What actor/actress comes to mind?

[Swithin]

Frances McDormand

Next: Played a U.S. Senator

[Dargo2]

Edmond O'Brien (in 'Seven Days in May')

Next: a devious character subversively amok in the Royal Court

[laffite]

Lawrence Olivier
Richard III

next : favorite English actor primarily known as a comedien(ne)

[j.lunatic]

next : favorite English actor primarily known as a comedien(ne)

Cicely Courtneidge

Next: A remarkably beautiful young actor (specifically male here)

[laffite]

Rupert Sewell in Middlemarch '94

next : a delectable young lady

[Dargo2]

Sue Lyon (well, James Mason once thought so in a certain movie, anyway)

Next: a little bear of a man (hirsute or not)

[j.lunatic]

Next: a little bear of a man (hirsute or not)

Edward G. Robinson (compact and all the the more powerful)

Next: a languid beauty

[laffite]

Greta Garbo

n: a pretentious little snit

[Dargo2]

Clifton Webb

Next: a great drinking buddy

[laffite]

Richard Burton

n ; another great drinking buddy

[Dargo2]

Don DeFore (often played a great drinking buddy, that is)

Next: played a character that weathered rough seas

[laffite]

Charles Laughton

n: actor/actress played a character out of this world (literally)

[KayFrancis]

Michael Rennie

Next: starred in a TV spin off

[laffite]

Valerie Harper

next : another who starred in a TV spin off

[Dargo2]

Bea Arthur ('Maude'...spinoff of 'All in the Family')

Next: British sitcom's premise remade for American television and starring whom (the Yank, that is)