The Wrap
19 Actors Who Have Played Their Own Twins, From Lindsay Lohan to Mark Ruffalo
By Margeaux Sippell
May 14, 2020
It must not be an easy feat to play your own twin, but a surprising amount of actors have done it. From Lindsay Lohan in “The Parent Trap” to Paul Rudd in Netflix’s “Living With Yourself” to Mark Ruffalo in HBO’s new series “I Know This Much Is True” here are 19 stars who have played their own twins, clones, and even split-personalities on TV and in movies.
Lindsay Lohan – “The Parent Trap,” “I Know Who Killed Me” Pretty much everyone is familiar with Lohan’s iconic role in ‘The Parent Trap’ remake, but few are familiar with her much more grown-up, darker role in this 2007 psychological thriller in which her she plays two very different versions of a girl named Aubrey Fleming.
Mark Ruffalo – “I Know This Much Is True” He plays twins Dominick and Thomas Birdsey in the HBO series, the latter of whom is schizophrenic.
Tom Hardy – “Legend” Hardy plays a pair of famous, real-life English gangster twins, Reggie and Ronnie A.K. A. the Brothers Kray, in this 2015 crime drama.
Armie Hammer – “The Social Network” Who could forget Hammer’s turn as another pair of real-life twins? He played both Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, A.K.A. “The Winklevii,” in this 2010 drama starring Jesse Eisenberg as Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Nicolas Cage – “Adaptation” Cage stars opposite himself — and Meryl Streep — in this 2002 Spike Jonze film about a struggling screenwriter and his freeloading twin brother.
Tatiana Maslany – “Orphan Black”
Maslany plays several different clones in this BBC America series, including Alison Hendricks, Sarah Manning, and Helena.
Paul Rudd – “Living With Yourself”
When Rudd’s character accidentally gets himself cloned, he decides to let the other version of himself do the heavy lifting in their shared life. Everything is fine until his wife, and pretty much everyone else in his life, starts liking his clone more than the real him.
Jackie Chan – “Twin Dragons”
Chan plans twins who were separated at birth in this 1992 action-comedy.
Leonardo DiCaprio – “The Man in the Iron Mask”
Leo plays both King Louis XIV and his villainous brother, Philippe, in this 1998 film based on the story of “The Three Muskateers.”
Christian Bale – “The Prestige”
Bale plays a magician with a big secret. Spoiler alert: Bale’s character is actually just pretending to be a master magician when really his twin brother is helping pull off the tricks behind the scenes.
Adam Sandler – “Jack and Jill”
The comedian dressed up as the female version of himself for this 2011 comedy about a twin sister who comes to stay with her brother’s family.
Bette Davis – “Dead Ringer”
Davis plays twins Margaret DeLorca and Edith Phillips in this 1964 thriller. Both sisters are in love with the same man, and they’ll go to crazy lengths to sabotage each other.
Edward Norton – “Leaves of Grass”
Norton plays twins Brady and Bill in this 2009 comedy. Bill, believing Brady is dead, goes to Oklahoma — only to get roped into Brady’s drug-dealing scheme.
Lily Tomlin and Bette Midler – “Big Business”
Tomlin and Midler play two sets of identical twins who are separated at birth and swapped, so they grew up believing they’re actually fraternal twins from different families. To make it even more confusing, both sets of twins have the same names.
Jeremy Irons – “Dead Ringers”
In this 1988 thriller, Irons plays identical twin gynecologists Elliot and Beverly Mantle.
Lisa Kudrow – “Friends”
In order to explain why Kudrow had a role on both “Friends” and “Mad About You,” which aired back-t0-back on Thursday nights, they did a little crossover in which they had Kudrow’s character Ursula the waitress from “Mad About You” come on “Friends” as Phoebe’s twin sister.
JK Simmons – “Counterpart”
Simmons plays both versions of Howard Silk from alternate realities in this spy series from Starz, which was tragically canceled after just two seasons.
James McAvoy – “Split”
Ok, so not exactly twins, but McAvoy plays Kevin — and all 23 of his wildly different and terrifying personalities — in this 2017 horror thriller.
Micheal Keaton – “Multiplicity”
Doug decides to clone himself not once but four times in order to get more things done between his job and his family life.
BEETTE IN A RECENT COMEDY THAT TAKES PLACE IN Italy WITH BETTE, CANDACE BERGMAN AND MAYBE GOLDIE, AND THE STAR OF GRACE AND FRANKIE OR JANE FONDA?
Sounds like a fever dream. Haven’t heard of this….