This week: Worst performance by an actress in a leading role.
My nomination: Kathrine Victor, star of “Wild Wild World of Batwoman.” Clunky and unconvincing from start to finish.
Who’s your pick?
|
 |
Weekend Discussion Thread: Worst PerformancesWith the Oscars this weekend, I thought we’d follow up on the recent “worst movie” discussion with some “worst performance” picks.
158 Replies to “Weekend Discussion Thread: Worst Performances”Commenting at Satellite News
We are determined to encourage thoughtful discussion, so please be respectful to others. We also provide an "Ignore" button ( Comments are closed. |
|
Satellite News is a fan site for the Mystery Science Theater 3000 television and Netflix series. It is an independent publication written and compiled by Chris Cornell (msampo@aol.com) and Brian Henry (erhardt4@aol.com). Satellite of Love, LLC does not maintain this web site, nor is it responsible for this site's content.
All content posted on Satellite News is copyright © 2024 by Chris Cornell and Brian Henry, except where otherwise noted. This Date in MSTory is written and compiled by Steve Finley, Chris Cornell and Brian Henry. Copyright © 2024 All rights reserved. Please do not reproduce This Date in MSTory items in any form without express written permission from the authors. Items of MST3K news may be duplicated or reposted, as long as Satellite News is cited as the source. The views and opinions expressed herein are not necessarily those of Satellite of Love, LLC. No warranty is expressed or implied that the information given herein is completely accurate, and in fact this information can and will change at any time. So there. Mystery Science Theater 3000, its characters and situations are copyrights and trademarks of Satellite of Love, LLC. Banner image created by Larry Lee Moniz. |
|
) to help our users cope with "trolls" and other commenters whom they find annoying. Go to our
Well, everyone’s already listed all of my picks, but I thought I’d add my thoughts, anyway.
Bonnie Pritchard – It’s not just the two plaids and poor delivery; it’s that head bob she does when asks, “Nick, it’s your grandmother?”
Emby Mellay – Never mind where the fish lives, she switches unnaturally between emotions like she has some sort of high-speed bipolar disorder.
Cisse Cameron – I’m not sure I have the words. Suffice to say, I pictured the retirement age for sleazy strippers to be about 25 years younger than that.
Oh good lord! Where to begin. Soooo many bad performances. First, my nominees,per season (excluding the KTMA years):
Angelica Jager: Valeria “Robot Holocaust”
(“Yew and yer daught-ah are dewmed”)
Esther Furst: Betty Crawford “Ring of Terror”.
(aka Rususci-annie)
Sandra Giles: Jana Ryan “Daddy-O”.
(“Want some?”)
Diane Mahree: Margaret “Manos: The Hands of Fate”
(“Ten miles! Might as well be ten thousand miles!”).
Marilyn Manning: Roxy Miller “Eegah”.
(“I think I’m gonna scream!”)
Jean Fontaine: Gloria Henderson “The Sinister Urge”.
(“Uh-uh, that’s not Dirk, no way!”)
Carla Herd: Carissa/Elizena. “Deathstalker and the Warriors from Hell”
(Double the actress, double the pain)
Carolyn Brandt: Marge Neilson, “The Incredibly Strange Creatures…”
(As bland as the lead actress in Ring of Terror.)
Adrianna Miles: Natalie Burke, “Werewolf”.
(“Wuhrwelf?”)
Leslie McRae: Michele Casey, “Girl in Gold Boots”.
(“I’m here to be a dancer!”)
And the winner is (drumroll):
Jean Fontaine! Narrowly beating out Adrianna Miles!!
Burr De Benning as DOCTOR! TED! NELSON! in “The Incredible Melting Man.”
I keep thinking back to how hard I was laughing when he had a deadpan expression on his face and the dullest possible voice as he said, “No, Neil. No.”
Maybe it’s the lousy dub, but Lora (sp?) from “Outlaw (of Gor)” is so grating that her death by spear just doesn’t seem sufficient enough. Or it could just be Troxartus Syndrome and the villain is so hammy as to make the whole film laughable.
Slightly off topic, but the weirdo priestess in “Wild Women of Wongo” (DAAAANCE!) is up there for me.
The love interest from Iowa in “Starfighters” who sexes corn or whatever as well. I’m sure she has a name, but I’ve seen that episode three or four times and I *still* don’t remember anything about any person in that movie.
The guy who played Wally/Prince of Space from, you guessed it, “Prince of Space”.
I liked it very much….NOT.
Everyone from “Monster A Go-Go” and any of the Coleman Francis movies.
“Jenny” in The Screaming Skull. It that MST3K flick ever going to be a part of a 4-DVD set? :)
Gotta go with Adrianna Miles, AKA the “Wurwolf” girl. Unsurprisingly, she only did one other film. She was no doubt hired because of her ventral attributes (which are shown in the uncut version), and probably because the director got laid…
A very close runnerup would be the ladies in “Angel’s Revenge”. Though of course it’s hard to separate performance from direction/script.
I agree with BobNotThatBob. Emby Mellay from “Touch of Satan.” Only a total idiot would utter the line, “This is where the fish live.”
I like how Spector broke down each season’s bad actress “winner”. I wish my memory was that good. I’ll just go by the strongest impression of which actress stood out best (or should I say worst).
The lead actress from “Rocket Attack USA”
Kim Cattrell from “City Limits” (sorry, Crow!)
ALL of the women from “Manos”
Betty from “Teenage Strangler”
ALL the women from “Angels Revenge”
Natalie from “Werewolf”
The female lead from “Horror of Party Beach”
Sadly, probably not: Screaming Skull is public domain, but that Gumby short would probably cause too much legal B.S. for Shout! Factory to bother with it.
Wavil: No, she said “lives.” She’s not talking just about fish in general, but THE Fish!
Hmm, Elaine Benes from Final Justice. Just finished watching it, and all she seemed to do was stand around and bask in the buttery glow of Joe Don Baker.
And the Jiggly Twins from Boggy Creek II: And the Legend Continues. The Jeep scene alone makes me want to curl into a fetal position and cry.
Tough category since most MST3K movies use women as arm candy or victims. But when Ann-Margret got the chance to play a somewhat complex lead villain in Kitten With a Whip, she put teeth marks in every piece of scenery. She gets my vote for crushing what could have been an okay movie.
On a tangent, during Battlestar Galactica last night while the Cylons were deciding if they should stay or go, did anyone else take the opportunity to shout out “STAAAYYY!”?
Even though I think she should have gotten hazard pay. I am going with pre-Yanni Linda Evans in Mitchell. I am going to second that to the oily sleezy guy in the dress in Attack of the Eye Creatures. :razz:
This one girl with a tiny role in The Creeping Terror. “My god what is it…?” That’s all that comes to mind right now when it comes to horrible actresses. For actors I’d have to say the guy who played Johnny in The Sinister Urge.
*Perhaps a more wooden delivery*
I actually thought Katherine Victor played her part with class and dignity, or at least as much dignity as someone dressed like that can muster.
My vote goes to Diane Mahree as Margaret in “Manos: the Hands of Fate”. Utterly histrionic (“WHERE CAN MIKE BE?”)
Honorable mention: Jean Fontaine as Gloria Henderson in “The Sinister Urge” for that voice, and Cisse Cameron as Lea in “Space Mutiny” for that scene in the disco with the hula-hoop (Yuck!)
Maybe she was supposed to appear spaced out, expressionless, and only half alive, but the actress who played the eponymous Humanoid Woman from KTMA did too good a job, and seemed borderline comatose. Her freakish millimeter thin shock white afro didn’t help matters. Neither did her lidless bulging bug eyes that seemed desperate to escape the skull they were lodged in. The inexplicably depressing, revolting, and upsetting color wash was the perfect vehicle for our actress to not emote in.
She was a lot more “humanoid” than “woman”. Come to think of it, the She-Creature from the same named episode had more feminine wiles than the humanoid woman did.
Whether this performance was the result of good acting, bad acting, no acting, or a lobotomy, it’s the most disturbing to watch of any movie inside or outside of an MST episode that I can think of.
If this film was put into widespread circulation, an epidemic of impotence and sterility would result among men (and probably women too) that no amount of high grade porn could cure. We could put an end to teen promiscuity, but at the cost of drasticly higher suicide rates. Think about it, won’t you? But don’t think about it for too long. You’ll hurt yourself.
“63. Garza says:
And the Jiggly Twins from Boggy Creek II: And the Legend Continues. The Jeep scene alone makes me want to curl into a fetal position and cry.”
You make a good point, although I kinda like Tonya the braless wonder’s work. The “high maintenance” girl though was just ungodly terrible, so she gets my vote.
Honorable mention goes to the mute from Phantom Planet.
You people are all wrong. The correct answer is Lance Fuller. I don’t think the opposite of a great actor is a monumentally bad actor, but a complete non-actor. If you doubt me, watch the end of She-Creature again. He is the Laurence Olivier of non-acting.
And to be perfectly honest, I actually like most of the performances in Touch of Satan, including Emby Mallay. I think its the writing that’s bad, not her performance, which being fairly understated, is a nice break from the usual screaming female leads.
whoops. I’m incapable of reading the words “best actress” apparently. I submit Lance Fuller in a brassiere.
“69. Matt D. says:
You make a good point, although I kinda like Tonya the braless wonder’s work. The “high maintenance” girl though was just ungodly terrible, so she gets my vote.
Honorable mention goes to the mute from Phantom Planet.”
I forgot about her. For someone whose entire role was based on facial expressions, it was like watching a block of wood try to emote.
I think Tonya’s appeal lays in her…assets.
Trash from Escape 2000 :shock:
I’m gonna put my vote in for Reb Brown from Space Mutiny.
Oh wait, he just *screamed* like a woman…
I cut a lot of these actresses some slack, because they never aspired to be any more than the lead in their boyfriend’s/daddy’s/uncle’s movie. I reserve my ire for those who have some acting experience, or should at least know better.
Therefore, Kathy Ireland is a good candidate. But I’m going to nominate that whiny woman from Deathstalker and the Warriors from Hell. I know her character was supposed to be unlikable, but her supposed turnaround at the end of the movie showed that she was just unlikable, period.
Okay, this might be cheating just a tad, but I’m nominating all of the women who dubbed “Gamera vs. Guiron.” Who knew that evil alien space babes sounded exactly like Minnesotan housewives?
It really seems as though there are some pretty strong contenders in this category. I won’t debate a single one, but I haven’t looked at all the posts too carefully, you rabid hounds. Has anyone brought up any of the females in Spider Island or the wife in It Lives by Night? There’s a whole lot of crap there if you want to dig for it…’Medium, I’m a Petite’ where you at? Doin’ good, I hope! F those jerks, I miss your truth, m’friend!”
Bara Byrnes, “Joanie Nichols” from ‘The Girl in Gold Boots’, wasn’t the worst actress, but she had the worst line ever said by an actress in an MST3K movie: “I used to have a pretty mind!” God, that line still cracks me up. So bad.
Kevin from Hobgoblins, because all he does is piss and moan throughout the entire movie.
Linda Griffiths as Apollonia James in Overdrawn At the Memory bank.
Just filling in details with this one. But really, how about the one who played the “cop” in “Angels’ Revenge?” Proof positive that the worst performances come from people who think they are great actors.
“Cisse Cameron from Space Mutiny gets my vote. So bad an actress that the Volume 4 DVD cover listed her actual name as “Lea Jansen.””
That’s actually pretty funny. On the one hand Rhino’s DVD releases usually had some error in there somewhere (Like the RIGHTS *badumpbump* am I right fellahs? Eh? Eh?) So the fact that some graphic artist over at Rhino putting in Cissi Cameron’s characters name in the cast credits instead of her real name cracks me up, I didn’t notice it until you brought it up.
But seriously now… Worst actress in an MST3K movie… Hooboy… There are so many.
To everyone who nominated the girls from Angel’s Revenge… Um… Those girls were hired to act? *giggle*
But a movie like that, and Wild World of Batwoman and the like, I think the primary focus on the female roles weren’t so much that they could act.
Choosing someone though.. Oh my… I’d save compared to the lovely and late Beverly Garland, they are ALL BAD!
So say I ;)
The lead actors in Hobgoblins. Abyssmal performances of an abyssmal script.
Runner-up, everyone in Red Zone Cuba. It keeps the movie from being too dark because there is no emotion and nothing convincing in any performance in the film.
daffyphack #71: whoops. I’m incapable of reading the words “best actress” apparently.
Judging from some of the responses, so are about half the posters here. :roll: So at least you’re not alone. :lol:
I too vote for the title characters of Angels’ Revenge. The fact that the film is one of the less dignified takes on Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai is bad enough. But the first time I watched it, their acting inflicted actual pain on me.
Pretty sure that the person who played Kevin in Hobgoblins is actually a woman, so still eligible for worst actress.
“I shot a starter pistol and whined another line!”
Wow. So many good bad choices — and so many good nominations. But here are a few of my top bottom ten that haven’t been mentioned yet:
Vivian Schilling in Soultaker — when you write your own role and still can’t make it believable… :roll:
Don Scardino and/or Patricia Pearcy in Squirm — yes, I did read the topic correctly. I’m just not sure which of these two counts as the leading actress… :???:
Kathy Ireland. I don’t blame Mike and The Bots’ one bit for yelling “SHUT UP!” when ever she did her squeeky voice!
Definitely the Angels from Angels’ Revenge. Such horrid, horrid females. Spilt the Bad Actress Award seven ways.
Seriously, though, it’s a difficult choice: Most of the women in the MST3K catalog are soo wooden, I’m surprised they have’t suffered an outbreak of Dutch Elm Disease.
yeah, i’ll still have to go with the fortunettelling gypsie is ticwslabmz.
the lesson, have sex with a fortune telling gypsie when she demands it!
My head almost exploded trying to think of a “winner” for this one. So many horrible performances. But, for a true leading role, and a true female type person, I’d have to say, just for THAT VOICE!!! alone, I submit to you….envelope please…
Kathy Ireland, Alien from L.A.
**a high-pitched voice is heard, “Oh, my GOD! You like me!! Bitchin’!!”***
See, there are many good choices, but as a default, above (or below) all of these actresses, stands Kathrine Victor from The Wild, Wild World of Batwoman.
Of course I noticed after I posted that although the title of this topic is Worst Performances, the fine print narrows it to female leads.
Sampo, I think the large print title is probably the cause of most of the posts in here that are not narrowed to females because it just says “Worst Performances”, so next time you do a topic like this, you might want to put the specifics of what you’re looking for right at the top.
Now, on that more narrow topic of female lead worst performances:
– Valeria in Robot Holocaust. She’s the REAL robot in that film.
– Runner-up: The female lead in Hobgoblins. Her performance makes you want to shower without actually touching her.
Re: Katherine Victor– I defy anyone to have a more inspired reaction to “Ching chong chow!”
My only regret is that we never saw her Batusi with Adam West.
I won’t let Jan Shepard go unscathed; her bland performance as Nan Grayson in Attack of the Giant Leeches was irritating. Just an utterly unappealing actress.
Mikey from Teenage Strangler. My favorite bad performance of all time.
The stuck up girl from Boggy Creek 2. That was just plain a bad performance.
I gotta disagree with ‘TrumpyCanDoMagicThings’ about Tracy from Pod People. I like her! She seems kind of fun. It’s just a movie and TV cliche to have pretty actresses whine that they can’t get a man.
I guess I read the topic wrong or something I dont know. But know I’ll give my choice for worst actress.
The girl who dubbed that kids voice in Pod People. I’m sorry I don’t know the kids name.
I guess I read the topic wrong or something I dont know. But know I’ll give my choice for worst actress:
The girl who dubbed that kids voice in Pod People. I’m sorry I don’t know the kids name.
Donna Denton AKA Queen Lara of “Outlaw” fame gets my nod for worst actress.
“You disgusting woooooorm!”
Although Cisse Cameron from Space Muitny makes me want to kill someone, I’d have to nominate the actress who was the first victim from “The Creeping Terror”. All she had to do was act like a giant garbage bag was eating her, yet she screwed it up.