The 20 best Alan Alda performances in honor of his SAG Life Achievement Award

When Larry Gelbart and Gene Reynolds transferred Robert Altman’s hit Korean War comedy to the small screen, there might’ve been some trepidation as to how the show’s male leads could possibly match the rakish chemistry of Donald Sutherland’s “Hawkeye” Pierce and Elliot Gould’s “Trapper John” McIntyre. They never quite filled the Gould vacuum, but Alan Alda’s take on the dashingly disreputable (yet expert) combat surgeon sanded down the sexist edges from the film and turned the character into the conscience of the show. 

Woody Allen assembles some of his favorite company members (Diane Keaton, Anjelica Huston and Alda) for a funny lark about a pair of New Yorkers who begin to suspect their friendly next-door neighbor has murdered his wife. Alda is aptly cast as a recently divorced friend who winds up becoming a part of Allen and Keaton’s clumsy attempt at playing detective. Alda’s aggressively ingratiating manner isn’t too far removed from his work as Lester in “Crimes and Misdemeanors." It might be more of the same, but we’re always in the market for more of  that“same”. 

Good luck finding a copy of this made-for-television staging of this Bob Randall/Luke Bower Broadway hit; despite turning up in syndication for years on the "4 O’Clock Movie," it’s now completely out of print. It’s not rare for old TV movies to disappear from circulation, but a light and breezy romp starring Alda and Carol Burnett? That should be forever. This play about two New Yorkers vying for a prize piece of Upper West Side real estate isn’t exactly a Neil Simon-level gut-buster, but it is an immensely enjoyable showcase for two of the most gifted comedic actors of their era. 

With less than four minutes of screen time, Alda bored deep into the consciousness of every Gen X-er who had the good fortune to watch the 1974 animated rendition of Marlo Thomas’ celebrated children’s entertainment album. Alda’s segment, which might be the most progressive of the bunch (particularly for its time), concerns a young man’s desire to play with and care for a doll. Alda sings the narration and voices some of the characters, who come to realize there’s nothing wrong with a boy wanting to explore his parental urges.

Alda masterfully plays against amiable type as Dr. Robert Gallo, the real-life biomedical researcher who, in this film adaptation of Randy Shilts’ bestseller, cares more about laying claim to discovering the AIDS virus than ceasing its deadly rampage through gay and minority communities. The character isn’t written with much nuance, but Alda deftly underplays what could’ve easily been a sneeringly heartless piece of villainy. The Gallos of the world typically don’t succeed because they’re lovable and compassionate.

It may not be top shelf stuff, but the crowd-pleasing comedy cocktail of Neil Simon and Alan Alda goes down as smoothly as ever in this televised adaptation of the hit 1992 play (which earned Alda a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor). It's a semi-autobiographical play about an unlucky-in-love writer desperate to assuage his writer’s block and save yet another failing marriage. Alda’s real and imagined dialogues with the women who’ve passed through his life are humorous and touching in the classic Simon style. It’s a pleasure to watch two masters bat the ball around for a couple of hours.

Alda earned a richly deserved Emmy nomination for his five-episode run in the sixth season of “ER” as Gabriel Lawrence, the mentor of Laura Innes’ Kerry Weaver. His brief arc reaches a tragic conclusion as he’s forced to step away from the job due to the early onset of Alzheimer’s. Lawrence’s final episode gives Alda the chance to shine, as the doctor unexpectedly finds himself in a life-or-death situation with a patient in the ER.

Alda spiced up the flagging political drama in its sixth season as California Sen. Arnold Vinick, a Republican moderate/maverick based in part on John McCain. The role quickly transformed from a guest spot to a series regular, culminating in Vinick’s vigorous, yet ultimately unsuccessful run for president against Jimmy Smits’ Matthew Santos. Alda proved to be the highlight of the seventh and final season, which resulted in the actor winning his first Emmy since M*A*S*H.

Five years after making his feature debut in Ossie Davis’s very stagy “Gone Are the Days!," Broadway star Alda returned to the movies to play George Plimpton in this watchable adaptation of the author’s book about trying to catch on with the Detroit Lions as their third-string quarterback. Though Alda certainly looks the part of a spindly tackling dummy, he mercifully doesn’t attempt an imitation of Plimpton’s effete demeanor or his trademark mid-Atlantic accent. It’s his first star turn in front of the cameras, and it did the trick.

Alan Alda plays acting point guard in his agreeable riff on “Father of the Bride," dishing off all of the juiciest, scene-stealing bits to his talented supporting cast. Alda’s great as the dad driven temporarily insane by the need to outdo his wealthy, soon-to-be in-laws in the wedding planning department. But the best bits belong to Joe Pesci, Catherine O’Hara, Ally Sheedy and, in a career-making performance, Anthony LaPaglia as a strangely formal mafioso who falls for Alda’s other daughter (Sheedy) — who happens to be a cop.

Bernard Slade’s rigorously schematic stage play about two married people who reunite once a year to cheat on their respective spouses gets a handsomely mounted big-screen transfer from director Robert Mulligan. The material plays every bit as dated and sitcom-y as it sounds, but you go along with it because Alda and Ellen Burstyn are magnificent together. Alda segues from wisecracks to genuine pathos as effortlessly as he did on “M*A*S*H," gradually constructing a flesh-and-blood character who wasn’t quite there on the page. 

Herbert Ross’ star-studded film of Neil Simon’s Broadway smash is a mixed bag that attempts to blend seriocomic scenarios with broad slapstick vignettes. When it works, it’s wonderful; when it’s off, you stick it out like you would a great stand-up comic work-shopping bum material. Alda is paired with Jane Fonda in one of the more serious segments about a divorced couple bickering over the future of their teenage daughter. This was Alda’s first go-round with Simon (Fonda had previously starred in the playwright’s “Barefoot in the Park”), and it’s a snug fit.

Alda’s screenwriting debut works much better today as an actor’s acting showcase than an eye-opener about corruption in politics, but director Jerry Schatzberg knows his way around a showcase, especially when gifted a lights-out cast that includes Meryl Streep, Melvyn Douglas, Charles Kimbrough and Rip Torn. Alda is terrific as the idealistic U.S. senator whose ambition threatens to destroy his marriage and promising career.

Alan Alda’s feature directing debut was a pop cultural sensation in 1981, finishing ninth at the U.S. box office and boosting sales of the Vivaldi concerti for which it’s named. It’s a good-natured ensemble comedy about a trio of married couples — Alda and Carol Burnett; Len Cariou and Sandy Dennis; Jack Weston and Rita Moreno — who vacation together four times a year. Tonally, this is vintage Alda: There are some belly laughs scattered throughout (most courtesy of Weston), but the film’s primary goal is to keep you smiling. And that it does.

This surprisingly violent made-for-television prison drama stars Alda as a professor struggling to survive a one-year prison sentence for manslaughter. Alda’s character defies the bullying of the population’s top dog (a superbly sleazy Vic Morrow), which turns his relatively short bid into a living hell. The Tom Gries-directed film was shot in the fully operational Utah State Prison, with inmates serving as background players on occasion. It’s a gritty change of pace for Alda, who anchors an impressive supporting cast that includes Billy Dee Williams, Clu Gulager and Dean Jagger. 

Alda’s funniest movie as a writer-director is a clever spin on the Hollywood-comes-to-a-small-town formula. The twist here is that the disruptive film crew is shooting an adaptation of the local celebrity author’s novel in his own backyard. Alda plays the increasingly flustered writer who gets seduced by the film’s leading lady (Michelle Pfeiffer), which spurs his longtime girlfriend (Lise Hilboldt) to fall for the incorrigible leading man (Michael Caine). It’s inspired silliness that, like most Alda movies, is too nice to let anyone lose in the end. Everyone basically gets what they want...just not in the way they expected.

“If it bends, it’s funny. If it breaks, it’s not funny.” Alda is absolutely brilliant as Lester, the perfect, repulsive embodiment of every TV comedy producer who’s produced a few hit series and now believes he's the next Norman Lear. He’s the devil to Woody Allen’s integrity-obsessed documentarian, who, hard up for money, agrees to direct a PBS documentary showcasing Lester’s alleged genius. This is Alda’s finest performance to date and one of the most dispiriting depictions of conceitedness ever put to film. The Lesters of the world never lose.

David O. Russell’s uproarious road comedy starring Ben Stiller as a new father who, having been adopted himself, yearns to discover the identity of his birth parents. After a series of mistaken identity foul-ups by an inept adoption agency employee (Téa Leoni), Stiller finally hooks up with his real mother and father: a pair of LSD-manufacturing hippies played by Alda and Lily Tomlin. Some of Alda’s best lines are thrown off in passing, like when he casually wishes that Stiller had been born with a third eye as “a symbol of enlightenment."

Alda was ideal casting as ultra-liberal Milton Greene, the biological father of Alec Baldwin’s cluelessly imperious NBC executive Jack Donaghy. Milton brings out Jack’s quasi-selfless side when it’s revealed his newly discovered papa is in need of a kidney donor. (Jack isn’t exactly thrilled that his dad’s magnum opus is a three-volume biography of Jimmy Carter.) Jack ultimately arranges an all-star musical benefit called “Kidney Now!” (the centerpiece of which is the song “He Needs a Kidney”) to save Milton’s life. Alda’s brilliant three-episode run earned him, you guessed it, yet another Emmy nomination.

David Wain’s culture clash comedy finds urban professionals Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston leaving New York City to take up residence in a hippie commune in rural Georgia. Alda plays the scooter-bound founder of the commune as a sort of zonked-out version of his “Flirting with Disaster” character with another decade or so of hallucinogenic mileage on his brain. It’s the kind of colorful supporting role leading man Alda used to hand off to one of his talented colleagues. Nowadays, he seems more than happy to let his freak flag fly on the periphery.