Yeah my OCD kicks in

Absolutely, i won't be able to sleep without answers.

Every time. I immediately go to IMDB.

Yep. I don't even really know why, but it's like I just HAVE to know, so I IMDB it, usually while I'm still watching the movie.

Sort of. There's so many That Guy actors.

I feel like after watching the sopranos I've become aware of so many other "that guy" actors who have many bit parts in movies from the 90s onwards

I can't continue watching without knowing.

Same with animated movies where I recognize the voice. Watched that super pets movie and the squirrel was the one that threw me. I was like, that’s got to be Diego Luna, right? So I went and checked and sure enough it’s him. I’ll so glad to see him getting more work, especially voice work.

Yeah most of the time , if I like their work. They don't even have to be the lead. Even someone who's only had supporting roles, like Stephen Root.

Yeah but mostly I'm waiting until the movie is over before checking him up. Don't want to get spoiled.

No but I do need to know their name if it slips my mind. I'd spend the whole movie going "Who's That Guy" otherwise.

YES!!! Just started watching The Serpent Queen and could barely get through the guest episode cuz I could not figure out how I knew the main character was! I knew I knew her from something popular and recent but she looked slightly different. Had a big OMG DUH moment once I looked her up. Samantha Morton = Alpha in TWD & Catherine in TSQ

Yeah I have to search up the cast of the movie and find out every other movie he’s ever been in

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Similarly, when i heard a song I haven't heard in a while and i KNOW it's from a movie/show but can't place it. Drives me nuts.

YES. That's even harder to find out

Definitely. All the time and not just actors. I often recognize most of the other main crew people mentioned in the opening credits be it a camera man, writer, editor, production designer etc. It's just interesting to know and remember what they've done before and whether I can see their style in a movie I'm currently watching. The director is naturally the most important factor for many - and the most recognizable - but when selecting what to watch, I've made some decisions based on the writer's name as well.

Happened to me yesterday watching Cabinet of Curiosities. I knew I'd seen the husband in the episode The Outside but couldn't put my finger on it. Ended up being Martin Star who played Gilfoyle in Silicon Valley. His lack of beard threw me off.

This is the single greatest reason to own a smart phone. Forget all of the conveniences and empowerment. Being able to look up where the hell you know a certain actor from is peak smart phone usage.

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The biggest surprise for me was Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby. They have written Children of Men, Iron Man and then created the adaption of the Expanse. It just felt odd to me.

Yup exactly, although I do try to figure it out first for as long as I can bear. On the times I get it right, before going to IMDB I allow myself a fist pump and say ‘boosh!’, it’s the little things…

100% I HAVE to figure it out. My IMDB app is the most used.

Jimmy James is no supporting role, friend.

Shazam helps me in those moments.

I just watched Blade of 47 ronin (terrible movie) a sequel to Keanu Reaves 47 ronin. One of the lords looked soo familiar. Turned out he played in 21 jump street waay back in 87

Now imagine having this problem before internet and smartphones, this bugged the shit out of you and maybe if you were lucky a friend knew who they were.

I enjoy watching some of the old westerns on the Grit channel. It's amazing how many actors were on those old shows. I will look-up just about every character in a show to see where their career took them. It's a game with me now.

My brain would explode

This.

It was even worse with songs, you heard the end of a song you liked in the radio and never heard of it again and they didn't repeat the name. Then by some miracle you hear it two years later again and needed to write up the songname. Shazam was a godsend for stuff like this.

>Gilfoyle in Silicon Valley

Happened the same to me with Gilfoyle when i was watching Silicon Valley. Turns out he was at Spiderman No Way Home and Far From Home as a Science Professor

I can see my wife roll her eyes

Oddly enough I feel like the issue was less serious because if you orthe people around you didn't know then you just didn't know and were more easily able to move on. These days we all know the answer is two seconds away or at least should be so we need to know

The best part of Amazon Prime is that on pause they show the character and actor names (at least for their own stuff, not sure about old movies and shows).

Every time!!

It would like that episode of Married with Children where Al spends the whole episode trying to remember a song.

I have to otherwise I get moist

Just now! My girlfriend had the first episode of From Scratch on, and I had to Google Danielle Deadwyler. I remembered her from Station 11.

Yeah and the worst is when they haven’t been in anything I’ve seen making me feel crazy.

Yes. Which is why amazon prime has the best streaming UI, you just pause to bring up x-ray and it lists all the actors in the scene currently. Wish all streaming platforms had this feature.

That's one of the things I like about amazon video, when you pause it the profiles of the actors on screen show up with links. My gf and I do that all the time when we recognize an actor but can't remember.

Yes. IMDB is my hero

On House of the Dragon it drove me nuts cause I KNEW I had seen the actor playing Aemond before

Turns out he was Osfirth on The Last Kingdom

I always have to be careful with this for tv shows because seeing their episode count can be a spoiler by itself (the trick is to go through the episode guide for the series on IMDb)

Yes! I always jump onto IMDB and check it out.

I found myself doing this constantly since a couple years ago. See a familiar face, immediately go to IMDB on my phone to check the actor out. I finally realized about 6 months ago that I was missing out on tons of character moments and plot points, or just cool details and cinematography. Recently I have a strict no phone policy while watching and I’m enjoying my viewing experience SO much more. If I’m still curious about the actor or other details after the movie, then the phone comes out and IMDB is still there. Not knocking your need to know, just thought I’d share my experience.

Yes! I was always curious to know when I was watching something to find out where and as what I had seen them before. But ever since I started watching Kdramas, it has especially escalated. I HAVE to know where they’re from. And the satisfaction I get after getting my answer is so worth it. Of course this doesn’t have to do anything with life but you take these small wins.

Yo I cannot stand watching movies with people like this. I love my mom and grandma but OMFG every new character seen on the screen just mean you missed the next 5 minutes of dialogue because "did he play _ in _ or was he the bad guy in _?" Like, what about THIS movie we're trying to enjoy?!

Do you have adhd? This is for sure an adhd thing.

Yup!!! I am EXTREMELY good at recognising faces so that happens to me all the time, cause I watch(ed) a shitload of movies. Before the Internet... yes kids...there was a time you had to dig into your own memories..I would rack my brain for hours trying to remember where I saw an actor before. Friends and family would rely on my skills and would call me to ask about movie characters and what movie they were in before. I do try to figure it out by myself first nowadays but if it takes more than 5 minutes I look it up. And then I unpause the movie and continue. :)

Yes

One of the best things about Prime is the ability to pause and see who all the actors in a scene are, with photos and character names,

It helps having an IMDb account and rating shows and movies, as when you press on an actor, under their filmography it says what you may know them from as you’ve rated that movie, always saves time

I go to IMDb when I see someone that’s now famous in something that’s clearly pre-fame, in a “wait, what?” Kinda way.

TV example, but, was watching Big Bang Theory and saw Steven Yuen in one scene in an episode and had to make sure it was early.

If I can’t figure it out on my own, yes I’ll look it up.

Absolutely! IMBD is my best friend.

All the time. I’ll sit here and say to my wife “who’s that, what have they been in?” Most of the time she will know, but otherwise search for the answer

Hmm hmm himmmm

I usually just look up the cast on the movie/TV show wiki or IMDB page, but Prime Video has a feature that names actors in a scene, it can sometimes be hit or miss tho.

I think my IMDb account is probably my oldest internet account for this reason. I’ve been hooked for probably 25 years now!

IMDB all day

I wrote a tool which among other things allows me to find out where I've seen an actor in one simple command. If anyone is interested you can check it out: https://github.com/Verpous/mscripts. I'm not making any money off of this, I'm only promoting it because I hope someone else will find it useful.

Thank God for IMDB!!

Yes. I can’t watch a movie or tv show without IMDB handy for actor resumes and film trivia.

Oddly, no. I'm fairly obsessive about many things but actor's names and past roles is absolutely not one of them.

Good tip! I always try to make my brain not register it, but brains are dicks sometimes.

I used to be a pro in identifying actors by name, etc., but I'm slowly getting worse at this. It might be because I spent less time watching films or there are a lot of new faces in the industry that I do not care about that much...

OR

I simply don't store that data in my brain anymore as I can access it at any point from a device that I always have in my pocket.

The other truth is - I also don't care that much, because I personally believe there's overall decline in quality as most films and shows aim at making money instead of being actually original and interesting.

Oh, 100%. Thankfully, I usually have my iPad right next to me on the couch so it's easy to look it up. Luke Kirby in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel was my latest obsession. Took me a while to figure out that I had loved him so much in Slings & Arrows.

Also, the reporter in Daredevil I recognized but couldn't figure out for the longest time, but I knew I had seen him in a hospital setting wearing scrubs. Turns out I remembered him from the early 90's in Chicago Hope.

Amazon prime has that feature where it tells you what actors are in that scene when you pause it, including the small roles. It has saved me some trouble.

Absolutely! That's how I found some of my favorite films.

What is it with people attributing very normal behaviour to ADHD?

Never forget the days of needing to wait until a movie ended so you could see the cast credits.

I feel like this has to do with the accessability of information and the exponential growth of data that we have to digest on a daily basis in comparison to back then.

We got so used to not needing to know information, but instead knowing how and where to find his information, that our brain adjusted to outsource this need for storage.

I also noticed I got worse with this kind of information, I was a lot better at memorizing infos.

It was specifically a question my psychiatrist asked me when I was getting diagnosed. It’s obviously not like “if you do this then you have adhd” but it certainly can be part of a pattern of behavior.

"Who they played before" FTFU

lol

Yeah. It’s 2022. How are there people who don’t know about IMDB?

EVERY TIME BRO IT BUGS THE HELL OUTTA ME

I feel like I NEED to figure it out because I won't pay attention to their current role until I do.

Absolutely.

I really wish there was a shazam app for animation voice actors. Happens so many times where I KNOW I recognize a voice but just can't place it and I can't think of anything else until I figure it out.

The worse is when you watch something old and you're trying to workout who they played after.

Yes but that's my learning style across the board; not being able to answer the questions that are swimming in my head and obsessively digging around until I can.

But I will pretty much always do that with movies because film is almost certainly my most thorough hobby.

I didn’t used to before smartphones. I’d only get up and go hit the internet if it was really bugging me. But once I got IMDB in my hand….always checking.

TRY THIS GAME , look at kid actors with small roles & guess Who they grew-up to be! Old TV shows especially.

Yeah but not really a lead either. I never watched Newsradio, but I think it was more of an ensemble show than a definite male & female lead series.

Same lol

It's just the sweet feeling of victory of remembering the actor before googling them

Yep I do it all the time. I’ll run to IMDB in a heartbeat to see what else they were in.

I get pretty obsessed, specially when it's difficult to find out.

Yes. I was watching judge dredd ( the original with Stallone) trying to figure out what else I've seen Armand assante from.

i do this and i 100% do not have ADHD

I somehow have a knack of remembering what I’ve seen most and even very obscure actors in before. Me and the wife make a game out of it quite often.

Man, I loved Luis Guzman in that.

You guys are both wrong, Martin Starr was in Freaks and Geeks and that's where everyone should recognize him from.

Yup have ruined some pretty major spoilers by seeing that the actor whose name I couldn't remember is no longer in the show after X episodes.

That and who the heck is singing that classic rock song?

I can look up everything just fine from my desktop. When I'm actually watching movies on a screen that's larger than any cell phone screen.

Out of curiosity - do you actually pause the movie you're watching on that tiny screen and open a new window/tab/app to find the name of an actor? That seems a bit unwieldy to me.

Don't get me wrong, I usually have at least two browsers open when I'm streaming vids. One for the video, the other screen for browsing or whatever. So it's not really an issue for me to use my 'non-video' monitor to look up some facts, but it seems like it'd be cumbersome at the very least to try to do that on my phone.

They do it for just about everything. Which means that now whenever I watch something on Netflix or Hulu and I don’t have this function I get irritated.

Most recently with House of the Dragon. It was driving me a little crazy that I couldn’t think of where I knew the actress who played Princess Rhaenys.

In the last few years I've been really mobility limited, so it's possible that I've just become more reliant upon my phone.

Watching things falls into three categories:

1. Watching alone: I'm probably watching on my phone or on the TV while also browsing my phone. I'll pick a time when things are slow to look something up, or I'll pause. But it'll distract me from the show if I don't find out.
2. Watching casually with my wife: I'll ask her, and if she doesn't know, I'll look it up on my phone, same as above.
3. Watching seriously with my wife: Sometimes we follow Drafthouse Rules. No phones, no pausing, lights off, but we can have food/drink. In that case, I make a point to look it up later.

On the songs, I will often unlock my phone and hit the microphone in the Google Widget, and have Google find the song for me, but it's always a race to get the search happening before the dialog starts up again.

It’s so satisfying knowing you were right when you later Google/IMDb them to confirm

Try tunefind.com. You can search a song name and it’ll bring up a list of movies or shows the song was in, sometimes down to the very episode and scene.

Absolutely. Been on the IMDB bandwagon before there was an app. I would run to my desktop or grab my laptop to bring with me.

Same, but only when me trying to figure out who it is gets in the way of me focusing on the movie

Or alternatively you SWEAR you know them from somewhere, look up the IMDB and they've been in nothing else you've seen so now you've gaslit yourself

Bro, but there’s porn.

Yep, have to have a guess with my husband first, then one of us ends up looking if we can't figure it out (or just to clarify we're right). The worst though is when you know you know an actor, look them up and find you've not watched a single other thing they've been in. It's so disappointing 🙄

I can imagine a scene or encounter that'll get me off. I can't imagine the name of someone whose name I can't remember.

Shazam app will also find the song 99% of the time from pretty much any part of it. no need to wait for dialogue.

My wife and I do the same thing. Whoever figures it out first gets bragging rights. If no one gets it after five minutes or so, we go to IMDB.

Oh, sorry. I meant before the show's dialog starts back up and the music moves to the background.

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Cause amazon owns imdb too

IMDB is probably my most utilized app on my phone for this reason 🙃

When I saw Smile last week it bugged me for half the movie before I managed to place the main actress as the daughter from Mare of Easttown.

Early on it wasn't as big of a need and would be a fun conversation piece with my friends later if they recognized them and I did not or vice versa.

In the modern post internet, smart phone era it is absolutely paramount that I see everything that vaguely familiar face was in even at the expense of the current movie im watching them in.

Yes and I will then fall into a rabbit hole most likely for the entire length of the movie.

Go to him

One of the reasons why I love prime video. A lot of the movies on there have a little tab you can click to see the actors and actresses in the movie.

wait til you start Law and Order from the beginning!

There's a sequel?

Thank god I’m not the only one!

Only once. When I saw Liam Neeson in Rob Roy.

Yes, I always check wikipedia or IMDb.

I just realized the bartender in The Shining was Doc Tyrell in Blade Runner, how could I not have realized this before

You can’t possibly be talking about shows here. Did you watch tv in the 80s? It’s almost never been anything but an ad selling product, just now we have experienced actors, writers and production crews.

Why I’m a big fan of Amazon’s X-ray

Wikipedia is just as detailed as IMDB and isn't owned by Amazon.

This is going to sound so stupid but i often wish there was a ‘Shazam’ for this where you take a picture of the actor and it pulls up their IMDB..

I mean its possible if Amazon has the X Ray feature right?

It can be a real problem for me. I’ll usually fire up Wikipedia and end up reading their whole life stories haha.

Get out of my brain

Sometimes I wonder if I have it. Any time I wanna google something I HAVE to in that moment or it bothers me. Or I have the hardest time focusing in general

Yes

Every single time! If I don’t google straight away I can’t concentrate on watching anymore

Yes, and so many times I'm left confused staring at IMDb when I've never actually watched anything they're in

Yes, I am not alone after all.

Only if it is Robert loggia

Absolutely!

We have been watching a lot of BBC stuff. I think there must be like 20 British actors because that happens a lot.

Joe Turkel, so good in everything he touched

Best thing about Amazon. I hate when I pause/tap the screen and realise it's Netflix and I'm gonna have to go to imdb instead

Yep. I stop the movie and look it up, or it will distract me for the rest of the movie b

I always have my iPad on my lap when I’m watching movies so I can look up the cast. If there’s an actor I like I want to see what else they’ve done. Also sometimes I watch an older movie and think who is that? For example the tough guy who roughs up Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop 2 is actually Mike from Breaking Bad/Better Call!

I live on Wikipedia, I’m always looking up something, or how to videos on YouTube.

Wow, I'm also surprised that IMDB has been around for that long.

My wife does this and it is absolutely maddening. If the movie is 90 minutes, it will end up taking us at least 2 hours to get through. Pausing any time a new character comes on screen. I kid you not, we've paused movies more than a dozen times. She is much more interested in figuring out what she had seen that actor in previously than actually watching the movie. Oh and age! 'how old do you think so & so actor is?' "I don't care, I'm trying to watch a movie" Then she ends up literally 'losing the plot' and complains she doesn't know what's going on. She often gives me the 'oh I wanted to watch that with you. why did you watch it?'

Because watching anything with her destroys appreciating dialog, character relation, scene setting, tempo, direction etc. etc. It's maddening.

I will also allow ‘Party Down’ as a respectable answer.

I have an actor and voice actor special interest, I’m really loving “behindthevoiceactors” I think it’s called because they give you a photo of a character

I go to Wikipedia. Love to cross reference.

I always love the challenge and will always try to remember where I’ve seen them before and THEN use imdb to confirm if I’m right or wrong. It’s just more fun that way.

Same! And then I invariably find they've done like one episode in each of a dozen TV shows I've watched, in some walk-on role I don't remember, and I'm left wondering if they were actually familiar or if they just reminded me of some other actor.

I'll tell you the answer to that question 99.99% of the time. They were on Murder, She Wrote. or at least that's always the answer at my house.

Yes

My family had a movie directory that was basically IMDb in book form. It was published in the early 90s and was about 3 inches thick. It had thousands of entries with a brief synopsis, year of release, key cast and crew, etc., all cross-referenced. Then separate indexes so you could look things up movie titles, actors, or directors. We were all cinephiles and it was beloved like an heirloom family Bible. We used it daily.

Oh yeah, I studied it in the late nineties when my friends and I played 6 Degrees of Kevin Bacon competitively. Also, the Oracle of Bacon.

Not all the time but way too often. Was watching that Cabinet of Curiosities on Netflix the other day and there was a guy on it who looks kind of like someone else but not quite and neither my wife nor myself could remember who he actually was so I had to stop the show and google it. Then there was Doc in Nobody, I was sure it was him but I had to stop and google it to be sure.

What makes things worse for me is that I have excellent recall for faces but I am terrible with remembering names - to the point that if I went to highschool with you 25 years ago then I will likely recognise you on the street today even if I haven't seen you since highschool but I will not for the life of me remember your name lol

Subtitles/CC will usually say the name of the song.

This guy f**ks... I've thought about this guy... maybe I haven't... I really haven't... hope your '22 is going well... thank you for having a similar answer

But I'm pretty sure this guy f**ks!

Freaking everyday! I saw David Bradley in an episode of Midsomer Murders. I'm like, looks like Filch from Harry Potter, imdb to verify and realize I didn't recognize him while he played Walder Frey on GoT!

Yes, I immediately start searching for the cast of what I’m watching and check the movies and series that actor has played in (unless it’s Chris Hemsworth or something, I know which movies he played in that I watched)

You can Google it as well, just Google the series, click on “Cast”, click on the actor and check his/her movies/series

Always, I also need to know the chronological history of their filmography in relation to the current movie I'm watching.

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Yeah, I will go on a loophole of a google search to figure it out because I am unable to contain my curiosity

So I've been watching Rome for the first time recently, just before Andor came out. As soon as the security guards showed up I knew it was the same actor so I checked imdb to confirm and was correct.

All the time.

I’m not the only one!!! Happy Dance

It drives my wife crazy XD

Not really, if I dont actually see the actor or actress, then they have done their job.

I reference Tom Cruise in tropic thunder

Tell the truth, unless you hear his bitcoin alert, you dont go gilfoyle imediately

Well Alicent was the girl who played Artemis in ready player one and the only place that i have seen your princess was Fate the Winx saga season 1

100% I use my IMDB app often!

Been married for over 10 years and I am 50 y/o. This guy doesn't fuck as much as he used to, unfortunately.

Unfortunately yes

yes i feel like need to know

That’s honestly the best thing about Prime Video as a streaming service. The extras and menus and info and everything they augment the episodes with. I wish Netflix, Disney+, etc, would copy that feature and approach. A movie/show’s streaming page should be like a full on DVD/Blu-Ray with specialized menus and bonus features and everything. Amazon is the only one that has done this.

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Yes. Absolutely.

Rhaenys was played by Eve Best, who I remember from Nurse Jackie. Cooke I definitely recognize from Ready, but also Bates Motel. Ive liked her in the show as well.