On Another Role Trivia Quiz

Answer: Charlie Allnut

Humphrey Bogart (1899-1957) is the actor common to both roles. He played Rick Blaine, owner of Rick's Cafe Americain, in the World War II drama,"Casablanca" (1942), opposite Ingrid Bergman and Claude Rains and "the beginning of a beautiful friendship". Set in September 1914, "The African Queen" (1951) had Bogart as Charlie Allnut, a riverboat captain, opposite Katharine Hepburn as the prim and proper Rose Sayer. Bogart also appeared as detective Sam Spade in "The Maltese Falcon" (1941).

Answer: Stella Dallas

I always wondered why Barbara Stanwyck (1907-1990) was never awarded an Oscar for the roles she played, both comic and dramatic. While she was nominated four times for "Stella Dallas", "Ball of Fire", "Double Indemnity" and "Sorry Wrong Number", she was finally awarded an Honorary Award in 1982.

In 1944, she played Phyllis Dietrichson, a manipulative, scheming woman trying to profit from her husband's murder in "Double Indemnity". She played the title role in "Stella Dallas" (1937) about a working-class woman trying to give her daughter everything.

Answer: Captain Morton

James Cagney (1899-1986) was one of the most prominent stars of the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. He played film actor and make-up artist Lon Chaney in "Man of a Thousand Faces" (1957). He was also the tyrannical captain, Captain Morton, of a Navy Cargo ship Reluctant at the end of World War II in "Mister Roberts" (1955).

Henry Fonda played the title role as Lieutenant j.g. Doug Roberts, a gentle, sane soul in the middle of wartime chaos. I left out Cagney's role as George M. Cohan in the 1942 movie "Yankee Doodle Dandy" because it seemed too obvious.

Answer: Annie Savoy

Susan Tomalin married Chris Sarandon in 1967, and used her married name as her stage name even after her divorce in 1979. One of her earlier roles was as Janet Weiss in the 1975 movie "The Rocky Horror Picture Show", which continues to have a cult following to this day.

She won an Academy Award as Sister Helen Prejean in the poignant "Dead Man Walking" (1995) about a convicted murderer sentenced to death. Sarandon also portrayed Annie Savoy in the baseball film "Bull Durham" (1988) and Louise in "Thelma and Louise" (1995).

Answer: Wilbur Turnblad

Christopher Walken is such a good actor that he seems to 'become' the person he is playing. In 1979 he won a Best Supporting Academy Award for the alarming and graphic war movie "The Deer Hunter". Walken was also nominated for his role as Frank Abagnale Sr., father of the impersonator Frank Abagnale Jr. in "Catch Me If You Can" (2002).

He also appeared in the remake of the John Waters film "Hairspray" (2007) as Wilbur Turnblad, father of Tracey Turnblad who becomes a star on a Baltimore teenage dance show. Wilbur's wife, Edna, was played by John Travolta.

Answer: Ada Monroe

Nicole Kidman was actually born in Hawaii but was brought up in Australia. She won a Best Actress Academy Award for portraying author Virginia Woolf in "The Hours" (2002), about the effect her novel "Mrs. Dalloway" had on three different generations of women.

She played Ada Monroe, a woman from North Carolina awaiting her husband's return at the end of the Civil War in the drama "Cold Mountain" (2003). Kidman also played Satine in the 2001 musical film "Moulin Rouge!", and she appeared in the comedy "Practical Magic" in 1998.

Answer: Troy Maxson

Denzel Washington started out on TV as Dr. Philip Chandler on "St. Elsewhere" in 1988, before he became a movie star. He has been nominated for Academy Awards for a number of films, and won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for "Glory" (1990) and a Best Actor Award for "Training Day" (2001).

He played Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, the boxer wrongly imprisoned for murder in "The Hurricane" (1999). Washington also performed as Troy Maxson, a bitter black man in the 1950s who never got to play baseball in the Major Leagues, in "Fences" (2016).

Answer: Jane Hudson

I had to include the iconic actress Bette Davis (1908-1989) in this quiz, two time Academy Award winner and the gold standard for acting at the time. She won her Best Actress Oscars for "Dangerous" (1936) and "Jezebel" (1939). My favorite role of hers was as actress Margo Channing, about the machinations of theater people in "All About Eve" (1950).

She later played "Baby" Jane Hudson, opposite her mortal enemy Joan Crawford, about an aging former child star and her paraplegic sister in "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?" (1962).

Answer: Lou Gehrig

Gary Cooper (1901-1961) was usually the strong, silent type and the guy you could always count on. He won his first Academy Award for playing World War I hero Alvin York in "Sergeant York" (1941). A year later he played Yankee slugger and first basemen Lou Gehrig in "Pride of the Yankees" (1942), where he quoted Gehrig saying, "Today I consider myself the luckiest man on Earth," despite having been diagnosed with ALS.

In 1952 he portrayed Marshal Will Kane in "High Noon", where he is forced to defend his town from the outlaw he put in prison years before.

Answer: Lisa Fremont

Grace Kelly (1929-1982) was the epitome of class and grace, so no one was surprised when she married Prince Ranier and became Princess of Monaco in 1956, before her untimely death in a car crash. In 1955 she won a Best Actress Academy Award for playing the wife of an alcoholic has-been, played by Bing Crosby in "The Country Girl". I picked roles showing her versatility, i.e. a musical and a Hitchcock drama.

In "High Society" (1956) she played Tracy Lord, about a spoiled heiress and her suitors. In the 1954 thriller, "Rear Window", she played the girlfriend of wheel-chair bound photographer "Jeff" Jeffries who believes he has witnessed a murder from his window.