At a rough count, more than a hundred actors have played real Presidents in movies, and some seventy on television.
Almost a hundred actors have played fictional Presidents, and around thirty have played fictional television Presidents.
Ten women have played Presidents either on television or in the movies - all of them fictional of course.
Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford have all played themselves; Clinton three times.
Perhaps the first man to play a President was Joseph Henabery, who appeared in The Birth of a Nation, way back in 1915. The man who played a President the longest would be Martin Sheen, who appeared as the fictional Josiah Bartlett in The West Wing for seven seasons (he was "officially" President for eight years in fact). During the same (fictional) period in history, however, there were at least a dozen other Presidents occupying the White House. A busy place.
A number of actors have played a President twice, though not necessarily the same Dave. President. Jason Robards has appeared as both Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S Grant, and Kevin Kline has also appeared as Grant, as well as the fictional President William Harrison Mitchell in
Brian Keith played both William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt, while Robin Williams also played Roosevelt and the fictional President Tom Dobbs in Man of the Year. Martin Sheen played not only The West Wing President, but also John F Kennedy.
Edward Hermann has been Franklin D Roosevelt twice, once in Annie and earlier in Eleanor and Franklin. Timothy Bottoms has played George W Bush twice.
Ronny Cox played two different fictional Presidents seven years apart, as did Gene Hackman. Sam Waterston and Beau Bridges played their fictional Presidents only three years apart.
Randy Quaid, on the other hand, has managed to be three Presidents: Lyndon B Johnson, Ronald Reagan, and President A Thornton Osgood, in Mail to the Chief, while Roy Scheider has played three different fictional Presidents.
Strangely enough, several English actors have played real life American Presidents: Anthony Hopkins (as both John Quincy Adams and Richard Nixon); Nigel Hawthorne as Martin Van Buren, and Michael Gambon as Lyndon B Johnson.
Alan Alda missed out on being President in The West Wing, but made it there when he played the fictional and unnamed President in Canadian Bacon.
Because there have been no real life Women Presidents there's been less scope for women to play Presidents, but amongst the more well-known names are Polly Bergen back in 1964, Joan Rivers, Loretta Swit (of MASH fame), Glenn Close, Patty Duke and Geena Davis.
Some of the actors who've appeared as the President over the years might actually make good presidents; they have the kind of charisma you'd expect from a real-life President. Actors such as Gregory Peck, Henry Fonda, Alexander Knox, Robert Duvall, Harrison Ford (as long as he wasn't being Indiana Jones), George Clooney, Fredric March, and Tim Robbins (although he was President, rather surprisingly, in The Spy Who Shagged Me).
But seriously, on the basis of the sort of parts they normally play, would you want any of these guys as President?
Billy Bob Thornton - too scary
John Travolta - after Hairspray?
Gary Sinise - too scary again
Paul Giamatti - probably would need therapy
Chevy Chase - the West Wing would be a riot
Will Ferrell - an elf in the White House?
Michael Douglas - scarier than Billy Bob
Chris Rock - would he stop talking long enough to get anything done?
Luke Wilson - too laid-back
For all the actors who've appeared in the movies or on television as the President, only one actor, Ronald Reagan, has managed to play the President for real. So don't bank on seeing any of these other actors in the job over the next few decades.
My thanks to the unknown compilers of the Wikipedia article on this topic for much of this information.
