00:00There's been a lot of Batman adaptations over the years.
00:02Also, water is wet.
00:03Yeah, beginning this with the obvious,
00:05but when discussing actors who've played Batman,
00:07it's mostly focused on films,
00:08with the occasional nod to TV like Adam West or animation with Kevin Conway.
00:12But if you dig deep enough,
00:14you'll find there's been a bunch of actors who've played Batman in live action
00:17outside of the most well-known versions.
00:19So for this episode, we're looking at the lesser-known live-action Batman.
00:22I'm mostly sticking to live-action because, well,
00:24there's a lot of great animated Batman productions.
00:27There's just a lot of it,
00:28and I want to make these episodes a little bit shorter.
00:31So let's start with the first actor to actually play Batman in live-action
00:34back in the 40s,
00:35Lewis Wilson.
00:36The first live-action depiction of Batman was a film serial in 1943,
00:40where he was played by actor Lewis Wilson.
00:42Wilson made appearances in other films,
00:43but mostly quit acting and went to work with General Foods,
00:46his last role being in the TV show Orson Welles' Great Mysteries in 1973.
00:50A fascinating fact I found was that his wife was actress Dana Nuttall,
00:54who he starred opposite in the B-movie Wild Woman.
00:56She would later marry film producer Albert Chubby Brockley,
00:59a.k.a. the producer of the James Bond movies.
01:01In fact, his son, Michael G. Wilson,
01:03along with his stepsister Barbara Brockley,
01:05were producers of the franchise until they gave Crow of Control to Amazon MGM this year.
01:09So there's a relationship between Batman and Bond?
01:11You probably didn't know until now.
01:13In 1949, they made another serial,
01:15but Wilson didn't return as a Caped Crusader.
01:17That role would be filled out by Robert Lurie.
01:19Robert Lurie took on the role in the 1949 serial Batman and Robin.
01:22Prior to Batman, he had a lot of roles in action films,
01:25most notably in the time around power film Mark of Zorro in 1940.
01:30Huh.
01:30He also starred in a ton of westerns,
01:32with his most prominent one being Mick Lingtok,
01:34with John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.
01:36He also had a steady career in TV,
01:38and appeared in another DC Comics adaptation,
01:40a 1956 episode of the George Reeves Adventures of Superman show,
01:43a little bit of a cool technical crossover there.
01:46Reeves and Lurie also acted in a World War II propaganda film about VD,
01:49directed by John Ford, well before their time in the tights.
01:53Small world.
01:54Now, this one had an interesting story behind it.
01:57In 1973, five years after the cancellation of the 60s TV show,
02:01Bert Ward and Yvonne Craig reprised their roles as Robin and Batgirl
02:05for a PSA about equal pay.
02:07But Adam West did not reprise his role.
02:09At the time, West wanted to distance himself from the role,
02:11so actor Dick Gautier played the role for this PSA.
02:14Gautier's had an interesting career.
02:15He starred in the original production of Bye Bye Birdie,
02:18earning a Tony Award nomination,
02:20and ended several appearances in TV shows like Get Smart,
02:22The Mary Ty Moore Show,
02:23and Charlie's Angels, among others,
02:25and films like the original Fun of Dick and Jane,
02:27and Billy Jack Ghost Washington.
02:29He also had a voice acting career,
02:30including Serpenter in G.I. Joe,
02:32and Rodimus Prime in Transformers.
02:34Batman wasn't his only flirtation with DC Comics,
02:36as he had an appearance in the London Carpenter Wonder Woman show,
02:38and a voice role in Batman the Animated Series,
02:40Feet of Clay, as Matt Hagen's friend.
02:42Also, his son was Rand Gautier,
02:44the man who stole Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee's tape in the 90s,
02:48and was played by Zef Rogan in the Pam and Tommy miniseries.
02:51Yeah, again, small world.
02:52In the early 2000s,
02:54there was a series of adverts for OnStar,
02:56an unballed guidance system starring in Batman,
02:58with the visuals taking inspiration from the Tim Burton and Joel Schumacher films.
03:02The ads had Michael Gohl return as Alfred from those movies,
03:05alongside Curtis Armstrong as the Joker,
03:07and Brian Stepanek as the Riddler.
03:09Batman also appeared in these ads,
03:10and was played by actor Bruce Thomas.
03:12Thomas has had a steady career.
03:14He's done voiceover work in cartoons and video games.
03:16He was a motion capture actor for Master Chief in the last three Halo games,
03:19and, more importantly for this video,
03:21did some voice work for some animated DC work.
03:23He was the voice of Commissioner Gordon in the DC Universe Animated Original Movies
03:27during the New 52 period, among other films as well.
03:29He was also apparently believed to be the man who played Batman in the Birds of Prey TV show,
03:33but he debunked that.
03:34Batman was apparently played by two stuntmen,
03:36Keith Campbell, and Alex Daniels,
03:38but there isn't any confirmation of that actually being true.
03:41So, this and a few other entries I debated taking off this list.
03:44In this instance, it was because David Mazuse is a young actor,
03:47with Gotham, the Batman prequel show,
03:48focused on the scene before Batman arrived on the scene,
03:50being his big major role so far.
03:52And also because in Gotham, he played a young Bruce Wayne,
03:54so technically not Batman age,
03:56but in the show's final,
03:58Mazuse wore the cape and cowl for one scene.
04:00There were other moments,
04:01but he was mostly kept off screen until the last scene of the show,
04:03which was the first time Batman made an appearance on a TV show in live action since the 60s,
04:07so there's a little interesting fact for you.
04:09It was also the same year when Ian Glenn showed up as Bruce Wayne in Titans.
04:12Titans was known as one of the few live action DC shows
04:15that allowed to use Batman with an on-screen appearance,
04:17whereas others were prevented from doing so before.
04:19It's why Green Arrow appeared in Smallville, for example.
04:22In Titans, what was originally the flagship show for DC Universe,
04:25the DC Comics streaming service,
04:26yet the streaming rules were weird,
04:28Bruce Wayne appeared in season 2 and 3,
04:30played by Game of Thrones actor Ian Glenn.
04:31While he wasn't wearing the costume, I think it still counts.
04:34Glenn is an actor who's had a steady career before and since playing the Kate Crusader,
04:38so no deep-dives,
04:39but he's also been the first live-action Batman to share the screen with Jason Todd,
04:43played by Colin Reuters,
04:43so there's that for you.
04:45Also in 2019, yeah, big year for DC shows,
04:47there was a Batwoman show.
04:48Batwoman was a show set in the Arrowverse,
04:51a series of DC-concent TV shows all shown in the same universe,
04:53but with a caveat that they couldn't use some of the big-name DC characters,
04:57with some exceptions.
04:58This was mostly due to the concurrent DC Extended Universe film series
05:02that were using all the big-name characters.
05:03Batwoman, the Gotham City set-shell starring Bruce Wayne's cousin,
05:06Kate Kane,
05:07then later Ryan Wilder because Ruby Rose left the show before season 2,
05:10defending Gotham and Bruce's absence.
05:12While Batman never showed up in person,
05:14sometimes he was obscured,
05:15but he managed to get Bruce Wayne to appear.
05:17In the season 2 premiere,
05:18Batman was impersonated by super-villain Harsh
05:20and appeared in A Vision to Luke Fox in another episode.
05:23Both of these instances,
05:24he was played by actor Warren Christie.
05:26Warren Christie's has and continues to work in TV and film.
05:29Noticable appearances include an episode of Arrow as a different character,
05:32and also Supernatural,
05:33whose colleague Jensen Ackles was considered to play a role,
05:35but didn't come to fruition.
05:36Also, Batman was supposed to have a crossover with Superman and Lois,
05:39but that didn't happen,
05:40due to the COVID pandemic affecting TV production.
05:42It's been suggested,
05:43but never confirmed,
05:44if it was supposed to include Bruce Wayne.
05:46The main plotline of Batman was about what happened to Bruce,
05:48and why he disappeared.
05:49So, it would make sense for a crossover to maybe follow that plot,
05:53but it didn't happen,
05:54so there's no way of knowing what was that going to entail.
05:57So, Warren Christie's appearance came after Kevin Conway's brief live-action appearance
06:00as Bruce Wayne in the first season of Batman,
06:02but I decided to mention it at the end,
06:04because I thought it would be a good way to end the video on.
06:06During the Arrow vs. Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover event,
06:09Kevin Conway made an appearance as an older Bruce Wayne.
06:14It's obviously well-known at this point,
06:15but Kevin Conway was known for the voice of Batman
06:17in a variety of different mediums,
06:19animation, film, and video games,
06:20and in a crisis of crossover,
06:21he got to play Batman,
06:22who broke his code and went bad.
06:24It's a good performance,
06:25out of several from The Man,
06:26going against type,
06:27serving as a contrast to Brandon Roof's
06:28Turner's Superman in the same episode,
06:30and gets to envelop every old, future version of Batman.
06:32He's got the exoskeleton from Kingdom Come,
06:34he crows Dark Knight Returns,
06:35he also gets to share a scene with Kate Kane,
06:37which this performance has a bit of physical importance.
06:39Kevin Conway is the first upcoming gay man
06:41to play Batman in live action,
06:42and having him share a scene with Kate Kane,
06:44one of the most prominent lesbian superheroes,
06:46and especially in an episode of her own show,
06:49is a good scene with a lot of significance to it.
06:50It also is a little bit thematically relevant
06:52to the show's overall arc,
06:54especially with Kane's character arc
06:55of trying to be Batman,
06:57or Bat-woman.
06:58Yeah, they kind of went into the legacy route.
06:59Anyway, it's a good scene with a lot of significance to it,
07:01and it's one of my favourite moments
07:03of Kevin Conway as Batman.
07:04So those were the men who were Batman
07:06in one way or another.
07:07While they may not be talked about
07:09among the well-known Batman,
07:10they still got to be the Dark Knight for one moment.
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07:22and also,
07:23please check out The Orange Bin,
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07:27of my episodes here,
07:29which with links to sources
07:30that I mention on the show.
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07:36back in the olden days.
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