Saturday, March 21, 2015

50 shades of Gary

By +Brad Naylor

British actor and star of the movies 'Dead Fish' and 'Tiptoes', Gary Leonard Oldman celebrates his 57th birthday today. Just as music producer George Martin vowed never to use the same sound twice, Gary Oldman stands by his decision to never wear the same haircut twice (unless it's a sequel).

50 wigs of Gary
20 of his 50+ movie and TV roles
Oscarless Oldman has been in way more than 50 movies but our teaser title wouldn't work if we allowed things like accuracy to get in our way. Gary's first major acting role was as The Sex Pistol's bass player Sid Vicious in Sid and Nancy. Strangely, this movie was also Courtney Love's first major acting role, but that is another post for another day (or not).

Gary's most memorable role depends very much on when you discovered him. He will most likely be remembered by the masses for his role as Harry Potter's wizard godfather, Sirius Black. Sirius Black goes down in history as the least imaginative name for a character in a book or movie because he is able to transform himself into a black dog. Black = Black and Sirius = Dog Star ∴ Sirius Black = Black Dog. Shame on you J K Rowling for taking the easy way out.

But, I digress. just take a look at Oldman's last 5 roles. He goes from a police commissioner to Elvis to some guy to a cyborg scientist to some guy fighting smart apes and all quite seamlessly AND with slightly different haircuts throughout.

Gary Oldman's last 5 faces
Gary Oldman as Gordon, Elvis, Wyatt, Norton and Dreyfuss
"The key to playing a new role is to embrace the hairstyle. Get into the coiff, get into the character," Gary told us. Sometimes it's more than just the hair. "When I first wore the hair of Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg, or J-BEZ as I called him, it didn't feel quite right. The swept fringe was good but the image needed to be more evil, more Hitler-esque, something more anti-Semitic. The producers wouldn't let me do a toothbrush mustache, so I added the soul patch, and J-BEZ was truly born."

Oldman's resume includes good guys, bad boys and pretty much every stop in between. There is probably no role he could not play, given the correct hairdresser. And we have a small Oldman character challenge for you...

A dozen more Oldman roles
Can you name all 12 character names?
If you want to show off your Oldman IQ then tell us the names of all the characters in the image above using the comments section below.

Happy Birthday Old Man!

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