Who’s the most typecast of them all?

We know that Godfather Al “Scarface” Pacino is in talks to play the power-mad King Herod for the film Mary, Mother of Christ.

Today, MTV’s MovieBlog reports that he’s about to play another heavy-handed leader (although in this case, that heavy hand will be held, um… “closer to the vest”)…

Yes, Pacino is soon to be heard shouting like a power-mad Napoleon.

But I don’t think the Academy is going to be in any hurry to give him another Oscar. They know it’s inevitable that he’ll eventually make a great Kim Jong Il. That’s the performance the world is waiting for.

Hoo-ah!

Speaking of typecast actors, which actor could give Al Pacino a run for his money? We know Pacino’s capable of playing other kinds of characters… and once in a while he’ll even turn in a performance without SHOUTING. But really, do we need to see Pacino as Saddam Hussein? Pacino as Idi Amin? Pacino as Harvey Weinstein? The man is still a great actor. He was great in Michael Mann’s Heat and, in my opinion, equally compelling in Mann’s The Insider. I wanted to see him play King Lear, because even though that is a kingly character, it’s a character who is humbled and ruined. I was sad to see that project canceled.

Which actors are most predictably cast as a certain sort of character? Who needs to break out and show us that they’re capable of doing something else?