Rory Arnold lists at Ranker - the ultimate source for lists and rankings in all categories

Rory Arnold - Lists at Ranker

Fun facts and wild true stories from behind the scenes of some of history's most beloved and infamous movies.

Movies in the Making

The Truman Show

<a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/best-the-truman-show-quotes/movie-and-tv-quotes" target="_blank">The Truman Show</a> is one of those movies that you keep thinking about for years after seeing it. The 1998 comedy/drama/science fiction film follows a man who was&nbsp;adopted by a company as a child and lives his life inside a controlled television show&nbsp;until he finally begins to catch on to the scheme.

Prior to his acclaimed performances in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Kidding, The Truman Show marked Jim Carrey&rsquo;s first major foray into dramatic acting,&nbsp;and he received <a href="https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-truman-show-1998" target="_blank">rave reviews</a> for his performance. The fascinating premise was backed by a clever storyline and an all-star cast, which helped make The Truman Show both a commercial and critical success. The film currently holds a <a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/truman_show" target="_blank">94%</a> fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes and grossed over <a href="https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl3229058561/weekend/" target="_blank">$264 million</a> at the box office. But here are some stories you may not have heard about the making of the groundbreaking movie.

Behind-The-Scenes Stories From 'The Truman Show'

General

Behind-The-Scenes Stories From The Making Of 'The Truman Show'

Rory Arnold

Pop Culture

Once movie stars reach a certain level of fame, it can be hard&nbsp;to imagine their earlier days of grinding it out in smaller, supporting roles in forgettable projects. But many of today&rsquo;s major film stars initially made a name for themselves on the small screen. If you&rsquo;re under a certain age, you may not even know that some <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/best-film-actors-who-got-famous-on-tv-first/greg" target="_blank">big-time movie stars</a> first found success on <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/celebrities-who-started-in-daytime-soaps/celebrity-lists" target="_blank">popular television shows</a>.&nbsp;

It used to be that television was viewed as the inferior medium, but these days, TV series&nbsp;certainly rival movies in pop culture cachet, and many movie stars are now vying for buzzworthy streaming television series. But back in the day, television roles could be used as launching pads to transition into film. From Will Smith to Tom Hanks to Melissa McCarthy, here&rsquo;s a rundown of movie stars that younger audiences may not know started out as TV stars.

Movie Stars Youngsters Don't Know Used To Be TV Stars

Person

Fun facts, wild true stories, and cringey ego-driven tea-spilling from behind the scenes of some of history's most beloved and infamous comedy movies.

Just Doing Comedy!

Monty Python and the Holy Grail

Monty Python rose to prominence with their BBC sketch series Monty Python&rsquo;s Flying Circus, but it was their second feature film, <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/monty-python-holy-grail-good-points/brenden-donnelly" target="_blank">Monty Python and the Holy Grail</a>, that cemented their reputation&nbsp;as comedy pioneers.

A <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/monty-python-holy-grail-accurate-details/alby-thompson" target="_blank">parody of Arthurian legend</a>, Holy Grail is still considered a classic more than&nbsp;40 years after its release. Though it went on to become a massive success, the film was made on a shoestring budget, and the experience of making it was notoriously grueling.

'Monty Python and the Holy Grail' Was An On-Set Nightmare That Everyone Hated Filming

Behind The Scenes 'Monty Python And The Holy Grail' Was A Nightmare

Lists about the beloved American adaptation of the BBC workplace comedy series "The Office," which ran on NBC from March 2005 until May 2013.

Dunder Mifflin, This Is Pam

The Office

There are so many moments from <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/important-office-episodes/jacob-shelton" target="_blank">The Office</a> that have stood the test of time and remain&nbsp;funny years later and after much repetition. Michael hitting Meredith with his car may be one of the greatest comedy television moments from the early 2000s, and his trainwreck dinner party with Jan serves&nbsp;up all of the belly laughs.

But, given its documentary-style format that catches a range of emotions, the beloved series is also known for its sincere and heartfelt moments like Jim and Pam&rsquo;s wedding and Michael&rsquo;s tearful goodbye. In spite of all the silliness, there are times when the characters on The Office endure&nbsp;real pain and crushing heartbreak. Here&rsquo;s a rundown of some of the saddest moments in the history of The Office -&nbsp;and be sure to vote up the ones that truly tug at your heartstrings.

The Saddest Moments On 'The Office'

Ranking The Saddest Moments On 'The Office'

Vin Diesel

<a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/hollywood-vin-facts/jacob-shelton" target="_blank">Vin Diesel</a> has built a massively successful career out of playing&nbsp;tough guys. In his first major movie role, he played a soldier in Saving Private Ryan. He appeared as a hardened convict, the antihero Riddick in Pitch Black, and the gruff but family-oriented man&#39;s man Dominic Toretto in the&nbsp;Fast &amp; Furious films. If those roles weren&#39;t enough to convince you of Diesel&#39;s masculine bonafides, he also played athlete/stuntman/spy Xander Cage in xXx&nbsp;and a real-life mobster in Find Me Guilty.

But who says tough guys can&rsquo;t also be secret nerds? After all, Diesel&#39;s real name is&nbsp;Mark Sinclair, a strikingly ordinary handle compared to his Hollywood persona.

In fact, Vin Diesel is a much bigger nerd than his action roles suggest, and not just the kind that makes an occasional appearance at Comic-Con. Vin Diesel is a dyed-in-the-wool, certified nerd, and we&rsquo;ve got the receipts.

Vin Diesel Is A Low-Key Ultranerd

Re-watching & cracking up at the funniest, most memorable sketches and lines in the history of Saturday Night Live.

Great Moments in SNL History

Chris Farley

Certain characters from Saturday Night Live have become especially memorable and manage to remain a widespread cultural reference years and years later. These types of <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/the-best-saturday-night-live-sketches-of-the-1990s/best-of-snl" target="_blank">rare SNL signature characters</a> often possess the dynamite combination of having been written from a unique perspective and performed by the only person who could pull it off.&nbsp;

Dana Carvey as the Church Lady, Molly Shannon as Mary Katherine Gallagher, Bill Hader as Stefon, and Kristen Wiig as Target Lady were all characters who were over the top and yet still representative of types recognizable to the audience. There was also a certain magic to how each of these cast members morphed into the character with full commitment that left the audience howling with laughter.

Chris Farley&rsquo;s performance as motivational speaker Matt Foley can certainly be considered one of his career highlights, as well as one of the <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-lists/50-greatest-saturday-night-live-sketches-of-all-time-12735/1-matt-foley-motivational-speaker-24042/" target="_blank">most popular and acclaimed sketches</a> in SNL history. Foley is a larger-than-life dysfunctional man who has fallen on hard times and is, of course, &ldquo;living in a van down by the river.&rdquo;&nbsp;

It&rsquo;s peak Farley as he barrels onto the set, flails his arms wildly, screams life advice at teens, and then trips and collapses onto the coffee table. It&rsquo;s such brilliant physical comedy that every other cast member in the scene cannot contain their laughter from the moment Farley enters. Here&rsquo;s the full story on &quot;Matt Foley, Motivational Speaker.&quot;

The Story Of Chris Farley's 'Matt Foley' Character, The 'Greatest Sketch In SNL History'

The Story Of Chris Farley's Motivational Speaker 'Matt Foley'

Ross Geller

Even years after the series ended, the general public still can&rsquo;t get enough of Friends. It&rsquo;s one of the most successful sitcoms of all time, and all these years later it still manages to acquire <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/how-watch-friends-it-leaves-netflix-1265400" target="_blank">major streaming service deals</a> and attract new fans who may not even have been alive during its original run.

Each friend is, of course, lovable but flawed for different reasons. There are certainly plenty of reasons to root for Ross Geller. He&rsquo;s a super-smart paleontologist with a Ph.D. from Columbia University. His high school crush on Rachel Greene turns into a love story that becomes&nbsp;the central storyline for the series. He was even voted the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.comedycentral.co.uk/news/our-favourite-ever-ross-moments" target="_blank">best Friends&nbsp;character</a> in a 2016 poll conducted by Comedy Central.

But one of the most absurd, and at times infuriating, contradictions about Ross Geller is that for someone so intellectually brilliant, he can&nbsp;also be a giant, petty baby. He can also be <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/creepy-ross-moments-from-friends/alexandra-plesa" target="_blank">creepy</a>, jealous, superficial, and problematic. Here&rsquo;s a rundown of some of his worst moments.

The Most Insufferable Things Ross Geller Did On 'Friends'

The Most Insufferable Things Ross From 'Friends' Ever Did

Saturday Night Live

Before <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/best-season-of-saturday-night-live/reference" target="_blank">Saturday Night Live</a> clips could go viral online, the most popular sketches became &ldquo;water cooler moments&rdquo; that everyone was talking about the next day. That is, of course, if you were able to stay up and watch the 11:30 pm live broadcast. But for its first 30 years, Saturday Night Live stayed true to the traditional spirit of live &ldquo;appointment television,&rdquo; where if you missed an episode, your only hope was to catch a rerun months later.

That all changed in 2005 when a low-budget digital short called &ldquo;Lazy Sunday&rdquo; permanently altered both Saturday Night Live and digital video streaming forever. The unprecedented viral success of the sketch was a major win for SNL, YouTube, and its creators, but it soon prompted a major copyright battle that would lay the groundwork for how video content would be distributed and consumed online for years to come.

How Lonely Island's ‘Lazy Sunday’ Changed 'SNL' (And YouTube) Forever

How Lonely Island's ‘Lazy Sunday’ Changed SNL (And YouTube) Forever

Ranking the best movies of the decade that brought us everything from Fight Club to Titanic to Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.

'90s Movie Nostalgia

Entertainment

Celebrity <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/inappropriate-celebrity-cameos/stephanroget" target="_blank">movie cameos</a> are a fun wink to the audience when a familiar face drops into a scene for a brief but memorable appearance. Sometimes, it&rsquo;s just a blink-and-you-missed-it pop in, while other times, they&rsquo;re given a joke to deliver. Occasionally, the guest star plays a pivotal role in moving the plot along.

But these cameos are also often very much a reflection of the times. The stars chosen for these moments were part of the zeitgeist in that given time. As a result, the person or the reference may not be as <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/inappropriate-celebrity-cameos/stephanroget" target="_blank">recognizable or relevant</a> to audiences watching years later. A Michael Jordan cameo in a 1993 film is going to pack less of a punch now than it would have if you saw it in the theater on opening weekend 20 years ago. Here are some movie cameos that could&rsquo;ve only happened in the &#39;90s.

Movie Cameos That Could've Only Happened In The '90s

Film

The Most '90s Movie Cameos, Ranked

A closer look at the scariest, goriest, and most suspenseful films that defined the genre in the 2010s decade.

2010s Horror: Decade of Dread

Horror

The <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/best-2010s-horror-movies/grayson-titan/" target="_blank">horror film genre</a> has evolved and changed a great deal over time, in large part because what an audience finds&nbsp;to be &ldquo;scary&rdquo; is influenced by a variety of factors, and cultural context must be taken into account.&nbsp;

For example, the 2018 film Halloween, which served as a direct sequel to the 1978 classic and a reboot of&nbsp;the franchise, was <a href="https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl1342342657/" target="_blank">massively successful</a> and well received, perhaps partially because it confronted how the world changed in the past 40 years.&nbsp;

In order to keep up with the times and keep audiences&nbsp;on the edge of their seat, filmmakers have had to think outside of the box and <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/bizarre-horror-movies/lisa-a-flowers" target="_blank">offer up new ideas,</a> ones that might make a collective audience wonder... WTF?

The Best Horror Movies Of The 2010s That Pushed The Boundary Of WTF

The Weirdest Horror Movies Of The Decade, Ranked By Fans

Lists of fun facts, fascinating trivia, and wild, charming, and even heartbreaking stories about some of the most famous people you feel like you already know.

The Life of an Actor

Lucille Ball

It&rsquo;s been well over half a century since I Love Lucy originally aired on television, and decades since Lucille Ball passed away, but many audiences still feel like they know Lucy. Though the original series ended production in 1957, it has lived on in reruns and streaming, while Ball herself went on to star in two more successful sitcoms.&nbsp;

There was an honesty and sincerity that Ball brought to her brilliant comedic performances that made audiences identify with her and root for her. Ball also added a personal touch by having her fictional character mirror her own experiences, as she starred alongside her real-life husband Desi Arnaz and incorporated her real-life pregnancy into her storylines.

By shifting her aspirations from film to television at a moment when the new technology was about to take America by storm, Ball made herself into one of the biggest cultural figures of the 20th century.&nbsp;But there are still many things most people don&rsquo;t know about her. The PBS documentary <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/lucille-ball-finding-lucy/477/" target="_blank">Finding Lucy</a> peeled back some more of these layers, offering a fascinating glimpse at the real <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/how-lucille-ball-got-her-start/erin-mccann" target="_blank">Lucille Ball</a>.

The Documentary ‘Finding Lucy’ Takes A Look At The Entertainer’s Life

The ‘Finding Lucy’ Documentary Is An Unflinching Look At Lucille Ball's Life

A look at Adam Sandler's comedies, dramatic roles, and public persona, from  early days at SNL to his modern critically-acclaimed roles.

Happy Madison Productions

Adam Sandler

Adam Sandler is best&nbsp;known for his unique brand of&nbsp;comedy. He got his big break&nbsp;in 1990 when he was hired as a writer and performer on&nbsp;Saturday Night Live, and he quickly&nbsp;carved out a&nbsp;niche for himself by performing hilarious original songs. <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/scripts-and-screenplays-by-adam-sandler/reference" target="_blank">Sandler&#39;s</a>&nbsp;SNL buzz helped him launch a massively successful film career, coming out of the gate swinging with two back-to-back hits: Billy Madison (1995) and Happy Gilmore (1996). His comedic winning streak continued with The Wedding Singer (1998), The Waterboy (1998), and Big Daddy (1999).

What&rsquo;s especially interesting about Sandler&rsquo;s success is the disparity between the <a href="https://www.ranker.com/crowdranked-list/the-best-and-worst-of-adam-sandler" target="_blank">critical and commercial reception </a>of his comedy films. Jack and Jill was released in 2011 and made almost <a href="https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl2388297217/" target="_blank">$150 million</a>&nbsp;- but it also has a <a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/jack_and_jill_2011/" target="_blank">3%&nbsp;approval rating</a>&nbsp;on Rotten Tomatoes, and some reviews went so far as to call it the &ldquo;<a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/movie-review-adam-sandlers-jack-and-jill-is-the-worst-movie-ever-made" target="_blank">worst movie ever made</a>.&rdquo; Sandler even poked fun at his poor Rotten Tomatoes scores by naming his 2018 comedy special Adam Sandler: 100% Fresh. (Interestingly, that special was widely praised and earned him a <a href="https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/adam_sandler_100_fresh" target="_blank">90% fresh</a>&nbsp;rating on the site).&nbsp;

The occasional&nbsp;pummeling Sandler receives&nbsp;at the hands of&nbsp;critics makes&nbsp;his intermittent&nbsp;shifts from comedy to drama&nbsp;that much more risky, but nonetheless impressive. It is difficult enough to switch genres because of audience perception, but that hasn&rsquo;t stopped Sandler from defying the odds and&nbsp;earning industry and audience&nbsp;respect along the way for a few of his dramatic roles.

A History Of Adam Sandler's Occasional Detours Into Serious Movies

Certain&nbsp;Saturday Night Live&nbsp;sketches have skyrocketed in popularity and become major cultural moments, but few sketches in the show&#39;s history have garnered as much love and attention as the Chippendales sketch from October 1990.

The sketch features then-newcomer <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/weird-chris-farley-stories/anncasano" target="_blank">Chris Farley</a> and then-major movie star Patrick Swayze competing against each other at a Chippendales audition while dancing to Loverboy&rsquo;s &ldquo;Working for the Weekend.&rdquo; Farley completely&nbsp;commits to the scene with an over-the-top performance. The&nbsp;sketch has often been cited as the moment Farley became a major star.&nbsp;

But in the years following Farley&rsquo;s tragic passing&nbsp;from an OD&nbsp;in 1997, a number of former SNL cast members, writers, and producers have been critical of the sketch. As the culture has become more sensitive to how weight is represented on television, there&rsquo;s no denying the problematic &ldquo;joke&rdquo; of the sketch.

Farley&rsquo;s significant substance use during his time on the show raises questions as to whether this type of comedy was detrimental to his own body image issues and mental health. Farley&rsquo;s former friends and colleagues weigh&nbsp;in on the subject.

What The 'Saturday Night Live' Staff Thinks Of The Chris Farley 'Chippendales' Sketch

What The SNL Staff Thinks Of The Chris Farley “Chippendales” Sketch

It can be difficult to decide which restaurants to go to when you&rsquo;re visiting an unfamiliar city. But these decisions can be made&nbsp;much easier when you realize that you can actually eat at the restaurants featured in some of your <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/greatest-fictional-waitresses/ranker-characters" target="_blank">favorite movies</a>.&nbsp;

After all, filmmakers often prefer to shoot on location at real-life eateries in order to capture the authentic essence of the city&nbsp;and, in some cases, the time period. Often, the personality of the restaurant adds so much zest that it makes the scene that much more memorable.

The closest you can come to stepping into your favorite movies is by visiting the actual locations where these types of scenes were filmed. The fun part is learning how many of them are real and still exist.

Famous Real Restaurants From Films You Can Actually Visit

Famous Real Restaurants From Movies You Can Actually Visit, Ranked

Home Alone

It&rsquo;s now been decades since the initial release of&nbsp;Home Alone (1990) and Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992), but the films remain as relevant as ever in <a href="https://tenor.com/search/kevin-home-alone-gifs" target="_blank">gifs</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JONGt32mfRY" target="_blank">commercials</a>, and <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Sweater-Contest-Sweatshirt-XXXX-Large/dp/B073T6F4N1/ref=asc_df_B073T6F4N1/?tag=hyprod-20&amp;linkCode=df0&amp;hvadid=312685275090&amp;hvpos=1o4&amp;hvnetw=g&amp;hvrand=3494981431495270123&amp;hvpone=&amp;hvptwo=&amp;hvqmt=&amp;hvdev=c&amp;hvdvcmdl=&amp;hvlocint=&amp;hvlocphy=9030946&amp;hvtargid=pla-569477252614&amp;psc=1" target="_blank">holiday gear</a>. But what&rsquo;s especially unique about Home Alone is that some of the most popular quotations actually come from the <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/movies-within-movies/jacob-shelton" target="_blank">movie within the movie</a>.

Prior to being left home alone, Kevin McCallister expresses a long list of grievances he has against his family. Chief among them is that he is not allowed to see the old movie everyone else gets to watch together. It&rsquo;s an old, black-and-white&nbsp;film called Angels with Filthy Souls that features an over-the-top, gratuitous outburst carried out by a trigger-happy mob boss named Johnny.

After his family accidentally leaves him behind, Kevin takes advantage of the opportunity to finally watch the forbidden film. Feeling rebellious, Kevin announces, &quot;Guys, I&#39;m eating junk and watching rubbish, you better come out and stop me!&quot; But later, Angels with Filthy Souls plays a hilariously effective role in helping Kevin order pizza and even outsmart the bad guys.

The fake movie became so popular that in Home Alone 2, it got its own sequel, Angels with Even Filthier Souls, which Kevin used to... wait for it... outsmart the entire staff at New York&#39;s Plaza Hotel, where he stayed by himself for several luxurious days.

Angels with Filthy Souls plays a pivotal role in the Home Alone films and&nbsp;gave us memorable quotables like, &quot;Keep the change, ya filthy animal.&quot; But there&#39;s much more to the story.

The Story Behind ‘Angels With Filthy Souls,’ The Fake Black-And-White Movie Inside ‘Home Alone’

‘Angels With Filthy Souls,’ The Fake Movie Inside ‘Home Alone’

Lists about NBC's monumental sitcom that ran from 1989 to 1998, and all the manzier, Rochelle Rochelle, ASSMAN, and Serenity Now laughs in between. Adios, muchacho!

It's a Show About Nothing

George Costanza

After the countless warm and fuzzy, family-friendly sitcoms of the 1980s, <a href="http://www.ranker.com/list/best-seinfeld-episodes/reference" target="_blank">Seinfeld</a> shook up television conventions in a major way. While they were making the show, Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David set a now-famous rule for the show&rsquo;s writers room: &ldquo;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/no-hugging-no-learning-the-seinfeld-credo-1471032667" target="_blank">no hugging, no learning</a>.&rdquo;&nbsp;

The characters on Seinfeld were not going to learn important lessons about love and friendship. There would be no sentimental moments or personal growth and evolution. There certainly was no painstaking concern over making sure the characters seemed likeable to the audience.

It was <a href="https://www.ranker.com/list/best-george-costanza-quotes/movie-and-tv-quotes" target="_blank">George Costanza</a>, played indelibly by Jason Alexander, who most embodied this motto. The character may have been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2004/oct/16/comedy.television" target="_blank">loosely based</a> on Larry David, but even Larry&rsquo;s character on Curb Your Enthusiasm wouldn&rsquo;t have attempted some of the things George tried to get away with. What makes the character especially interesting is that for someone so neurotic, emotionally volatile, and frequently unemployed, he often displays remarkable overconfidence. The audacity of his schemes make George somehow worth rooting for -&nbsp;even if it&rsquo;s just to enjoy what a mess he&rsquo;s made.

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