I Thought Fran Ryan and Marjorie Main Were The Same Person

I've never thought about either of them.

Just don't mix up Alice Pierce with Mary Wickes

I did too. I thought wow, that Ma Kettle actress looks good for her age and still works.

R2 PEARCE, dear.

I used to get Marjorie Main and Marie Dressler confused.

I get Goldie Hawn and Golda Meir mixed up

I thought Dom DeLuise and Paul Prudhomme were the same person.

I thought Donald Trump and the ginormous turd I passed this morning were the same. Still not sure they aren't.

The Marjorie Main look-alike of Marjorie's time was Minerva Urecal. Ironically, when I looked up Minerva, a picture of Marjorie identified as Minerva popped up, even though Main was a major character actress at MGM and Minerva worked mainly at Monogram.

I thought Mary Frann and Joanna Cassidy were the same person.

Agnes Moorehead and Judith Anderson

William Lundigan and Dennis O'Keefe

Mary Beth Hughes and Veda Ann Borg

Donald Meek and Roland Young

Donald Cook and Donald Woods

Marjorie Rambeau and Mary Boland

Zasu Pitts and Una Merkel

Kathleen Howard and Esther Dale

R12 Zasu & Una did share the same role in the 1932 and 1939 versions of "Destry Rides Again", but then again so did Mary Wickes and Ruth Roman.

Not Ruth Roman, but Marie Windsor. There. Corrected myself.

Mary Wickes and Marie Windsor had the same role in different versions?!

Long ago: Charles Coburn and Charles Laughton

Chili Williams and K.T. Stevens

I used to confuse Chili Williams with Chill Wills.

Laura Hope Crews and Jessie Royce Landis

Ina Balin and Susan Kohner

Fay Spain and Gloria Talbot

^^^yes!

Tyrone Power and a few people (Frederic March? Ray Milland?)

It doesn't help that the only thing I've seen him in is SON OF FURY.

I think Fred and Ray were major pussyhounds.

Oops. I thought R22 was saying that Ty had flings with Fred and Ray.

R23

[quote]r23 I think Fred and Ray were major pussyhounds.

Well, Frederic March must have married for love, because his wife Florence Eldridge was no prize looker.

Frances Farmer and Faye Emerson.

There's a story that Fred kept making a play for Carole Lombard when they were filming Nothing Sacred. So she came up with the idea of affixing a dildo down there. Next time, as she allowed his hand to creep up, he was met with a big surprise.

Don DeLuise and James Coco

Jack Albertson and Arthur O’Connell

Robert Conrad and William Conrad

Slim Pickens and Chill Wills

Before I studied their individual works, I used to confuse Ann Sothern and Joan Blondell whom I liked more. Sothern had a high pitched whiny voice and Blondell was more street smart New York. Ironically, they appeared together in the film "Cry Havoc" and Sothern replaced Blondell in the recurring role of Lucy's old friend on "The Lucy Show". Different character but same premise. Sothern's character of Maisie was basically the same character that Joanie had played in all those Warner Brothers programmers with Glenda Farrell. Later on, they both played blowsy older broads, such as Ann's hardened hooker in "Lady in a Cage" and Joan's cardshark in "The Cincinatti Kid".

Hugh Marlowe and Richard Carlson

Marie Windsor and Audrey Totter

Fran Ryan was on part of Doris Day's 1st year TV show but left or was asked to leave because she and Doris didn't get along.

Fran Ryan was once confronted by someone in public who asked her if she played Ma Kettle. Ryan responded gruffly, "Yes, and I died 25 years ago!"

Fran doing a stunning dramatic turn at 11:00 in this trenchant documentary....

Notice how you never see Fran Ryan and Paul Ryan in the same place at the same time.

R36 Or Maeve Ryan.....

And I would throw in Irene Ryan.

R38 JED!!!!!

Fran comes out at 12:15.......

Fran also appeared on "General Hospital" in 1989 in the recurring role of Sister Agatha, the head of the convent where Monica Quartermain gave up her daughter, Dawn. A few years later, equally formidable popular character actress Kathleen Freeman appeared as Sister Mary Dorothy (Bill Eckert's great aunt) for a month or so. I wonder if Bill (played by Anthony Geary) ever referred to her as "the penguin".

Joe Besser and Joe Penner.

Audrey Totter and Jan Sterling

Elizabeth Spriggs and Meryl Streep.

Coleen Gray and Mala Powers

Colin Blakely and Woody Allen.

R30 Wrong. It's trivial, but why is the internet have to be such a fountain of misinformation.

Ann Sothern stated playing "The Countess" during the third season of "The Lucy Show" as Vivian Vance was being phased out. Ann wanted co-billing to become Lucy's full-time costar. Lucy, of course, would not agree to that. Ann continued with occasional appearances during season four. During this season, Blondell did two episodes as a try out for becoming a regular, but she and Lucy did not get along. There's a whole story about their conflict during the filing of their second show together with Lucy making a gesture like she was pulling an old-fashioned toilet as a comment of Blondell's performance and Blondell responding by saying "fuck you, Lucille Ball."

John Fiedler and Percy Helton.

R36 OR Irene Ryan

Rae Dawn Chong and Neneh Cherry.

R30, as you might know, "Maisie" had been intended for Harlow. Ann did a very nice job in a little film called "April Showers," with Jack Carson.

Pier Angeli and Marisa Pavan

Barbara Bel Geddes and Joanne Woodward.

R53 probably because they were twins.

Robert Loggia and Robert Lansing

Evans Evans and Sarah Marshall.

Yes!! ^^^^Did you know that Sarah's father was Herbert Marshall?

The Marshalls.

R58 I hear it was considered in bad taste to say, "Knock on wood" on a Herbert Marshall set. Merle Oberon accidentally did and everybody gasped in shock.

Jessica Walter and Judge Judy

Burt Brinckerhoff and Bob Denver.

I thought Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen were the same person

Me too, OP! The Hungry Jack commercial especially confused me. I'll bet they intentionally made her as Ma Kettle-like as possible in that.

Another one for me was M. Emmett Walsh and Eugene Roche. I mixed them up for decades!

Barnard Hughes was also similar looking.

Carole Eastman and Natalie Wood.

Anita Gillette and Penny Fuller

Why Did Fran Ryan leave Doris Day?

Numerous accounts on the web suggest that Ryan left the series because she was replacing the ailing Barbara Pepper as Doris Ziffel on Green Acres…which doesn’t make much sense when you stop to consider that Mrs. Ziffel was only a minor character on that bucolic sitcom (why would leave a show you’re on every week as opposed to a series where you appear less regularly?) and that Ryan’s first Ziffel outing wasn’t until the fall of 1969, when the Day show was already in its second season.

Joi Lansing and Barbara Nichols