Movie stars who had small TV roles before they were famous

DiCaprio became famous pretty early, as he was in his early 20s when he made films like “Romeo + Juliet” and “Titanic.” The future Oscar winner has been acting since he was a kid, though. This includes a recurring role later in the run of “Growing Pains,” where he played a homeless boy taken in by the Seaver family.

Clooney’s story is well-known at this point. Before movie fame, even before TV fame on “ER,” the actor was hopping from small TV role to small TV role to try and get his career going. He popped up on “The Facts of Life,” “The Golden Girls” and in his most prominent early role, “Roseanne.”

Lawrence is the second-youngest winner of the Best Actress Oscar, so you would think she was always famous. Not so! We could talk about her role as the daughter on “The Bill Engvall Show.” However, people on the internet like to point out that even before that, she played a mascot on an episode of “Monk.” Yes, in her first break she was wearing a furry animal suit.

Pratt is a big time movie star. He’s also Star Lord in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but let’s not forget “Jurassic World” or “The LEGO Movie.” It’s crazy to think that in the first season of “Parks and Recreation,” the plan was to write his character, Andy, off the show. We can go back even further though. Pratt had a role in the show “Everwood” and also appeared in a few episodes of “The O.C.”

Adams almost quit acting after she was removed from the cast of the series “Dr. Vegas,” where she was supposed to be a regular. Fortunately for her, and movie audiences, she didn’t. While the multi-time Oscar nominee had a few small TV roles, you may remember her from her few episodes on “The Office” as Jim’s girlfriend.

Before he forgot Sarah Marshall, he carried a watermelon. That was in the movie “Can’t Hardly Wait,” to be fair, but it was a tiny role. Around that same time, he got himself a part in the ensemble of the beloved but little seen, “Freaks and Geeks.” Then he had another secondary role in the sitcom “Undeclared” from the same crew. Eventually he’d find greater TV success with “How I Met Your Mother” but also got to hang out with the Muppets in a movie.

Deadpool would probably have a field day poking fun at Reynolds’ early career. We aren’t even talking about the sitcom “Two Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place,” because he was one of the leads. Television movies count as TV, which means we can include Reynolds’ role as the love interest in the “Sabrina, the Teenage Witch” film starring Melissa Joan Hart. Hey, it’s still more noble than “Van Wilder.”

We wouldn’t say that Alba has had a terribly successful movie career, but she has definitely been a movie star — one who has been nominated for multiple Razzies, but still. Before that, and before her breakout TV role starring in “Dark Angel,” she appeared in three episodes of Nickelodeon’s “The Secret World of Alex Mack” as a mean girl.

Williams has gotten a ton of acclaim for her portrayal of a couple of real famous people, namely Marilyn Monroe and Gwen Verdon. For a serious-minded actress, she also had a long run on the soapy, silly teen drama “Dawson’s Creek.” As a child actress, though, she definitely was steeped in cheese. Williams popped up in episodes of “Baywatch,” “Step by Step” and as Brad’s girlfriend on “Home Improvement.”

Are you afraid of the dark? A young Gosling certainly wanted to know. Many years before “La La Land,” or even “The Notebook,” Gosling was a child actor in his native Canada. There, he was a member of the Midnight Society on the children’s horror show “Are You Afraid of the Dark?”

Jordan carries a lofty name, so it’s probably fortunate that he didn’t go into basketball professionally. Instead he became an actor, getting acclaim for his work in movies like “Creed” and “Black Panther.” People have been noticing Jordan’s work since he was a kid acting in the ensemble of HBO’s “The Wire.” Jordan played Wallace, a character who, spoiler alert, doesn’t make it through the first season. He does make an impact though.

Speaking of “La La Land,” Stone was also in that movie, even winning an Oscar for it. Early in her career, Stone popped up in an episode of “Medium” and an episode of “Malcolm in the Middle.” It was so long ago she was credited as Riley Stone, because she hadn’t settled on Emma as her stage name yet. (Her real first name is Emily, but there was already an Emily Stone in the Screen Actors Guild.)

Drew Barrymore has been acting since she was a kid. Cameron Diaz basically debuted with a big movie role in “The Mask.” Then there’s the third of “Charlie’s Angels”: Liu. It took her longer to get to the point of movie stardom, along the way popping up in two episodes of “Coach” and three episodes of “ER.”

The son of two showbiz professionals, Stiller had a bit of an "in" for getting in the business. However, he was far from an overnight star. He appeared in the popular sitcom “Kate & Allie” for one episode and had a small role on “Miami Vice.” He also appeared in a bunch of small movie roles before getting a brief shot on “Saturday Night Live” and then eventually getting his own sketch show on FOX.

This has been an America-heavy list. We wanted to include one overseas actor though, mostly because we wanted to have Blanchett on the list. Given her movie career, you are maybe imagining her in some costumed drama or Elizabethan story. Nope. She appeared in an episode of a cop drama called “Police Rescue.” Imagine somebody like Blanchett popping up in an episode of “Law & Order.” Actually, Philip Seymour Hoffman was in a first-season episode of “Law & Order.” That tracks.

The HBO miniseries “Band of Brothers” had a huge cast, and it featured a lot of future stars. We didn’t want to include them all, but we did include two. First up is Fassbender, who played Technical Sergeant Burton Christenson. Now, in addition to his critically acclaimed work, he’s played Magneto in a bunch of X-Men movies.

Speaking of actors who have mixed critical acclaim with comic book movies, there’s Hardy. You may remember him better from the war movie “Dunkirk,” even if his face is under a mask for most of it. It was far from his first war project, though, as he popped up as a private in “Band of Brothers” as well.

Famously, a young Aniston has a role in “Leprechaun.” She was also a cast member in the sketch comedy show “The Edge,” which flew well under the radar. We tried to avoid sketch shows for this list though. However, we can still acknowledge Aniston’s role in Mayim Bialik’s sitcom “Molloy.” Alas, it lasted only seven episodes, and nobody remembers it.

You might very well be reading these words in Freeman’s iconic voice. That’s the level of fame and ubiquity he reached. It took the future star a long time to get there though. He had a couple of small roles in soap operas, but he also popped up for several years in episodes of the children’s show “Electric Company.” And yet it took so long for things to finally pick up. Several years later he had a role in a “Twilight Zone” reboot.

On the movie front, people may know a pre-game Cooper from the cult classic "Wet Hot American Summer." You may also know him as a supporting character from "Alias," and he wasn't even considered the love interest for Jennifer Garner's character either! Before that, though, the future Oscar nominee was on five episodes of the drama "The Street." Also, he shows up in a few episodes of "Inside the Actors Studio" asking questions from the audience.

Carell rose to fame alongside Stephen Colbert on “The Daily Show,” and they also worked together before that on “The Dana Carvey Show.” That was the first place most people would have seen him, aside from the fact basically nobody watched that show. That was also true of the sitcom “Over the Top,” where he had a supporting role as, believe it or not, a Greek chef. Thankfully, “The Daily Show” came calling, and then “The Office” and then movie stardom.

This is a fun one. Most people think of McConaughey from his breakout role in “Dazed and Confused.” Not only was that the first place basically everybody saw him, but it also is still one of his most famous roles and gave him his catchphrase “All right, all right, all right.” Way back in the day, though, the Oscar winner had a delightfully esoteric gig. He appeared in dramatized reenactment scenes in an episode of “Unsolved Mysteries.” How could we not include him just based on that?

Nicholson is from old-school Hollywood when future stars would often end up in small roles in TV shows and movies. We could have done a list just of people who had small roles in old Hollywood Westerns. Nicholson did indeed show up in a couple of those, but in another old Hollywood thing that would never happen these days, he appeared in two episodes of “The Andy Griffith Show” as two separate characters.

Yes, technically a teenage Fishburne was in “Apocalypse Now,” but it did not jump-start a career, and he was, at best, the fifth or sixth lead in that film. After that he spent years in small movie and TV roles trying to get to the point where he could become Morpheus. There are a few TV appearances we could mention, but you may have guessed why we wanted to have Fishburne on this list. He popped up several times as Cowboy Curtis on “Pee-wee’s Playhouse.” It’s a sight to behold.

Fitting that a woman named “Zooey” is at the end of this list. Her starring role in “New Girl” may make people think of her more as a TV star, but there are movies like “Elf,” “Yes Man,” and, of course, “500 Days of Summer” to point to on the movie front. We specifically thought of her for this list, though, because of her appearance in a 10th-season episode of “Frasier” where she plays a prominent role. It wasn’t her first guest spot on an NBC sitcom. In 1998 a young Deschanel was in an episode of “Veronica’s Closet.”