Alan Arkin’s 10 greatest roles: From Little Miss Sunshine to Bojack Horseman

The late actor created numerous unforgettable characters in his roles, ranging from a violent and vicious criminal to a cartoon JD Salinger. Photo / Getty Images

The actor Alan Arkin, who has died at 89, enjoyed a career of remarkable versatility and longevity. From his first major role in Norman Jewison’s 1966 comedy The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming, to his swansong in 2022′s Minions: The Rise of Gru, he was always a character actor of refined genius.

Although not exactly a conventional leading man, he was well used by discerning film-makers and created numerous indelible roles in the process.

Yet in truth, he was someone who could elevate even the most mundane material with his offbeat and often inspired line readings; when given a role that deserved his particular genius, he could make it into something unforgettable. Here are 10 of his very finest parts, on both television and film.

1. Wait Until Dark (1967)

Alan Arkin stalks blind Audrey Hepburn in a scene from the film Wait Until Dark, 1967. Photo / Getty Images

Arkin was not usually an actor associated with on-screen villainy, but - especially earlier in his career - his versatility was such that he could take on roles such as that of Harry Roat, a violent and vicious criminal, in the 1967 psychological thriller Wait Until Dark.

Roat is preying upon Audrey Hepburn’s blind woman, who he believes has come into possession of some drugs that he wishes to obtain, and Arkin’s ability to portray the character’s gradual shift from apparent persuasiveness to vicious threat, to near-Satanic violence in the terrifying Grand Guignol climax was a testament to how he could dampen down his natural likeability to chillingly convincing effect.

2. The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (1968)

American actors Alan Arkin and Sondra Locke in a publicity still for Robert Ellis Miller’s 1968 drama, The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter. Photo / Getty Images

Long before there was any debate about ableism or representation, Arkin was Oscar-nominated for his performance as John Singer in the adaptation of Carson McCullers’ The Heart is a Lonely Hunter.

As a deaf-mute silver engraver who struggles to adapt to life in the small American town in which he lives, Arkin conveys Singer’s decency, warmth and humanity without any dialogue, and manages to offer the complexities and contradictions of his inner life in the most economic of ways, right up until the heartbreaking and tragic ending.

He was nominated for an Oscar, but lost out to Cliff Robertson’s portrayal of mental disability in Charly; Arkin’s performance has endured considerably better.

3. Catch-22 (1970)

A Catch-22 poster featuring Alan Arkin and Paula Prentiss, 1970. Photo / Getty Images

Joseph Heller’s legendary anti-war satire Catch-22 was widely believed to be unfilmable, which is why Mike Nichols’ flawed but fascinating version of it has to be reckoned a success of sorts.

Much of the credit for its achievement comes down to Arkin, cast in the lead role of Captain John Yossarian, whose cynical and paranoid attitude towards the military - who he believes are doing all they can to ensure his imminent death - is shown to be justified by their blithe disregard for human life.

Arkin manages to make the on-screen Yossarian a more sympathetic figure than he is in the book, bringing a relatability and humanity to someone understandably frustrated by the titular paradox that ensures few can escape the air force.

4. The Return of Captain Invincible (1983)

Farewell to the great Alan Arkin. Do yourself a favor and go watch THE RETURN OF CAPTAIN INVINCIBLE if you haven't. pic.twitter.com/uFkxdGUM2Q

— Landon McDonald🔜Kowai Con (@McMovieMan) June 30, 2023

A long time before superhero films became common currency, Arkin appeared in one of the strangest examples of the genre, in which he played Captain Invincible – the so-called “Legend in Leotards’”

He’s a once-renowned superhero who has fallen from grace after WWII but is offered a chance of redemption when he has to battle Christopher Lee’s nefarious Mr Midnight. Just to make matters even weirder, the film features songs composed by Rocky Horror’s Richard O’Brien.

It’s a true one-off – the novelist Terry Pratchett called it “a series of bad moments pasted together with great songs and a budget of fourpence” – and it flopped at the box office. But Arkin, as usual, brings charm, peerless comic timing and a fine singing voice to this most unusual of heroes.

5. Edward Scissorhands (1990)

#RIP Alan Arkin 🕊️🤍
(March 26, 1934 - June 30, 2023)#JohnnyDepp and Alan Arkin
starred together in 'Edward Scissorhands', 1990 pic.twitter.com/ME4yUbztyg

— Savvy? 🏴‍☠️ (@Savvy_CapJackie) June 30, 2023

Arkin was always skilled at playing everymen, but perhaps there was no more mundane character in his entire oeuvre than that of Bill Boggs, the nondescript patriarch in Tim Burton’s fairytale Edward Scissorhands.

A bowling aficionado who is unfazed by the presence of “Ed” in his family’s life, Arkin (who said that when he first read the script he was “a bit baffled”) has the tricky role of playing an unostentatiously decent character whose utter mundanity stands in contrast to the considerably more heightened and theatrical world.

And, of course, he manages to sell some of the film’s best comic dialogue, such as when he sighs: “Sweetheart, you can’t buy the necessities of life with cookies.”

6. Grosse Pointe Blank (1997)

Grosse Pointe Blank (1997).
As we're rightfully celebrating the incredible career of Alan Arkin tonight, it'd be a crime not to post this brilliant scene from Grosse Pointe Blank, with John Cusack.
I love this movie so much.#ripAlanArkin pic.twitter.com/FpHcGltq88

— The Sting (@TSting18) June 30, 2023

John Cusack’s jet-black hitman farce is oddly in danger of being neglected these days, which is an enormous pity, not least for the dynamic between Cusack’s assassin Martin Blank and Arkin as his reluctant therapist Dr Oatman.

Although the two only share a handful of scenes on screen, every line of dialogue the two deliver in them is a gut-bursting comic delight, as Blank’s nonchalant attitude towards his murderous profession is met with a combination of incredulity and fear by Oatman, who ends up being far more in need of assistance than his client.

Arkin, as ever, underplays the character’s neuroses, making the jokes – “I’m emotionally involved with you”, “How are you emotionally involved with me?” and “I’m afraid of you” – land all the harder.

7. Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Alan Arkin, the veteran Oscar-winning "Little Miss Sunshine" actor, has died at 89. I will never forget him for this quote. pic.twitter.com/KW98mocAp0

— Eric Alper 🎧 (@ThatEricAlper) June 30, 2023

After two previous nominations, Arkin finally won his first Oscar, at the age of 72, for his performance as an insanely badly-behaved and cantankerous pensioner – we learn that he has been ejected from a retirement home for snorting heroin – who accompanies his dysfunctional family on a road trip across America to his granddaughter Olive’s titular beauty pageant.

Although he dies en route due to a drug overdose, his influence is subsequently felt when his granddaughter performs an outrageous burlesque that he has tutored her in, and subsequently shows up the whole pageant for the tawdry and exploitative nonsense it is.

Arkin gives a broader and bigger performance than usual, in contrast to his dialled-down co-stars, but it works beautifully; his Edwin Hoover may well be his single most fondly remembered role.

8. Argo (2012)

John Goodman (left), Alan Arkin and Ben Affleck in Argo.

“Argo, f*** yourself.” A Best Picture winner from a bygone time when films were celebrated for being purely entertaining rather than worthy, Ben Affleck’s movie is elevated considerably by the casting of Arkin as veteran film producer Lester Siegel, who is recruited to take part in an elaborate scam involving the creation of a fake film in order to smuggle a group of American diplomats out of Iran.

Arkin takes relish in portraying the character of a macho, ball-busting producer who declares, “If I’m doing a fake movie, it’s gonna be a fake hit”. But - as so often with the actor - he ensures his gruff veneer cannot conceal the kindness and decency that lies underneath his bark. And his much-repeated catchphrase might be the thing that’s most fondly remembered about the film a decade on.

9. BoJack Horseman (2015-16)

Let's look back at when Alan Arkin portrayed J.D. Salinger on Bojack Horseman. https://t.co/3AeJtoT6PW

— /Film (@slashfilm) June 30, 2023

There are many joyous and wonderful things about the animated sitcom BoJack Horseman, but one of the funniest jokes is the idea that the notoriously reclusive novelist JD Salinger would seek to return to the public eye with a gameshow entitled Hollywood Stars and Celebrities: What Do They Know? Do They Know Things?? Let’s Find Out!

The genius idea is not that Salinger has gone mad or is desperate, but that he genuinely believes this is no less important a part of his life’s work than Catcher in the Rye. Arkin’s voiceover role as Salinger is understated and full of gravitas and intelligence – which, of course, makes the incongruity of a profoundly stupid quiz show being his latest endeavour all the more amusing.

10. The Kominsky Method (2018-19)

In short there was nothing ALAN ARKIN couldn’t do. Nothing. He was that good. This is rare. And this is what made him one of America’s finest Actors.

Your legacy is assured and so Alan Arkin, RIP 🎭

This is Norman’s eulogy for Eileen from

THE KOMINSKY METHOD (2019) pic.twitter.com/LOKKhacjBp

— Michael Warburton (@MichaelWarbur17) June 30, 2023

Chuck Lorre’s comedy-drama, revolving around the friendship between a faded actor and his agent and best friend, only managed to keep Arkin for two seasons, and his loss was keenly felt when it returned for its third and final instalment.

Yet when he was on screen, his chemistry with Michael Douglas was both tender and hilarious; the two men are both clearly trying to steal scenes from one another, but they do so in such a way that their affection and respect can clearly be seen, rather than there being any risk of the spotlight being hogged.

And when Arkin’s character Norman begins to romance his former inamorata, Jane Seymour’s Madelyn, he manages to be both tender and hilarious. The moment in which he over-dramatically throws open the door to her bedroom, overcoming his fears of intimacy, is one of the defining moments of this great actor’s distinguished career.