Stars Who've Played Real People

The Succession star will take on the role of the beloved puppeteer in SNL 1975, which tells the story of Oct. 11, 1975, the night that Saturday Night Live premiered on NBC. The Muppets creator and his team appeared on the first season of Saturday Night Live.

After playing a young Willy Wonka, Timothée Chalamet is once again portraying the youthful, pre-fame iteration of another world-famous pop culture icon: Bob Dylan.

The actor has been tasked with bringing the music legend's life story to the screen in the new biopic A Complete Unknown.

In The Offer, the Paramount+ original drama about making The Godfather, Goode makes the most of every scene as the infamous Paramount Pictures executive, who was tasked with turning the floundering film studio at the time and eventually saw the potential in 1972 acclaimed movie. 

A-lister Will Smith won a Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of the father of tennis phenoms Venus and Serena Williams in "King Richard."

Two years after Tiger King became a national sensation, Mitchell took on the wild animal zoo owner in Joe vs. Carole, Peacock's scripted version on the big cat saga. 

Hughes makes his onscreen debut as Abdul-Jabbar in the HBO series, Winning Time, chronicling the rise of the Lakers basketball team in the 1980s. 

On The Dropout, Seyfried portrays Theranos' founder, who was convicted of fraud following the fallout of the biotech company. 

On the Hulu true-crime series, The Girl From Plainville, Fanning portrays Carter, who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the 2017 texting suicide case.

On the HBO series, Winning Time, Brody portrays Lakers coach Pat Riley during the rise of the basketball team in the 1980s. 

For the Showtime series Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber, Thurman transformed into the author and entrepreneur behind The Huffington Post who later joined Uber’s board of directors.

The Oscar-winning actor underwent a six-month method transformation in order to become the eccentric founder of WeWork in the Apple TV+ limited series WeCrashed.

The younger Fanning sister portrays a younger version of Catherine the Great of Russia in The Great, a satirical Hulu series created by Oscar-nominated screenwriter Tony McNamara. 

Mrs. America marks Cate Blanchett's first starring TV role with the Oscar winner portraying Phyllis Schlafly, a conservative constitutional lawyer and opponent of the proposed Equal Rights Amendment.

Mrs. America recounts the real-life battle over the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment and the unexpected backlash led by Phyllis Schlafly. In the FX on Hulu limited series, Rose Byrne feminist and political activist Gloria Steinem. 

The Booksmart actress will portray Monica Lewinsky, a then 22-year-old White House intern who engaged in a sexual relationship with President Bill Clinton, in Impeachment: American Crime Story, the third installment of the FX anthology true-crime series.

The Oscar-winning actress portrays the matriarch in seasons three and four of the ongoing Netflix drama The Crown about the real-life events of the royal family. 

The Oscar-winning actress portrays the former Fox News host in Bombshell, a movie about the Roger Ailes sexual harassment scandal that was exposed by the women who worked at the cable news channel.

The two-time Oscar winner perfectly portrays the beloved children's show host in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood. The film gives viewers a look at the friendship Fred Rogers developed with journalist Tom Junod (Matthew Rhys), who was doing a profile on him. 

Nicole Kidman takes on the role of Grace Kelly as the Princess of Monaco in the biopic Grace of Monaco. The film follows the late actress' former involvement with Monaco's Prince Rainier III and France's Charles De Gaulle's dispute over tax laws in the early '60s. 

Josh Brolin played former president George W. Bush in director Oliver Stone's W.

Tom Hanks portrayed the late Walt Disney in Saving Mr. Banks and was often spotted filming at Disneyland in Anaheim, California.

West Wing star Rob Lowe returns to the Oval Office to take on the role of the late President John F. Kennedy. Lowe stars in National Geographic's Killing Kennedy, which is based on FOX News pundit Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard's book, Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot.

Once Upon a Time star Ginnifer Goodwin poses as First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in National Geographic's television event Killing Kennedy. The TV movie is adapted from Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard's book Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot, and focuses on President John F. Kennedy's assassination and its impact on America.

Fun fact, Goodwin's Big Love co-star Jeanne Tripplehorn also played Jackie O in HBO's 2009 movie Grey Gardens.

In CBGB, a movie that examines NYC's punk rock scene through the iconic rock club, Akerman plays the Blondie singer. Co-starring in the movie are Rupert Grint, Stana Katic, Johnny Galecki, Alan Rickman and Ashley Greene. 

In The Fifth Estate, Benedict Cumberbatch dons blonde locks to take on the role of the controversial figure Julian Assange. The film is a look back at the relationship between WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and his early supporter and eventual colleague Daniel Domscheit-Berg (Daniel Brühl), and how the website's growth and influence led to an irreparable rift between the two friends.

Daniel Radcliffe plays the iconic poet Allen Ginsberg in Kill your Darlings, which focuses on the true story of some of the Beat generation's most famous figures -- Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs and Lucien Carr -- being arrested for murder when David Kammerer, an outsider to their group, is found dead. The film also stars Ben Foster, Elizabeth Olsen and Michael C. Hall. Check out the film's first teaser trailer here.

Gina Gershon is a dead ringer for fashion mogul Donatella Versace. The actress stars as the platinum blonde icon in Lifetime's TV movie House of Versace. The biopic shows Donatella being thrust into the spotlight after the 1997 murder of her brother Gianni Versace, and her struggle with drug abuse and near bankruptcy.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is taking on the role of CIA employee Edward Snowden in Oscar-winning director Oliver Stone's thriller Snowden. In this first look at the actor in character, he's seen playing the whistle-blower before he made headlines for leaking thousands of classified documents to the press. 

Jennifer Hudson portrays Winnie Mandela in a drama that chronicles the life of the powerful and politically active wife of Nelson Mandela from her childhood through her marriage and her husband's incarceration.

Usher impressively channels Sugar Ray Leonard in the film Hands of Stone, a biographical film in which he plays the legendary boxer.

Ice Cube debuted the first photo of the cast of the NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton on Twitter on June 18, 2014, featuring O'Shea Jackson Jr. (Ice Cube's son), Jason Mitchell and Corey Hawkins dressed as rap icons Ice Cube, Eazy-E and Dr. Dre. Directed by F. Gary Gray, Straight Outta Compton hit on Aug. 15, 2015.



"He was born to play the role," Ice Cube joked with ET's Rocsi Diaz about his own son playing him in the movie. "He was born to play that part."

Ashton Kutcher shared on Twitter a split pic of he and the late Apple mogul Steve Jobs as a way to promote the biopic jOBS.

VH1 cast Drew Sidora as Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins, KeKe Palmer as Rozonda "Chilli" Thomas and Lil Mama as Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes for their TV movie Crazy, Sexy, Cool: The TLC Story, which is based on the real-life and career of the legendary '90s group. Chilli and T-Boz were consultants and executive producers for the film.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 actor is stepping into the iconic shoes of the legendary James Dean in the movie Life, which is about the friendship between Life magazine photographer Dennis Stock (Robert Pattinson) and the Rebel Without a Cause superstar. Dean tragically died in a car accident in 1955 when he was just 24 years old.



 

Director Stephen Frears' Lance Armstrong biopic stars Ben Foster as the controversial cyclist.

Angela Bassett channeled singer Tina Turner to a tee in 1993's What's Love Got to Do with It?  Another stand-out in the film? Laurence Fishburne as her shockingly abusive ex, Ike Turner.

Joaquin Phoenix won a Golden Globe for his portrayal of singer Johnny Cash in 2005's Walk the Line, but he wasn't the only award winner to come out of the 2005 biopic -- Reese Witherspoon won Oscar gold for her role as Cash's long-time love June Carter.

Leonardo DiCaprio got glowing reviews for his portrayal of FBI head director J. Edgar Hoover in Clint Eastwood's intense J. Edgar.

Amanda Seyfried plays legendary Deep Throat star Linda Lovelace in Lovelace, which tracks the "girl next door" as she is used and abused by the porn industry at the hands of her coercive husband, Chuck Traynor (Peter Sarsgaard), only to later take control of her life and reveal that she was actually the survivor of a far darker story.