This is a continuation of Friday’s post on the top ten casting choices in the history of SciFi & Fantasy film/TV. That post garnered some great comments and some very worthwhile suggestions, not one of which has altered my top five.
5. Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale
Wizard of Oz was a flop on its release, but went on to become one of the most-watched films of all time. Its vocabulary (the yellow brick road, “There’s no place like home”, flying monkeys, the green-skinned witch, the “Over The Rainbow” song) has become thoroughly embedded in the world. The film is part of the grand heritage of Western culture, far overshadowing its source material. Would it have been such a success with first-choice Shirley Temple in the role? Then ten years old, Temple was lined up for the part but inter-studio wrangling killed the deal. After a few other actresses were considered and discarded, MGM settled on one of its reliable second-stringers, Judy Garland. At 16 she was much too old for the part, but they taped her breasts down and relied on her girl-next-door looks and got the thing done. As part of the bargain they ended up with Garland’s distinctive singing voice, and her ability to convey great emotion through song. That singing voice made the movie work.
4. Buster Crabbe as Flash Gordon
Buster Crabbe was a genuine all-American hero, with an Olympic gold medal for swimming and the kind of handsome good looks that belonged on big screen. His athletic attributes got him a role as Tarzan, and that in turn led to casting as Flash Gordon in Universal’s new serial of the same name. Universal took a chance on the first (1936) Flash Gordon serial, which was the most expensive serial production ever made by a studio, and they were richly rewarded – it was an enormous hit. Two sequel serials followed, and in both Crabbe reprised the role. He was the right man in the right place, and the world responded. Science fiction on screen would never be the same again.
3. Harrison Ford as Han Solo
Ford had a key role in George Lucas’ American Graffiti, but Lucas was not interested in casting him for his upcoming science fantasy opus. However, Lucas did bring Ford in to read at the auditons of other actors. The story goes that Ford’s frustration with being frozen out, and with the turgid dialogue, made his line readings progressively more surly and acerbic as the session went on until Lucas’ compadre Spielberg realised that Ford would be perfect for the cynical Han Solo. He was; his grumpy anti-hero anchored the first movie with a genuine sense of mean, some finely delivered comedy, and astoundingly good chemistry with a walking carpet. Without someone of Ford’s calibre in the Solo role, the Star Wars films would have struggled to win us over. But with his bragging space rat on the scene, we were helpless.
2. Patrick Troughton as the second Doctor Who
The BBC’s most successful dramatic children’s TV programme – an unexpected success drawn primarily from the popularity of the Dalek monsters introduced when another script didn’t come through – was running into trouble. Ratings were starting to drop, it had never really transitioned to proper family entertainment, and most crucially, the actor who played the titular character was unwell and getting worse by the week. His performances were erratic and filled with line fluffs and it was getting harder and harder to create the demanding show around him. Faced with this situation, the sensible thing to do would be to let the show run its course, and bring it to an end. Instead, the BBC decided they were going to recast the main part; and they were going to do it right on screen, using the character’s alien nature as an excuse. More audacious still – the new actor, Patrick Troughton, was chosen specifically to put an entirely different stamp on the whole idea behind the show. Instead of a tetchy space grandad and his charges, Doctor Who became the story of an unpredictable space hobo and his friends. Troughton’s boundless charisma and considerable acting chops launched the series into a new age, and effectively smashed any boundaries that might have existed around Doctor Who. Tom Baker was a wonderful piece of casting, Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper were brilliant and audacious choices, but it was with Patrick Troughton that the UK’s greatest sci-fi product came into its own.
1. Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard
When Paramount decided they were going to make a new Star Trek series, science fiction and fantasy were out of the public’s mind. The scifi/fantasy movies and TV of the time were odd beasts, almost apologising for their existence, robbed of the confidence of the 70s and the early 80s. The return of Star Trek was an attempt to reverse this trend by bringing back the most successful science-fiction property of all.
But there was a kind of genius at work here. Star Trek had thrived on the bare-chested Captain James T Kirk and his all-American bravado and machismo; the revival would explicitly repudiate that very character type. The new Captain of the Enterprise would be erudite, thoughtful, and European. Shakespearean actor Patrick Stewart, who had appeared in several sci-fi/fantasy movies in small roles, was offered the part. He accepted, and embraced it. His performance provided gravity and credibility and emotion in the face of shaky plots, poor characterisation, and acres of technobabble. Under his guidance, Star Trek: The Next Generation found its feet in the second season and became a new phenomenon. ST:TNG would, in turn, change what was possible on television. It made the small screen safe for science fiction and fantasy again. Not only that – it also took some of the first and boldest steps into onscreen continuity for non-drama television. TNG’s legacy includes Hercules and Xena, the X-Files, Buffy and Babylon 5; the current round of Lost-style shows is a second generation that calls TNG grandfather. The entire 90s sci-fi/fantasy scene was made possible by TNG, and Patrick Stewart made TNG possible. He’s my pick for the greatest casting choice ever in sci-fi/fantasy.