Worst lead actor

(Why not try my own best/worst of question?)

What is the worst actor on a TV show, that was made a leading
character?

Anim8rFSK...

wait for the howls . .

Patrick Stewart

The guy has a GREAT voice, but frankly, his line reads, his movements,
an embarrassment.

Rob Jensen...

IMO, it's a tie between Patricia Arquette (Medium) and Jennifer Love
Hewitt (Ghost Whispering Breasts). Never, not even on 7th Heaven
(where the worst actor on television is thankfully relegated to a

record hunter...

Who is that?

supporting role) was so much lack of talent wasted on lead characters
than on the title leads of these two series.

Ian J. Ball...

I dissent on JLH - while she personally tends to make my skin craw,
she's actually a pretty good actress IMO. Certainly better than others
on TV that I could probably come up with.

-- Rob

David Levy...

David Caruso.

cloud dreamer...

Ohhh....I second that one...very much!

chicagofan...

Darn it, you beat me here! OK, make my vote No. 3 for the *poseur du jour*.
bj

cloud dreamer...

LOL! Unlike the other best/worst threads...this one, I believe, has a
clear winner.

Ian J. Ball...

You are BANNED from this newsfroup, Heretic!!1!

record hunter...

Mmmm....CSI: HORATIO!

LKU...

Clark on Smallville. Every time when the dramatic music swells up the
other characters in the scene look appropriately serious, then the
camera switches to Clark and he has that same dopey blank expression
he always has. It's hilarious.

SoHillsGuy...

I'll throw out one from about a decade ago -- Farrah Forke.

She was had no comedic timing whatsoever in her supporting role on
"Wings," yet landed a leading role in the sitcom "Dweebs." In that,
she was horrifically unfunny and bad. She's barely had regular work
since.

Brian Thorn...

Ashton Kutcher, "That '70s Show"
(Off TV now, Kutcher thankfully is off stinking up movies that are
inflicted upon audiences only once or twice a year.)

Scott Bakula, "Star Trek: Enterprise"
(He was great on Quantum Leap and good on Murphy Brown, but was
phoning in his performances on Enterprise.)

Avery Brooks, "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine"
(And you think Nana Visitor was bad? Brooks was prone to sudden swings
from chewing the scenery to totally disinterested performances, with
little in between.)

Brian Tkatch...

I never liked the character too much (did swing from good to bad) but
was it the actor, or the writing?

B.

Tom Welling, "Smallville"
(Should have stuck to modeling.)

DS9's Kira. Her character was poorly written (the worst character in

jayembee...

I disagree. As characters go, I thought Bashir, Quark, and Jake
Sisko were worse.

Brian Tkatch...

Bashir and Quark were extremes. They represented a form of humor on the
show, but the social scenes made them more normal.

Jake was annoying, but "OK".

DS9, by far) poorly acted, and noone in their right mind would put

jayembee...

Again, I disagree. While she didn't have the acting chops of some
of her peers, she was far better than Terry Farrell.

Brian Tkatch...

I thought Terry did a very good job.

By Kira, i had a hard time believing she was a character and not just a
actress who forgot to stay home.

someone so self-absorbed in a place of power.

jayembee...

And yet the character grew over the course of the series. She had
some serious blinders on at the beginning, but they were the sort
of blinders that the Bajorans, having just come out from under
Cardassian oppression, would've looked for in a leader.

Brian Tkatch...

No, from beginning to the end all Kira's choices were about Kira, and
what she herself though was good. All the making of a horrible leader.

kaydigi...

During the start of the major war Avery Brooks was great as far as Star Trek
acting goes. He cemented his role during the episode where Sisko had to get
the Romulans involded in the war.

Seriously was Avery worst than Bakula?

4400's Isabelle (of course).

jayembee...

I'm not sure I'd call her a lead actor.

Brian Tkatch...

Consider how much screen time she's had in season three, she's either a
lead actress of a piece of furniture.

B.

X-File's - T-1000.

Larry Smith...

If we're voting I am voting for David Caruso "CSI Miami".
His over-emoting is almost comical.
I love his laughable scenes with children.

record hunter...

Caruso made just one wrong move in his career: making room for Jimmy

record hunter...

Making room for Jimmy Smits.

bklyntv...

Actually in this thread I was just reflecting on the irony of him being
too good for TV, walking out, failing at movies and returning to what
is essentially the same show he walked out on, but a much, much worse
version.

Anim8rFSK...

Getting into acting.

Chris...

Yes it was one of the worst. Clooney made one of the best, that is what
Caruso was trying to do but failed in the worst way.

jayembee...

I wouldn't say that. I still think that he was very good in the
first season of NYPD BLUE. And he's done a few movies early in his
career where he was good. His mistake was getting it into his

bklyntv...

Do we have a "Thief of Hearts" fan in the house?

jayembee...

I was specifically thinking of the two Abel Ferrara films he was in:
KING OF NEW YORK and CHINA GIRL.

head that he was much better than he was, and that other people
thought he was as good as he thought himself to be.

chicagofan...

LOL... that makes two wrong moves, yours... then RH's. ;)
bj

Smits.

PorchMonkey4Life...

Leave Hawk, alone!

Ronnie...

Boy, I wish there were less sci-fi dorks around here.

I'd probably vote for Cybill Shepherd's starring roles, myself.

Brian Tkatch...

It may be sci-fi itself is prone to bad actors because less actors are
as sci-fi savy, and some people in charge miss the point about what the
fans are actually interested in.

Anim8rFSK...

Also, sci-fi scripts tend to have painful dialog. Wasn't it Harrison
Ford that said "You can't say these lines, you can only type them"?

Ronnie...

Something tells me that just about any worst/best list you would
make would be dominated by sci-fi/fantasy shows.

Here's a shocker...your post in the "final episode" thread focused
on the same shows.

Brian Tkatch...

That was a reply to another post.

Anim8rFSK...

That's . . . a real good point. Much as I love Moonlighting, it sure
isn't due to her.

record hunter...

Jimmy Smits. I had to miss the last two years of WW because of him. I
have never understood how he gets work.

bklyntv...

Duh, David Caruso, CSI Miami

Anim8rFSK...

Huh. That's an interesting choice!

Casey McDonald's Guidance Counsellor, Ian J. Ball...

This is getting annoying... >:/

PorchMonkey4Life...

it's a wonderful choice. Caruso's acting is downright Shatner-esque.

Anim8rFSK...

The Shat has better hair.

PorchMonkey4Life...

You mean a better toupe... A squirrel has been sitting atop his head
since the late 70's.

wdstarr...

I'm not sure -- it's been a long time since I saw "Hawaii Five-O" --
but I think there's a lot of Jack Lord in there too.

tomcervo...

We have a weiner. Our Lord. He had a series before 5-0, "Stoney Burke"
that had Warren Oates in a regular role. He never made that mistake
again, and made sure his co-stars would have no more charisma than
James MacArthur.
I read a story once about a visit to the set; the reported asked how's
it going and the answer was "Fine right now, while the Lord's away."
Several times.

bklyntv...

And Leslie Neilsen circa "Airplane."

GarondoMarondo...

Robert Patrick was a fine replacement for Mulder.

..
Garondo Marondo!

PorchMonkey4Life...

Keanu Reeves in anything

JacquesZMonkey...

And what tv show is he on, genius?

PorchMonkey4Life...

A presenter at the Academy Awards. And he was horrible. Barbra Walters'
Special and he was awful. Good Morning America and he was awful.

Hey, I'm a Keanu fan but the boy can't act. He's just nice to look at.

Rappers in anything