Auto-Biopics: Celebrities portray themselves in their own biopic
Scripted autobiographical films, not documentaries
List activity
2.9K views
• 5 this weekCreate a new list
List your movie, TV & celebrity picks.
22 titles
- DirectorMichael ShowalterStarsKumail NanjianiZoe KazanHolly HunterPakistan-born comedian Kumail Nanjiani and grad student Emily Gardner fall in love but struggle as their cultures clash. When Emily contracts a mysterious illness, Kumail finds himself forced to face her feisty parents, his family's expectations, and his true feelings.Kumail Nanjiani - Comedian and co-writer with his wife Emily.
- DirectorTom GriesMonte HellmanStarsMuhammad AliErnest BorgnineJohn MarleyMuhammad Ali plays himself in a reconstruction of the events that brought him to fame.Muhammed Ali - Heavyweight Champion
- DirectorBetty ThomasStarsHoward SternMary McCormackRobin QuiversThe autobiographical story of Howard Stern, the radio rebel who is now also a TV personality, an author and a movie star.Howard Stern - Radio Host
- DirectorClint EastwoodStarsAlek SkarlatosAnthony SadlerSpencer StoneThree courageous young Americans prevent a terrorist attack on a train bound for Paris.3 Americans Alek Skarlatos, Anthony Sadler & Spencer Stone who stopped a 2015 terrorist attack on a Paris bound train, reenact the event.
- DirectorCorey AllenStarsAnn JillianTony Lo BiancoViveca LindforsAnn Jillian finds out she has cancer and the movie shows how she deals with that (the hospital treatments and impact on her life).Ann Jillian - Actress
- DirectorJesse HibbsStarsAudie MurphyMarshall ThompsonCharles DrakeThe true WWII story of Audie Murphy, the most decorated soldier in U.S. history. Based on the autobiography of Audie Murphy who stars as himself in the film.Audie Murphy - War Hero
- DirectorAlfred E. GreenStarsJackie RobinsonRuby DeeMinor WatsonBiography of Jackie Robinson, the first black major league baseball player in the 20th century. Traces his career in the negro leagues and the major leagues. Restored in original Black and White.Jackie Robinson - Baseball Player
- DirectorEdward J. LaksoStarsDarren McGavinKathie BrowneNoah Beery Jr.Race car driver Richard Petty stars in his own b-movie bio.Richard Petty - Racecar Driver
- DirectorLawrence C. WindomStarsBabe RuthRuth TaylorWilliam SheerThe "true story" of baseball great Babe Ruth; Ruth plays himself.Babe Ruth - Baseball Player
- DirectorAlfred E. GreenStarsTommy DorseyJimmy DorseyJanet BlairThe Dorsey Brothers bandleaders' lives traced from childhood music insisting father to fame rise eventual split furthering careers propelling with their music.Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey - Musicians
- DirectorChuck BarrisStarsChuck BarrisRobin AltmanBrian O'MullinA week in the life of "The Gong Show" host and creator Chuck Barris who lives through a series of outrageous competitors, stressful situations, a nervous breakdown and other comical characters involved in his life and work on the TV show.Chuck Barris - Game Show Host
- DirectorCharles BartonStarsTom HarmonAnita LouiseForest EvashevskiTom Harmon (ol' # 98 for the Michigan Wolverines, husband of actress Elyse Knox and father of Mark Harmon and Kelly Harmon) took a back seat to no one on the football field (except the Minnesota Gophers) or, later, in the broadcast booth, but, on film, he managed to find himself in two of the all-time bad sports movies..."The Spirit of West Point" and "Harmon of Michigan." The latter, if it had been a true-life biography of Tom Harmon, might have made a passable film but after a short prologue, narrated by sports writer Bill Henry who is not the same as actor William Henry, that semi-recaps Harmon's football-playing days at the University of Michigan, it quickly develops into a mess that indicates the director and writers used the technical adviser, Coach Jeff Cravath, only to put plays on the blackboard. Once Harmon,(supposedly playing himself but the character he plays here has more character flaws than the law allows), graduates from Michigan, he marries his college sweetheart Peggy Adams (Anita Louise), turns up his nose at the prospect of playing professional football---a poor-paying and not-that-well respected job in 1941---and starts a vagabond tour of coaching tank-water colleges. Authenicity went out the window when the narration ended, as did any kind of time tracking, as everything that follows seems to happen in a single football season. Tom takes an assistant coach job at a cow-pasture college under Jimmy Wayburn (William Hall) and lasts one day before Wayburn fires him. Then he signs to play for a College All-Star team doing exhibition games against pro teams, but his team-mates, hacked because Tom gets star billing, lay down on him and he gets smacked down hard on every play. One of the leaders willing to let Harmon get slaughtered is old Michigan teammate Forrest Evashevski (playing himself), a life-long friend in real life and Godfather to Mark Harmon and a long-time respected coach at the University of Iowa. Harmon wins the game by himself, but decides this isn't his cup of tea. He hangs around the house a few weeks, then gets a job as an assistant under old-time coach Pop Branch at a college that has three buildings on campus and a football stadium seating 100,000 fans. He helps Pop win a few games (still ticking along in what appears to be the same fall football season), but the alumni at Webster College are tired of losing, fire their coach and hire Harmon away from Pop. Harmon takes over the Webster team in mid-season and becomes the all-time example of a hard-ass coach willing to win at any cost, including installing a screen-pass play that depends on an illegal blocking scheme---the Flying Wedge---to make it work. His Webster team begins to thump their opponents by large scores, usually leaving the other team battered and bloodied by the use of the illegal blocking scheme. They win four or five games which, based on the writers time scheme, would have them playing 20 games a season in what was then a nine-and-ten game season. Plus, the press and other coaches around and about, are up in arms about Harmon's tactics, but the jerks refereeing the games evidently haven't read the rule book nor the newspapers and throw no penalty flags against his team. Well, one referee does once, but he never officiated nor had lunch in that town again. It, by any reasonable calendar must now be July of the next year in a season that should have ended in December, and hard-case Harmon's team is going up against Pop's team (where Harmon coached earlier in this never-ending season) and Pop drops by and tells Tom he ain't all that fond of Tom's coaching methods, but Tom poo-pahs him off, and then sends his team out and they gleefully dismantle Pop's fair-playing team by 109-0. But Webster's quarterback Freddie Davis (Stanley Brown) suffers a concussion running a play Harmon calls just to run up the score even higher---Harmon evidently didn't read the script because nobody using their own name would want this character perceived as Himself---and it's nip-and-tuck whether Freddie will get out of the hospital alive. It gets even stickier when Freddie parents drop their hospital vigil long enough to tell Tom they are right proud that he is Freddie's coach. Say what? Tom sees the light and reverts back to the good old boy he started out as.Tom Harmon - College Football (Questionable whether the events in this movie actually happened at this time in his life)
- DirectorShirley SunStarsMark SalzmanQingfu PanHangcheng DongMark Salzman always was interested in Kung-Fu and the Chinese culture, claims to have seen every Kung-Fu movie. 1982, with a degree in Chinese literature, he visits a province university in China for two years to teach Chinese teachers the English language. He learns the refinements of correct behavior among Chinese people, makes friends with his pupils, falls in love with the young doctor Ming, learns Wushu (similar Kung-Fu) from the famous teacher Pan... but also learns about political repression, especially when he's forbidden contact with some of his friends.Mark Salzman - Martial Arts
- DirectorArthur PennStarsArlo GuthriePatricia QuinnJames BroderickA cinematic adaption of Arlo Guthrie's classic story-song.Arlo Guthrie - Song Writer
- DirectorFrancis D. LyonStarsBob MathiasWard BondMelba MathiasCalifornia school boy and Stanford University student Bob Mathias was the first man to win two Olympic Gold Medals in the Decathlon in the 1948 and 1952 Olympics. The film begins with him as a 17-year-old schoolboy in Tulare, California where his high school track coach, played by Ward Bond, encourages him to train for the Olympics, with the Dacathlon in mind. His story, far from over, ends here with his victory in the 1952 Olympics and with Mathias in the U.S. Marine Corps. He and his wife, Melba, play themselves in one of the few movie bios that doesn't play fast and loose with the facts, especially in a bio with the subject playing himself.Bob Mathias - Olympic Gold Medalist
- DirectorFrancis D. LyonStarsElroy 'Crazylegs' HirschLloyd NolanJoan VohsThe story of the life and career of football star Elroy "Crazylegs" Hirsch (who plays himself).Elroy Hirsch - Football Player
- DirectorLeigh JasonStarsDouglas CorriganPaul KellyRobert ArmstrongThis is the story of the historic 1938 flight of Douglas 'Wrong Way' Corrigan who starred as himself in this film, which chronicled his infamous flight. On July 17, 1938, he loaded 320 gallons of gasoline (40 hours' worth) into the tiny, single engine plane. While expressing his intent to fly west to Long Beach, CA, he flew out of Floyd Bennett Field heading east over the Atlantic. Instrumentation in the plane included two compasses (both malfunctioned) and a turn-and-bank indicator. The cabin door was held shut with baling wire. Nearly 29 hours later, he landed in Baldonnel near Dublin. He forever claimed to be surprised at arriving in Ireland rather than California. He returned to the US as a hero, with a ticker tape parade in New York and received numerous medals and awards.Douglas Corrigan - Football Player
- DirectorCesar GallardoStarsGabriel ElordeAura AureaRuben RustiaGabriel Elorde - Prize Fighter
- DirectorEric KhooStarsTetsuya BesshoMotoko GollentYoshihiro TatsumiA story based on the life and short stories of Yoshihiro Tatsumi, a mangaka known for his gekiga style of alternate Japanese manga.Yoshihiro Tatsumi - Animation Artist
- DirectorEdward JoséStarsHarold R. PeatMiriam FoucheWilliam SorelleHarold R. Peat tries to enlist in the United States army so that he may fight in World War I but is rejected by the recruiting officer. He is despondent until he and his friend, Old Bill, concoct a scheme whereby they are both accepted. After a stint in training camp, Harry bids his sweetheart Mary goodbye and accompanies Bill to France. Following several adventures at the front, Bill is killed and Harold, in trying to save a load of ammunition, is wounded. Harold spends some time in a French hospital, after which Mary comes to France to bring her heroic private home.Harold R. Peat - Lieutenant WWI
- DirectorCaryl S. FlemingStarsAl J. JenningsJ. Morris FosterFrank FarringtonOklahoma lawyer Al Jennings, whose father was a famous and respected judge, is enraged at the murder of his brother Ed, shot in the back by two killers. As if that wasn't enough, he finds himself falsely accused of robbery, and while escaping those phony charges he is chased and shot by a posse. Although wounded, he manages to elude the posse but takes his revenge by robbing a country store. It's not long before he has his own outlaw gang, with headquarters at the Spike S Ranch. A local sheriff is determined to capture him, so Al and his brother Frank make plans for one last, big robbery before leaving Oklahoma forever.Al J. Jennings - Attorney
- DirectorArthur BertheletStarsMary MacLaneRalph GravesPaul HarveyThe story of six affairs of the heart, drawn from controversial feminist author Mary MacLane's. None of MacLane's affairs - with "the bank clerk," "the prize-fighter," "the husband of another," and so on - last, and in each of them MacLane emerges dominant. Re-enactments of the love affairs are interspersed with MacLane addressing the camera (while smoking), and talking contemplatively with her maid on the meaning and prospects of love.Mary MacLane - Author