Watching an actor or actressâ screen test or audition tape feels very voyeuristic, like youâre seeing something thatâs not supposed to be seen. Theyâre reading back scenes that, more often than not, will make it into the movie, but they havenât mastered the role yet â theyâre just auditioning, and God knows I wouldnât want my first draft of, well, anything to be looked at by thousands, if not millions.
But weâre not here to debate the morality of all that: letâs instead take a look at the audition tapes for 10 comedians, from Steve Carell to Emma Stone, for 10 different roles, all of which they eventually won. And after watching the screen tests, itâs not hard to see why.
Actor: Kristen Bell
Role: Sarah Marshall
Movie: Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Why She Won the Role: Sheâs a likable villain.
Actor: Steve Carell
Role: Brick Tamland
Movie: Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
Why He Won the Role: The redness of Carellâs face when heâs pretending to choke.
Actor: Jim Carrey
Role: Andy Kaufman/Tony Clifton
Movie: Man on the Moon
Why He Won the Role: Jim Carrey really gets that âtake my wife, pleaseâ joke.
Actor: Michael Cera
Role: Evan
Movie: Superbad
Why He Won the Role: Heâs wimpy, sure, but thereâs conviction in Ceraâs speech, a skill most actors canât pull off.
Actress: Megan Fox
Role: Mikaela Banes
Movie: Transformers
Why She Got the Role: BEST. COMEDY. EVER.
Actress: Alyson Hannigan
Role: Michelle Flaherty
Movie: American Pie
Why She Won the Role: Sheâs breathless and nerdy, yet also sexy, which is actually what the part required.
Actress: Audrey Hepburn
Role: Princess Ann
Movie: Roman Holiday
Why She Won the Role: So perfectly dignified, but thereâs something mischievous beneath her majesty.
Actor: Dustin Hoffman
Role: Michael Dorsey/Dorothy Michaels
Movie: Tootsie
Why He Won the Role: At times, and as weird as this is to say, you actually forget itâs Dustin Hoffman playing Dorothy.
Actor: Sam Rockwell
Role: Chuck Barris
Movie: Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
Why He Won the Role: Confessions is barely a comedy, but I wanted to include at least one video of Sam Rockwell dancing, which is precisely the reason he won the role.
Actress: Emma Stone
Role: Olive Penderghast
Movie: Easy A
Why She Won the Role: She breezes through tongue-twisting phrases as if she were coming up with them on her own, and her cadence is just vapid enough that she feels like a real online diary-filmer. But because of her Emma Stoneness, itâs never obnoxious and always charming.