Before Lee Pace graces the big screen as the hunter/antagonist Evan McCone in Edgar Wright’s The Running Man, let’s go back through his best characters and projects. Pace is a rare working actor who’s equally commanding on the big screen in movies and the small screen on television, and we should celebrate that!
It’s unlikely that anyone will go into The Running Man and not know who he is (unless they’re fooled by the mask), but your favorite is likely to vary. He’s just been in so many movies and shows. Not to mention the stage.
Pace has acted in off-Broadway plays in New York City since 2001, and has been on Broadway twice. He played Bruce Niles in Larry Kramer’s play The Normal Heart in 2011 and won a Drama Desk Award. In 2018, he starred in a revival of another play/duology set during the AIDs crisis, Angels in America: Millenium Approaches and its second part Angels in America: Perestroika as Joe Pitt. Fun fact: he replaced Russell Tovey, who played the role in the same production in London.
Pushing Daisies
The facts were these: from 2007 to 2009, Pace starred as Ned the piemaker in this supernatural dramedy. Ned has the ability to bring dead things back to life with a single touch. There are just two caveats. If he touches them a second time, they die permanently. And if he doesn’t touch them a second time after a minute, the universe will take a replacement life from close proximity.
These abilities saddled Ned with some unique childhood trauma. As an adult, he uses them to ask murder victims who killed them as a side hustle. This goes smoothly until he discovers that his childhood crush is one of those murder victims. He brings her back, but can never touch her again. It’s a charming, romantic, macabre, perfect show.
The Fall
Thanks to Mubi, you can now stream this underrated fantasy film from director Tarsem. Pace plays a stuntman (in 1915 a.k.a.the early, early days of Hollywood) named Roy recovering from injuries in a hospital who meets a little girl named Alexandria and tells her a story as they both convalesce.
He, the young girl, and other people they encounter at the hospital appear in the story as various characters. It’s like The Princess Bride, but the fairy tale is an epic adventure set in a dessert instead of an enchanted forest. Both the story that Roy tells and and his and Alexandria’s reality get quite dark over the course of the film. The Fall is also just gorgeous to look at, and the visuals are even more stunning thanks to a recent 4K restoration.
Halt & Catch Fire
Despite running for four seasons, this AMC series that can best be described as “80s Mad Men” and set in/around Silicon Valley is actually a bit underrated. Pace played a Steve Jobs-esque entrepreneur named Joe MacMillan.
He’s charismatic, more talented at selling than creating, an industry disrupter, and bisexual to boot. In the first season, he assembles a team of coders and engineers to take on the personal computer revolution and get rich. Over the course of the season, he betrays them and they betray him as the computer age branches out into the World Wide Web and beyond.
Bodies Bodies Bodies
Bodies Bodies Bodies, the dark comedy/thriller from A24 starring Rachel Sennott and directed by Halina Reijn, does not feature Pace that much. (Spoiler alert, maybe?) But the film does understand two very important things about him as a presence: he’s very handsome and he’s very tall.
Pace plays the older boyfriend of Sennott’s character. He acts like a laid-back himbo, but, surrounded by a group of mostly waifish Gen Z women he strikes an imposing figure. Even the character played by Pete Davidson, who lest we forget is the reason we’re stuck with the phrase “BDE” now, is intimidated by him.
The Hobbit trilogy
Pace has appeared in a few major franchises. (The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 does not appear on this list, even though it means Pace is part of my second favorite end credits sequence of all time.) The first is The Hobbit trilogy. He plays the Sindarian Elvish king Thrandruil. He’s a little bit of a villain, because at this time in the history of Middle-earth the Elves were not down to help out dwarves and men. He rides an elk. He’s a total diva. He has a particularly contentious relationship with Thorin Oakenshield, the character played by Richard Armitage. His son, Legolas, openly rebels against him.
In the final part of Peter Jackson’s trilogy, King Thrandruil sends his army to assist in the titular Battle of the Five Armies. It wouldn’t be a Lord of the Rings story if an army wasn’t showing up at the last minute, right?
Foundation
You know how Apple TV+ just has these shows that you find out about after they’re like multiple seasons in? It’s, like, your friend from college’s favorite show and you’ve never even heard of it? Foundation feels like one of those shows sometimes. Though, to be fair, Pace fans were probably following Foundation from the beginning.
It’s based on a book series by science fiction giant Isaac Asimov that inspired both Star Wars and Dune. It’s about an intergalactic empire grappling with the followers of a guy who can predict the future using math. Pace plays a series of emperors who happen to be clones called Cleon or Brother Day. This means he gets to play different versions of the same character. It’s fun!
Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day
This film is a totally underrated, absolutely charming romantic comedy starring Amy Adams and Frances McDormand. The latter plays Miss Pettigrew, a down-on-her-luck governess in the 1940s who takes a job working as a social secretary for Adams’ character, an American actress named Delysia.
Pace’s character is one of Delysia’s three boyfriends at the start of the film. He’s a poor piano player who may or may not have served time in jail. Should Delysia choose him, and love, over the other men who have jobs and/or money to offer in addition to their affection? That’s none of Miss Pettigrew’s business, but it is ours! Watching this movie is like slipping into a warm bath. Plus Lee Pace sings!
Guardians of the Galaxy
The next major franchise that Pace has appeared in is, of course, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He plays Ronan the Accuser in both Guardians of the Galaxy and Captain Marvel. As much as we do love and appreciate Captain Marvel at The Mary Sue, Guardians is going on the list because his role is significantly larger.
When he’s funny (this movie is a comedy, after all), it’s only because he takes himself so seriously. He’s so good at playing it straight in that dance-off at the end of the film. But his villain turn is seriously scary. The scene where he dismisses Drax’s pent-up revenge quest? Chilling! Brutal!
The Party’s Just Beginning
Did you know that Karen Gillan wrote and directed a feature film, and cast her Guardians co-star Pace as her love interest, sort of? The film follows a self-destructive young woman named Liusaidh whose close friend has recently died by suicide. Her grief exacerbates the frustrations, anxieties, and boredum she was already feeling in life.
Pace plays a similarly depressed divorced dad named Dale who Liusaidh meets and attempts to bond with in the second act. They’re like the grotesque, fun-house mirror version of a sad boy and manic pixie dream girl relationship because they’re actually going through some very rough times.
Lincoln
Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln has so many heavy-hitters in it that it’s almost silly to call it a “Lee Pace” film. But we want to celebrate that he is, indeed, on that very deep bench of acting talent! You remember that the film stars Daniel Day-Lewis, Tommy Lee Jones, and Sally Field, but did you remember that the ensemble cast includes Jeremy Strong, Colman Domingo, Dane DeHaan, Stephen McKinley Henderson, David Oyelowo, Elizabeth Marvel, and Adam Driver?!
Everyone is in this. Pace plays the Democratic Congressman and former New York City mayor Fernando Wood, who vehemently opposed President Lincoln and the 13th Amendment that formally abolished slavery. Not great! At least we know he lost.
(featured image: Rob Kim/WireImage)
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