlejuice, Batman and Peewee’s Big Adventure are classics. Heck I even like Mars Attacks.

    Johnny Depp I’m neither here nor there about.

  • From Hell is really good, as long as you can watch without holding it up against the comic book. It’s a straight-up detective story.

    I guess Scissorhands is alot of miming, I wouldn’t quite say it’s Mr Bean, but I can see the point. There’s no question that it’s an ‘acting’-part and that there is alot of acting going on, but I definitely think he did a good job, especially in the more humorous aspects of it.

  • I assume when you say ham it up, you mean he’s over-the-top? If that’s the case, I definitely feel the same way at times, watching him play Jack Sparrow gives me a headache, but in From Hell he’s alot more underplayed.

    And yeah, Tim Burton definitely has earned the ‘position’ he’s in. Problem is he’s at that 2nd-tier of movie knowledge, behind the Steven Spielberg-tier, and a pretty easy target for people looking for one. But like Sean said… Batman, Batman Returns, Mars Attacks, Sleepy Hollow, Edward Scissorhands (and you might even include Nightmare before christmas as well)… Can’t beat that.

  • TheSnowLeopard

    Depp is just coasting while he remains Burton’s muse. I haven’t seen all his performances, but I’ve yet to see one that really made me take notice and go ‘Wow!’ I’d say Donnie Brasco was his best characterisation – a decent dramatic performance.

    Ed Wood is Burton’s best work.

  • Primal

    I have no problem with Wes Anderson working with the same actors. I don’t like when you guys call it lazy when directors work with the same actors. Often times when I do see the same actor working with the same director, they do well and sold me in that role that I can’t imagine anyone else doing any better. I think the positives definitely outweigh any negatives you can find when you see talented directors work with the same talented actors.

    All the actor-director team-ups mentioned are ones I really do like. Another team-up that comes to mind is now Mortensen/Cronenberg. Whatever movie they make together, I am going to see it no matter what.

    As for Burton, I love his films. His best collaboration with Depp is Ed Wood, no doubt for me. Batman and Beetlejuice are my favorite though. So I actually prefer Burton-Keaton much more.