Ted Danson

Danson’s vain men tend to be charming enough to get away with it, and vulnerable enough that we do not entirely want them caught. He makes their self-importance funny without asking us to despise them. Sam Malone in Cheers (1982–1993) gave him the leading television role that established him as a comedian. That combination of vanity and vulnerability is what we value most in his work.

Before Cheers, he played Peter Lowenstein in Lawrence Kasdan’s Body Heat (1981), a useful reminder that he did not begin as the main attraction. William Hurt and Kathleen Turner are the centre of that film, making foolish desire credible even when the debt to older noir shows too plainly. Danson has a supporting part, and it is worth keeping that proportion in mind. We recommend the film warmly, without pretending it is the place to see everything he can do.

Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan (1998) gives him a brief appearance as Captain Hamill. The authority that matters most here is Tom Hanks’s, and it is under punishing strain. We were frightened by the combat sequences, rather than merely impressed by their staging. The writing between battles is more familiar, though the film is worth the ordeal. These two films show the limits of using his cinema work as the measure of his acting: both deserve an evening, neither gives him as much to do as a leading television role.

The later move through darker work in Damages (2007) to Michael in The Good Place (2016–2020) makes a simple story of fading sitcom fame difficult to sustain. His timing and physical comedy remain particular strengths in the latter. Danson has put his preference plainly: “Comedy has to be rooted in sadness or it's worthless to me.” We need not mistake that for a promise that every role will be profound; it explains why the charming, self-absorbed men can hold our interest. Start with Cheers, then try The Good Place for the physical comedy that has lost none of its precision.