How do you decide what to watch these days when you are spoiled for choice? It’s a problem viewers face with the numerous streaming platforms available, and it can be difficult to settle on one film or series. However, audiences find comfort in returning to the tried and true. The same can be said for actors that become favorites and to whom fans stay loyal.
Netflix has realized the value of name recognition in producing programming with familiar faces. There are “veterans” of the streaming platform that appear in two or more Netflix Originals. You definitely won’t find a shortage of programs to catch these stars and feed your obsession (if you can admit to yourself, you have one).
Julia Garner (‘Ozark,’ ‘Inventing Anna,’ ‘Maniac’)
You may know her best from her most recent and memorable role in the series, where she sports a grating accent as the titular and infamous Russian-born German immigrant and swindler, Anna Delvey (Sorkin), in Inventing Anna. Before that, though, Julia Garner won two Primetime Emmy Awards for her masterful and compelling performance as Ruth Langmore, a “top lieutenant” to Jason Bateman’s drug cartel money-launderer protagonist, Marty Byrde, in the ever-popular Netflix Original, Ozark.
Garner’s flair for moving dramatic roles and being the “straight-man” in comedies: she can also be seen in the dark comedy psychological miniseries, Maniac. She appears alongside Emma Stone’s main character, Annie Landsberg, as Annie’s deceased younger sister, Ellie.
Laverne Cox (‘Inventing Anna,’ ‘Orange Is the New Black’)
In both Inventing Anna and Orange Is the New Black, Laverne Cox portrays strong, no-nonsense women who, underneath it, all, have big hearts. In Inventing Anna, she plays a celebrity personal trainer, life coach, and fiercely loyal friend, Kacy Duke, alongside Garner. But her story arc in Orange as Sophia Burset was quite ground-breaking for exploring the transition of a transgender woman who desperately resorts to financial fraud to get life-affirming sex reassignment surgery and the injustices she faces once imprisoned. Cox earned four Emmy Award nominations for her performance as Sophia.
Be sure not to miss Cox in two excellent Netflix documentaries on equal rights and the representation of trans lives in Hollywood: Amend: The Fight for America and Disclosure, respectively.
Jason Bateman (‘Ozark,’ ‘Arrested Development’)
Viewers initially came to know and love Jason Bateman for his comedic role as middle son, Michael Bluth, the strait-laced but hilarious voice of reason in the disgraced Bluth family on the originally FOX-produced, then Netflix Original series, Arrested Development. His playing off of the ensemble cast, which includes another Netflix mainstay, Will Arnett (of Murderville and Bojack Horseman), Michael Cera, Portia de Rossi, Alia Shawkat, Tony Hale, David Cross, Jeffrey Tambor, and the late, great Jessica Walter, is a delight to watch. There is never an opportunity missed for laughs.
Bateman’s role in Ozark is a dramatic departure from his comedy roots but one that has garnered him praise in awards circles, including an Emmy Award win for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series. The thriller sees Bateman play a financial advisor, Martin “Marty” Byrde, who moves to the Missouri Ozarks to launder money for a Mexican drug cartel and protect his family (Laura Linney, Sofia Hublitz, and Skylar Gaertner) from being killed as his former business partners were.
Simone Ashley (‘Bridgerton,' ‘Sex Education’)
For fans of the enemies-to-lovers trope, Bridgerton is the series for you. Season 2 sees Kate Sharma (Simone Ashley) clash with her sister, Edwina’s (Charithra Chandran) suitor, Anthony Bridgerton (Jonathan Bailey), only to eventually fall in love with him herself.
Ashley can also be seen in the British comedy-drama Sex Education as Olivia Hanan, a member of the rich and famous “Untouchables” clique at Moordale Secondary School. Like her classmates, Olivia deals with awkward sexual experiences and learns to become sex-positive with the help of the main character, Otis Milburn (Asa Butterfield).
Noah Centineo (‘To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before’ Franchise, ‘The Perfect Date,’ ‘Sierra Burgess Is a Loser’)
As the teen romance genre staple on Netflix, Noah Centineo is the go-to leading man. In another well-played-out trope of romance, he plays an enamored teen heartthrob who doesn’t realize he is actually in love with the girl who was right in front of him the whole time in Sierra Burgess' Loser and The Perfect Date as Jamey and Brooks Rattigan, respectively.
Centineo’s breakout role is as the love interest of Lara Jean (Lana Condor), Peter, in the universally adored To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before franchise. Oddly enough, he again plays the role of someone unaware that they've caught the romantic attention of another.
Nick Kroll (‘Human Resources’, ‘Big Mouth,’ ‘Oh, Hello on Broadway’)
Comedian Nick Kroll has become a Netflix darling as the voice of many beloved colorful characters in the smash hit “facts of life” animation series, Big Mouth. Its success and popularity have rightfully scored it a spinoff, Human Resources, with new eccentric characters in addition to the old favorite hormone monsters, Maurice “Maury” Beverley (voiced by Kroll) and Constance “Connie” LaCienega (voiced by SNL alum Maya Rudolph).
You can also see Kroll flexing his comedic muscles on stage with the comedy special, Oh, Hello on Broadway, as his geriatric character Gil Faizon, alongside his elderly friend, George St. Geegland (John Mulaney), as well as being featured in an opening sketch for Seth Rogen’s Hilarity for Charity special.
Millie Bobby Brown (‘Stranger Things,’ ‘Enola Holmes’)
At 12 years old, Millie Bobby Brown made her on-screen debut as Eleven in the Duffer brothers’ beloved sci-fi horror drama series, Stranger Things. Brown portrays a little girl with psychokinetic powers who escapes from a laboratory in the 1980s fictional town of Hawkins, Indiana.
Stranger Things’ popularity gained Brown roles in features, including Enola Holmes, as the titular younger and precocious sister of well-known detective, Sherlock Holmes, who joins her brother, Sherlock (Henry Cavill, of Netflix’s The Witcher), and eldest brother, Mycroft (Sam Claflin), in trying to find their missing mother, Eudoria (Helena Bonham Carter).
Ryan Reynolds (‘The Adam Project,’ ‘Red Notice,’ ‘6 Underground’)
With beginnings in comedy, Ryan Reynolds now helms blockbuster action films but still manages to bring humor to his roles. Despite generally not being well-received by critics, Reynolds gives his all for Michael Bay’s 6 Underground as a billionaire, Magnet S. Johnson, aka “One,” who leads a highly skilled team of six other vigilantes that clandestinely take down a ruthless dictator, Rovach Alimov (Lior Raz).
In a more playful role in the comedy action film Red Notice, Reynolds plays an international art thief, Nolan Booth, alongside his main competitor, Sarah “The Bishop” Black (Gal Godot), and FBI Special Agent, John Hartley (Dwayne Johnson), trying to recover stolen and missing bejeweled eggs originally belonging to the Ancient Egyptian queen, Cleopatra. Reynolds also stars in the more recent and heartfelt, The Adam Project, as the titular Adam, who travels back in time to visit his younger self (Walker Scobell), and his parents (Mark Ruffalo and Jennifer Garner) on a mission to save the future.
Adam Sandler (‘Hubie Halloween,’ ‘Uncut Gems,’ ‘Murder Mystery,' ‘The Week Of,’ ‘The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected),’ ‘Sandy Wexler,’ ‘The Do-Over,’ ‘The Ridiculous 6’)
Adam Sandler’s extensive catalog of films on Netflix spans his older comedy classics from the 1990s and 2000s but also more recent comedy ventures, most of which include his old SNL pals and some pretty standard laughs.
But then Sandler throws you a curveball with more meaningful and stunning performances, such as a “fast-talking New York jeweler and gambler” in the Safdie brothers’ Uncut Gems that many have argued should have earned Sandler an Oscar nod, and as Danny, the suffering son of Harold (Dustin Hoffman) who always plays second fiddle, in his dad’s eyes, to his brother, Matthew (Ben Stiller), in Noah Baumbach’s The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected). Don't miss out on exploring Sandler’s perplexing range.