45 Stars Who Look Nothing Like Their On-Screen Characters
31. Patricia Heaton
Patricia Heaton is an American actress, known for the roles of Debra Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond and Frances “Frankie” Heck on The Middle. In The Middle, Patricia Heaton plays the part of the hectic and over the top mom.
She says all the cast members were cast because of the quirky looks, and that she goes out of her way to make Frankie a little bit frumpy. Her outfits and haircut are very plain, far from the glamorous woman she can be in real life. She says that even with the extras on set and the cameos, the casting director goes out of his way to find people who look ordinary and have a friendly Midwest vibe.
32. Lea Michele
All the fans of Glee will recognize Lea Michele instantly. She plays Rachel Berry, an extremely ambitious singer in the high school’s glee club. You can say she is not very popular despite her vocal talents. She definitely has her own style and many people find her personality to be a little overbearing.
In several interviews, Michele stated that she gained a lot of weight to play the part of Rachel. It was also hard for her to adapt to the LA lifestyle. Since her show was canceled, Lea Michele is more present in the media, where she promotes a lifestyle of fitness, wellness, and clean eating.
33. Jenna Fischer
You cannot help but like Jenna Fischer, the plain secretary Pam on The Office. Pam Beesly is suffering from her boss’ and her coworkers’ stupidity and having a sweet romance with the gorgeous Jim. She confessed her first acting job was a “sex education video for psychiatric patients.” You can safely say she has come a long way since that time.
You have to be honest and admit Pam seems a little plain and boring sometimes, but Jenna thought the role was perfect for her. She was quoted as saying: “I’m so attached to Pam’s journey,” and, “I just love playing this character so, so much.” When The Office premiered in 2005, Jenna admitted she didn’t wish to be a huge star. On the contrary, she just wanted to “be on a long-running hit TV show.” Jenna got her wish, and she created something we will always remember.
34. Janel Parrish
Janel Parrish is an American actress and singer. She first made a name for herself with the role of Mona Vanderwaal in Pretty Little Liars. She was also acting in Bratz: The Movie and came in third place in the 19th season of Dancing with the Stars.
On Pretty Little Liars, you could see two sides of Janel. She played a timid and unpopular Mona in flashbacks reflecting back when she was bullied for her appearance. Contrast that with the present day, Mona, a confident, sexy girl who was afraid of nothing and extremely smart. In the show, you might say she is a bit of a villain, and Janel expressed on numerous occasions how much she loved to play the role. It’s just “so much fun,” according to her.
35. Tori Spelling
Tori Spelling is the one and only Donna from Beverly Hills 90210. An obnoxious girl with a big heart who was obsessed with NOT losing her virginity to her boyfriend David. But before all that, she had braids and glasses and was on Saved By The Bell. She was Violet Bickerstaff, Screech’s love interest. Since that, she has been known for True Tori, an elegant reality television show where she would expose her life to viewers and wash her dirty laundry in public.
After sharing her marital problems, failures, and other controversies on True Tori, Spelling tried her luck in acting again, but her attempted return failed miserably. Her new show, Mystery Girls, was rapidly canceled. Here is something that will sadly make a lot of sense for a lot of people, though, she once said: “All it takes is for one person to say you’re ugly, and you’re like, I guess I’m ugly. And that was it.”
36. Sophie McShera
Sophie McShera is a British actress, famous for playing the role of a simple kitchen maid, Daisy Robinson, at the beginning of Downton Abbey. Funnily, she claims she got her first big acting job because of the show Saved by the Bell.
She also played the part of Drisella Tremaine, one of Cinderella’s infamous stepsisters in a new adaptation by Kenneth Branagh of the fairy tale. She said it was fun playing a girl cruel and evil. It was also ironic because her co-star Lily James, who was playing Cinderella, was also in Downton Abbey. In the show, she was the servant, and Lily James was the lady being served, and in Cinderella, the roles were reversed entirely!
37. Kaitlin Olson
Kaitlin Olson is an American actress who is mostly known for playing Deandra “Dee” Reynolds on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. She is hilarious in the show. People have described her character quite accurately as a “drunken, rude, borderline sociopathic character.” She is enjoying the part, and she plays it perfectly.
Her role is lunatic and versatile; Dee is always changing and Kaitlin perfectly fits herself into the part. Nothing for her is too much or going too far, and anything is acceptable and possible as long as it’s funny. She can be happy, sad, angry, vulnerable, depressive, or desperate. She’s always amusing playing the trashy and ugly alcoholic. So far away from the beautiful lady she is in real life.
38. Alyson Hannigan
Everyone remembers Alyson Hannigan from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She played Willow, a plain and innocent girl who becomes Buffy’s side-kick and friend. She also appeared in the American Pie trilogy and the legendary show How I Met Your Mother.
On Buffy, the sweet and innocent Willow evolved into a strong witch who was not afraid to fight to protect her beloved friends. Willow was also one of the first major gay characters on television in the ’90s. A lot has changed over the last 20 years, and it was entirely new back then to explore the homosexuality of one of the main characters. Alyson Hannigan also met her husband, Alexis Denisof, on the set of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. They are still happily married with two children!
39. Aimee-Ffion Edwards
Aimee-Ffion Edwards is a Welch actress. People will remember her as the ugly duckling named Sketch from the show Skins. The TV series ran for seven seasons and dared to explore some very controversial topics like substance abuse, violence, bullying, grief, mental and physical illness. Sketch only appeared in the second season.
The cast of the show was regularly changing. She was a quirky girl who developed a fascination for the gay character of Maxxie, which turned into a real obsession. Sketch had a sad life; she was alone to take care of her mother, who was suffering from multiple sclerosis. Since Skins, she has acted on A Poet in New York and Being Human.
40. Mae Whitman
Mae Whitman is a young actress from the US who acted in films like Independence Day. Many will remember her for her role of Ann Veal on Arrested Development. She plays the girlfriend of George Michael, who is played by Michael Cera. On the show, they had this running gag of always forgetting her because of how plain she is.
Mae Whitman is nothing like Ann in real life, and she has continued to act in more shows and movies since the end of Arrested Development. In 2015, she played the lead in the film The Duff, in which it is she learns she is “the duff” of her group of friends, which stands for “designated ugly fat friend.” Ouch! She does not look like that description.
41. Pauley Perrette
All the NCIS fans know and adore Abby Sciuto played by Pauley Perrette! This American actress is also a singer, writer, and civil-rights activist. Before she finally became a full-time actress, she had many different jobs. Those helped her to create the complex character of Abby, a forensic scientist working at the Naval Criminal Investigative Service to solve crimes committed by members of the Navy. She has been described by the show creator as: “the happiest Goth you will ever meet” and “alternafreak”.
The character of Abby is easily one of the most fascinating characters on TV. The creator of the show explained she was the: “smartest, most capable person” on TV. When asked if she’s really “Goth,” in real life, Perrette always has the same answer: “Who cares?” She also described Abby as “a smart that simply cannot be reduced to a stereotype.” You have to admit she is really awesome in that show!
42. Delphine Chanéac
French actress, Delphine Chanéac is also a model and a DJ. She appeared in the Canadian science-fiction horror drama, Splice, as Dren, which is actually “nerd” spelled backwards. Dren is another version of the infamous Frankenstein’s monster. The film mixes and horror and explores the limits of research on genetics and the dangers of playing God.
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Those kinds of roles are really hard to play for an actor. You have to get under the skin of something between a human and a monster. Something that feels a wide range of emotions. Delphine Chanéac pulls it quite well. It’s tough to recognize the beautiful woman and the makeup department pulled off an amazing job to make her look sad, curious, ugly, and terrifying all at the time.
43. Demi Moore
Demi Moore needs no introduction. She showed her talents for pottery with Patrick Swayze, on Ghost, but the role where she really pulled off an incredible transformation is as Lieutenant Jordan O’Neil, on GI Jane. She was a test-case, designed to prove that a female soldier could succeed in one of the toughest training units in the US military.
She suffered extremely harsh treatment in brutal conditions but yet refused to give up. She said she wasn’t interested in becoming a poster girl for women’s rights, but she wanted to prove she could do it. People then tried to bring her down by claiming she is a lesbian. She successfully gets rid of the allegations and demonstrates her bravery on the field in Libya, before officially becoming part of the unit.
44. Sandra Oh
Scrubs are not the most flattering outfit, so it’s no surprise Sandra Oh looks so much better in real life than as Dr. Cristina Yang on Grey’s Anatomy. During her ten years on the show, she won many awards for the role, including a Golden Globe and two Screen Actors Guild awards.
Sandra loved the role and gave her best every minute she was playing her. But after ten years, she wanted to try new things and she told the world: “It’s such an interesting thing to play a character for so long and to actually get the sense that she wants to be let go as well. She wants to be let go, and I am ready to let her go. We have to start the process, story-wise, for the Grey‘s writers to think how she’s going to go.”
45. Ellie Kemper (Kimmy Schmidt)
Elie Kemper plays the hilarious, unpredictable, chaotic, and “unbreakable” Kimmy Schmidt. This young woman spent years in a bunker after being kidnapped by a cult leader who led her and other women to believe the apocalypse happened on earth. After being rescued, she decides to move to New-York and befriends misfits Lilian and Titus in the hit comedy. Because she stopped living in normal society from a really young age, Kimmy had no social skills and everything seems new to her.
Tina Fey produced the show about this eccentric young woman who just wants to start a new life. She is living a long series of weird adventures as she is trying to fit in into that new city and life. Meanwhile, her boss Jaqueline and her friend Titus, an inspiring actor and singer are here to help and support her in their very own way. This is an unforgettable comedy with many different types of humor mixed together! Ellie Kemper transformed herself easily in the hilarious, sweet, and quirky Kimmy.
46. Kate Winslet
Kate Winslet is one of the most famous English actress and singer. She was the youngest woman to be nominated for five Oscars and finally won one on her sixth nomination for The Reader. She also won an Emmy Award, four Golden Globe Awards, a Grammy Award, and three BAFTA Awards. She’s beautiful, but she is not scared of taking the roles of ugly women, inside or physically. That’s why she accepted without hesitation the role of Sarah Pierce, in Little Children.
In the movie, she has a short monologue about Emma Bovary, the heroine of Gustave Flaubert’s novel, Madame Bovary. She explained she didn’t like or understand Emma in the past, but now, she finds there’s something beautiful, even heroic about her: “It’s the hunger. The hunger for an alternative, and the refusal to accept a life of unhappiness.”
