7 Days in Hell, which itself is a parody of the infamous 3-day Isner-Mahut Wimbledon match, is about a 7-day long tennis match. One player is Charles Poole (Kit Harington), a dim-witted English Mama's Boy who is the only British tennis player of note, parodying Andy Murray (the differences being Murray is Scottish and not as dumb). The other player is Aaron Williams (Andy Samberg), who is basically an over-the-top version of Andre Agassi.
Dennis Quaid as a barely functional Texan president whose dad had been president, who "decided" to run because people told him to, etc. With Marcia Gay Harden as his beatifically gentle, tolerant wife and Willem Dafoe as his scheming bald puppetmaster.
Hugh Grant as a boorish British showrunner/judge of the titular singing competition, an ersatz Simon Cowell.
Blood Guts Bullets And Octane: A supporting character is a California car dealership owner who dresses like a cowboy and stars in his own Kitschy Local Commercials. He's a riff on Cal Worthington, who became a minor celebrity for his "Cal Worthington and his dog Spot" ads that appeared on West Coast television from the 1960s to the 1990s.
The Canadian buddy cop film Bon Cop, Bad Cop features several characters obviously based on real-life NHL figures:
Harry Buttman is a blatant play on NHL commissioner Gary Bettman.
Comedian Rick Mercer plays Tom Berry, a bigoted and loudmouthed hockey commentator, essentially Don Cherry with the serial numbers filed off.
Several victims of the Tattoo Killer are parodies of real NHL team owners and officials.
Brassed Off: The miners' union leader is a thinly disguised version of the real-life unionist Arthur Scargill.
The Broadway Melody features a famous producer of Broadway revues named Francis Zanfield. Also, the Mahoney sisters are based on the Duncan Sisters, who were actually offered the parts but chose instead to appear in a different MGM musical, It's a Great Life.
Nick Hostetler (Russell Crowe) in Broken City is obviously intended to be a more antagonistic version of New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg.
In The Campaign, Glenn and Wade Motch and their company, Motch Worldwide Global, who are attempting to buy the election for their own purposes, are a thinly veiled fictional counterpart to the real life Charles and David Koch, and their company Koch Industries.
Master Phineas the painter from Cinderella (2015) looks like Salvador Dali!
Citizen Kane is infamously a not-quite-thickly-veiled-enough version of media titan William Randolph Hearst. Hearst came down upon the movie and everyone associated with it like a sledgehammer. Orson Welles' career never quite recovered. Later, both Welles and Herman Mankiewicz would independently apologize for the version of Marion Davies depicted in the character "Susan Alexander" — a hopelessly incompetent hack who was a raging alcoholic and whose career was pretty much bought "off the rack" by the powerful Kane. The real-life Davies was a consummate professional, liked and respected by her peers, who specialized in light comedies and musicals. Her success was independent of her relationship with Hearst, though he did try to use his clout to gain Davies leading-lady roles — a career path that Davies herself knew she was not suited for.
Cloud Atlas: The Lemon Awards are a pretty obvious reference to The Orange Awards, a literary prize sponsored by the mobile phone company Orange.
Played with in Club Dread: While Coconut Pete is an obvious parody of Jimmy Buffett, complete with singing a song called "Pina Coladaburg", Jimmy Buffett does get mentioned in the movie... and is Pete's Berserk Button, since he feels Buffett ripped off his act.
An interesting case is the German dub of Coneheads. Since the actor who played the great leader of the Coneheads looked a bit like Germany's then-chancellor Helmut Kohl, the dubbers decided to add a gag and chose a Voice Actor who had a somewhat similar voice.
Along with President Orlean of Don't Look Up being a Trumplica, billionaire Sir Peter Isherwell combines traits of several well-known tech billionaires. He's the CEO of a company that ruthlessly datamines its customers and controls swathes of social media (Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg) and does Steve Jobs-like presentations of product announcements for the cellphone arm of his business. Like Elon Musk, he proposes Awesome, but Impractical solutions for mundane problems and inserts himself into major events, and has a high need for minerals mined under environmentally disastrous conditions. His talk about "guiding human evolution" to cover his plans for profit and attempt to privatize every space program also bring Musk to mind, as does the look of the pods his company launches to mine the comet.
Edie Sedgwick's love interest in Factory Girl was obviously Bob Dylan, portrayed as an unnamed character by Hayden Christensen. Bob Dylan himself threatened legal action over his initial portrayal during production, resulting in the removal of all references to Dylan in the script.
Field of Dreams: The famously reclusive author Terence Mann was the famously reclusive author J. D. Salinger in the original book, but Salinger threatened to sue if he was featured in any adaptation of the novel.
The vampire movie Fright Night (1985) has a character who is an actor/horror show host (played by Roddy McDowell). His character's name on the horror show Fright Night is Peter Vincent — a homage to Peter Cushing and Vincent Price.
Most of the humor if not the entire premise of Galaxy Quest is lost if you don't realize that Tim Allen is William Shatner (although really, the entire cast qualifies).
The 1998 American version of Godzilla had the New York City mayor as a Roger Ebert lookalike. Used as a Take That! by the end of the film when his aide (an Expy of Siskel) gives his job performance a thumbs down. This was because Siskel and Ebert had criticized director Roland Emmerich's earlier productions. Ebert was offended not by the portrayal, but that if Emmerich hated them so much he didn't have the ballsto let Godzilla eat them.
In the film adaptation of Gone Girl, Missi Pyle's "Ellen Abbott" character is a southern-accented, big-blonde-haired, wide-eyed rabble-rouser. She has a cable show that makes a lot of hay out of no-good, murdering husbands, and pretty, abducted women. And she tosses around sensationalistic, catch-phrase-riddled accusations about active crime investigations. But she's totally NOT Nancy Grace. No, sir. Nope.
Até Que A Sorte Nos Separe 3 had Hassum's daughter marrying the son of billionaire "Rique Barelli", whose nome is only the start of an extended Eike Batista joke: the name of his company has three letters ending in "X", his wife is a former Playboy cover who wore a necklace with his name◊, and bad business decisions sap his fortune.
Inverted in The Hustler (1961) — Real Life pool player Rudolf "New York Fats" Wanderone claims that Minnesota Fats is based on him. After the film was released, he adopted the nickname for himself and became better known by it than the movie character.
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny: Jürgen Voller is a Nazi scientist and member of the SS who, after the war, was recruited by the U.S. government and moved to Alabama, where he spent the next twenty years helping NASA build rockets to win The Space Race. All things that were also true of Wernher Von Braun, the leading developer of Germany's rocket program.
In My Country: Reverend Mzondo is clearly a slightly fictionalized version of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who co-chaired the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
In It Happened in Hollywood, silent movie cowboy actor Tim Bart is a thinly disguised version of Tom Mix. And Mix's horse Tony gets his own counterpart in the form of Bart's horse Toby.
Iron Sky: The president of the United States is a clear parody of Sarah Palin.
Irreconcilable Differences: The film's plot about an idealistic young director who becomes a narcissist and leaves his loving and supportive wife for a younger, dumber woman is a thinly veiled and brutal take on the real-life love triangle between Peter Bogdanovich, Polly Platt and Cybill Shepherd. Ryan O'Neal, who plays Albert, had been directed by Bogdanovich as his marriage to Platt was falling apart.
Willard Whyte, a stand-in for Howard Hughes (who was a friend of series producer Albert R. Broccoli - he even suggested the plot after dreaming he went to visit Hughes and found an impostor instead - and didn't get offended, to the point he helped with the Vegas locations).
Jimmy Dean (Whyte) was very uneasy playing an obvious Hughes parody, since he essentially worked for Hughes (if you worked in Vegas back then, you either worked for him or you worked for the Mafia). He was afraid Hughes would take it as an insult and either fire him, ruin his career or strike him down with a bolt of lightning. Fortunately, Hughes wasn't insulted.
Shady Tree, a Vegas comedian (as well as a smuggler) in the film references real life Vegas comedian Shecky Greene.
Later, Tomorrow Never Dies has a slightly corrupt media mogul as the villain (many guessed Rupert Murdoch, but the writer claimed to be aiming at Robert Maxwell instead).
Skyfall's villain, Raoul Silva, appears to be partially based, in both appearance and overall plan, on Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks.
And fictional leaders: Live and Let Die stars a Caribbean dictator who dabbles heavily in voodoo, similar to François Duvalier, who had died in office as President of Haiti a few years before the film's release; Licence to Kill features a "Republic of Isthmus" (Panama) ruled through a puppet president by a major drug dealer (Manuel Noriega); and the unnamed female British Prime Minister who appears in 1981's For Your Eyes Only shows every sign of being Margaret Thatcher.
JT LeRoy: The character "Eva" was a stand-in for real-life actress Asia Argento, who directed and starred in The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, based on LeRoy's writings. Eva is, likewise, focused on getting such a movie made, and even has sex with LeRoy to convince him to agree to the movie's production. (Except LeRoy wasn't even a real person... It's complicated.)
Princess Tilde, as she is listed in the credits, is clearly a fictionalised version of Crown Princess Victoria of Sweden (in status) and her younger sister Princess Madeleine (in looks and age).
The Corrupt Church in Kentucky is modelled after the Westboro Baptist Church.
The unnamed American president, who is only shown from the back but is clearly African-America, strongly resembles Barack Obama in both his looks and voice.
In a case of What Could Have Been, this trope was ultimately avoided with the new president shown in the 2017 sequel. For most of the film's production, the president was a direct, unflattering parody of Donald Trump, and was intended to be a humorous commentary on what could have happened if Trump had won the 2016 Presidential Election. When Trump actually did win, the scenes were reshot to make the character a more generic Southern president.
In The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, Zissou is a clear parody of Jacques Cousteau, right down to the uniforms...yet at one point he makes an offhand reference to "Cousteau and his cronies." No one comments on the resemblance between the two crews.
Captain Fuller from The Lone Ranger is blatantly General George Armstrong Custer in all but rank.
Long Shot: Parker Wembley, an old and foreign-born right-wing media mogul, is obviously supposed to be Rupert Murdoch. His Wembley News channel's graphics package is identical to Fox News.
Lord of Illusions: Nix and his cult take some cues from Charles Manson and his Family, such as living in a run-down compound in a Californian desert, and committing murders at the behest of a charismatic madman. Harry even compares the cult to Mansons' at one point. The big difference is that Nix really is an Evil Sorcerer with the power to start the apocalypse, not just a hippie with delusions of grandeur.
May December: Gracie sleeping with the thirteen-year-old Joe, bearing his child in prison, and marriage to him in the 90s are strongly inspired by the real life case of Mary Kay Letourneau and her rape and eventual marriage to Vili Fualaau, her sixth-grade student, from the same time period. The line "who [was] the boss, who [was] in charge", said by Gracie when Joe tries to discuss the power imbalance of their relationship for the first time, is even taken directly from an interview with Letourneau and Fualaau.
In My Favorite Year, Peter O'Toole plays washed-up film idol Alan Swann, who is not in any way related to Errol Flynn. He is appearing on the live variety show of King Kaiser, who is totally not Sid Caesar. And Kaiser is being stalked by the goons of a crooked labor leader who is certainly anyone but Jimmy Hoffa. Given that the viewpoint character is partly based on the movie's producer, Mel Brooks, who was a writer for Sid Caesar and who probably witnessed the real-life events that inspired the film, it may not be this so much as Our Lawyers Advised This Trope.
In Nancy Drew, murder victim Dehlia Draycott (Laura Harring) is a blatant expy of Natalie Wood — same kind of movie star career, same birth and death dates, same circumstances of death (found dead in the sea).
In The Palm Beach Story, John D. Hackensacker III is a pretty obvious goof on the Rockefellers.
Quiz Lady: Terry, as the kindly and beloved elderly host of a long-running quiz show who is known for being welcoming to all contestants, brings to mind Alex Trebek and his long tenure hosting ''Jeopardy!.
In The Right Stuff, the lead engineer for NASA and the Soviet "Chief Designer" were both unnamed. These characters represented, respectively, Wernher von Braun and Sergei Korolev. In Korolev's case, this was Truth in Television: his identity was a state secret until his death in 1966. As for von Braun, he was made a celebrity by Walt Disney and his Disneyland series, becoming his go-to guy for anything space-related.
In RocknRolla, there is a Russian millionaire mobster and businessman that is trying to make a huge football stadium. It's a surprise that Roman Abramovich didn't sue them.
Rocky V includes the character of George Washington Duke, who is this to fight promoter Don King (complete with King's catchphrase "Only in America"). Per King's reputation, Duke is portrayed as a sleaze who will exploit fighters for profit however he can while ignoring such trifling matters as health issues, repeatedly trying to coerce Rocky Balboa into a sanctioned match with the current Heavyweight Champion despite Rocky's brain damage problem. This culminates in luring away Rocky's apprentice Tommy Gunn (frustrated with the slow pace of his tutoring) with the promise of vast fame and fortune if he defeats Rocky, to try to force Rocky into a profitable "master vs. apprentice" match.
In the original Rocky, Apollo Creed is obviously based on Muhammad Ali.
In Second Tour, Pierre-Henry Mercier is candidate President of the French Republic. He is quite similar to Emmanuel Macron especially how he appeared in French politics in 2017. He comes from a wealthy family and is new in French politics, unlike usual candidates.
In the football film A Shot at Glory, Rangers manager Martin Smith can be seen as an equivalent to real-life former Gers boss Walter Smith.
In Star Trek: First Contact, there are more than a few similarities between the character of Zefram Cochrane and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry. Both were men who were elevated to near-mythic status posthumously, seen as legends and visionaries with "a dream" — and both were lecherous, with substance abuse problems, and primarily motivated by money (not to mention extremely tall). The filmmakers claim they didn't base Cochrane on Roddenberry, but the similarities are there. One commentary noted that the scene where a star-struck Reg Barclay meets Cochrane was like a star-struck Trek fan meeting Roddenberry. And both, in different senses, created the world of Star Trek.
Zandow the German strong man from The Strong Man surely is not meant in any way to be inspired by Real Life German bodybuilder Eugen Sandow.
In Sunset, the character of Alfie Alperin is very strongly based on Charlie Chaplin. Of course, lawyers for the Chaplin estate probably would have something to say if the movie had Charlie Chaplin commit the acts that Alfie does.
Nigel Tufnel is a loose parody of Eric Clapton, right down to his name. The writers arrived at the name "Nigel Tufnel" by combining a generic British first name ("Nigel" instead of "Eric") with the name of a posh London neighborhood ("Tufnell Park" instead of "Clapton Pond", with the character's name losing one "l"), thus keeping the parallels relatively subtle.
Christopher Guest and Michael McKean note in the Criterion DVD commentary that the archetype of the long-lived British band whose star power has faded, but yet continued to ride their fame and grind out tours year after year, calling out Status Quo in particular, formed much of the inspiration for Spinal Tap.
David St. Hubbins sings lead vocal and plays rhythm guitar. Derek St. Holmes sang lead vocals and played rhythm guitar for Ted Nugent.
The 2007 Transformers film combined this with Invisible President. All we see are a pair of patriotic socks. Based on the Texas accent we hear requesting ding-dongs, it's clearly a joke at the expense of then-President George W. Bush. Interestingly, the sequels name-drop and feature President Obama explicitly and make his administration's poor decision-making in regards to the robot threat a plot point.
The Tremors series features the return of the Assblaster which had been sold to Siegfried and Roy in the third film. Rather embarrassingly, the creators no longer had the rights to use the names and they were referred to as "Sigmund and Ray."
The fourth Bibi & Tina movie features Dirk Trumpf, a sleazy building contractor who convinces von Falkenstein that he needs to build a gigantic wall around his castle (taller than the castle itself!) for protection, including barbed wire. He is later seen stealing von Falkenstein's money and yelling at his workers for working too hard, telling them to only work when somebody is looking.
TunnelVision has Gene Scallion, the film critic on Wake Up America, who appears to be a parody of Gene Shalit if he looked older and didn't have an afro.
Benicio Del Toro said he gets a lot of inspiration from the style of Dustin Hoffman and based his performance as Fenster in The Usual Suspects outright on Hoffman as Mumbles in Dick Tracy.
The bad guys of Venom (2018) and Johnny English Strikes Again are both wealthy techbros with more than a passing similarity to Elon Musk, with the Venom villain having his own private space program and the Johnny English villain running a company called "Volta".
It is generally accepted that Dustin Hoffman's character in Wag the Dog is based on film producer Robert Evans. Hoffman, however, claims that he actually based the portrayal on his own father.
Gordon Gekko from Wall Street is modeled on Ivan Boesky, the corporate takeover artist who, before being convicted of insider trading, gave a commencement speech at the University of California, Berkeley telling business school students, "You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself."
WarGames: Professor Stephen Falken, the programmer of JOSHUA, is similar to Stephen Hawking, complete with having the same first name and bird-related last names, according to Word of God. Hawking is most famous for his disability, as was Falken in an earlier draft until they realized how unfeasible it would be in the massive NORAD set.
Warrior: The film often skirts amusingly close to actual MMA figures without quite hitting them on the nose.
Koba is obviously Fedor Emelianenko with the serial numbers filed off. They are both bald, stoic, tattoo-free, dominant Russian champs who never fought on American soil. Some reviewers mistook the reference for a take on Rocky IV's Ivan Drago.
Brendan's trainer Frank Campana resembles Greg Jackson, both presented as personable top-level trainers with an intellectual approach.
Bryan Callen as a ringside color commentator is an obvious Joe Rogan impersonation. Both are brash comedians with a casual commentating style.
The sponsor of the Sparta tournament is a bald businessman who is always hanging around the press and got rich before getting into the fight game. He's a combination of the casino tycoon Fertitta brothers, who bought the UFC, and the bald UFC president Dana White, an infamous media hound.
One of the secondary characters in Youth is an ex-soccer legend in a decadent state that is easily recognizable as an expy of the Argentinian Diego Armando Maradona as he was in The '90s.
in which every name was changed except, for some reason, Pat Moynihan's
