Age is not valued in our modern society, we’re told. You hit forty and you might as well just seal up the coffin. But, as we all know, some things are better with age. Like, for example, these five actors.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus
Louis-Dreyfus is, of course, best known for playing Elaine on Seinfeld, and she pretty much could have taken the dump trucks of money and retired, like Jerry pretty much has.
Instead, she’s gone on to a whole different kind of comedy, the beloved and profane Veep, likely the most incisive show about politics today. It’s still a show about nothing, it’s just that the cast takes that nothing far more seriously.
Alec Baldwin
It’s easy to forget Alec Baldwin has been on TV since 1980, and despite success in stage, screen, and just about everywhere else, never really left. He appeared on Nip/Tuck, enthusiastically romanced Phoebe on Friends and equally enthusiastically romanced Megan Mulally on Will and Grace, and even wrote an episode of Law & Order. All of which, it turned out, was just a preview for his champion run as ruthless capitalist and oddly warm mentor figure Jack Donaghy on 30 Rock, for which he won two Emmys, seven Screen Actors Guild awards, and two Golden Globes.
Keri Russell
If you’d told somebody back when Felicity wrapped up that Keri Russell would be best known a decade later for playing a ruthless deep cover agent on The Americans, nobody would have bought it. But yet, here she is, putting targets in sights, kicking traitors through walls, and offering an emotional and complex look at a woman realizing that maybe she is, on some level, the American she pretends to be.
Bryan Cranston
Similarly, if you’d applied this GIF…
To the dad from Malcolm in the Middle at the time, everybody would have thought you were nuts. But here Bryan Cranston is, the lead of one of the single most beloved dramas in a generation. It’s almost enough to make you forget he once led a riot for his right to listen to Phil Collins.
Amy Poehler
It’s not uncommon, after a long career on Saturday Night Live, to pretty much fall off the radar. Poehler, however, went straight from SNL to one of the single most beloved sitcoms of the modern era, Parks and Recreation. It’s not just that Parks is funny, it’s that it actually has a lot to say about government and ambition, and Poehler is ideal as the aggressive and aggressively optimistic Leslie Knope.
So, there you have it: Proof that some things just get better as time goes on.
