Boston Bar Association

Larry DiCara – Nixon Peabody
"Frank Skeffington in The Last Hurrah. The closest I ever came to being Mayor was serving as Acting Mayor during the Blizzard of 78."

Julia Huston – Foley Hoag LLP
"My first acting experience was playing Jezebel in the church pageant when I was 6 or 7 years old.  My Jezebel was portrayed at a high volume and with great enthusiasm!  It would be fun to reenact that role, although of course I would have to compete with Bette Davis."

Alicia Greenaway – Riemer & Braunstein LLP
"I would be Frodo Baggins in the Lord of the Rings.  What is more thrilling than wearing a sparkly necklace holding a magic ring and tramping around Middle Earth slaying evil creatures with your BFF?  Sure beats the drudgery of driving up Route 3A every day."

Harlin Doliner– Verrill Dana, LLP
"I would love to play the Lorax from the classic Dr. Seuss story and movie.  He has a unique, timeless way of getting across the message and ethic of environmental protection to both children and adults.  It would be perhaps also serve as an excuse to once again wear pajamas with feet."

Chris Strang - Desmond, Strang & Scott, LLP
"I would probably go with Ferris Bueller in Ferris Bueller's Day Off. A character who puts all his efforts into having the most fun day possible sounds awesome to me. I also think I could be more convincing in the scene where he pretends to be Abe Froman, Sausage King of Chicago. However, I would struggle to pull off singing "Twist and Shout" on the float. I think that movie is due for a sequel..."

Christine Hughes - Emerson College
How can one resist a role that’s been played by Sarah Berndhart, Flora Robson, Bette Davis, Glenda Jackson, Dame Judi Dench, Cate Blanchett, and Helen Mirren?  Queen Elizabeth I, of course.

J Charles Mokriski - Proskauer
I would have loved to play Thomas More, in Robert Bolt's play turned into an Oscar-winning film starring Paul Scofield, A Man for All Seasons.  Its dialogue is rich with nuggets of wisdom, humor, irony, and inspirational thought, all uttered by Thomas More, lawyer, humanist, King's counselor and Chancellor.  I would love the opportunity to make those lines live on the big screen.

Pattye Comfort - Equal Justice Coalition
"If I could play any character in any movie it would be Karen von Blixen in Out of Africa. Moving to Kenya in the early 20^th century, living in that gorgeous place (“I had a farm in Africa, at the foot of the Ngong Hills”) and managing the coffee business that had been started and then abandoned by her no-good husband - seems to me a great adventure. The added bonus, of course, would be playing opposite Robert Redford!"

Al Wallis - Brown Rudnick Center for the Public Interest
Chili Palmer in Get Shorty. Boldly confident. Uncompromisingly tough. Whip smart. Heart-throbbingly romantic. Cooldefined. Acting this part would be virtually effortless. 

Cameron Casey - Ropes & Gray LLP
"I'd choose Audrey Hepburn’s character in Roman Holiday.  It would be a chance to play a princess and a rebel and to ride around Rome on a Vespa with Gregory Peck - a pretty unbeatable combination"

George Field - Burns & Levinson LLP
"Sir Thomas More (played on stage and screen by the magnificent Paul Scofield) in Fred Zinneman's screen version of Robert Bolt’s play A Man For All Seasons.  More, Chancellor of England, suffers execution rather than subordinate his beliefs, his conscience and the rule of law to the demands of the ambitious and more powerful, including King Henry VIII.  As that story unfolds, he dazzles with his humor, humility, familial devotion and crystalline logic. What lawyer would not thrill to deliver More’s reprimand to the pragmatist Roper, who would “cut down every law in England” to “get after” the Devil:  when “the Devil turned ‘round on you, where would you hide, the laws all being flat?  Do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?  Yes, I’d give the Devil the benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake!”

Geoff Howell - DLA Piper LLP
"It comes down to Han Solo vs. Superman (the 1978 version) for me. Although both have charisma, a sense of humor, and heroic abilities that would be quite useful in every day life, I think Superman gets the edge: the ability to fly circles around the world and reverse time would come in handy in my day job as a lawyer."

Melissa Langa - Bove & Langa, P.C.
"As a firm believer in enjoying the fabulous absurdity of life, I'd play Susan Vance in Bringing Up Baby. To paraphrase Pauline Kael, this classic screwball comedy keeps trifling nonsense in artful balance  -- a useful skill in managing a law firm!"

Orlando Lopez - Burns & Levinson LLP
"If I could play a character in a movie, I would play Hannibal (not Dr. Lecter but the Carthaginian). Anybody that can get elephants by the Pyrenees and the Alps (not quite as hard as getting an elephant through the eye of a needle – a camel may be easier) and then beat the mighty Romans, shows the resolve and strategy that we should strive for in serving our clients or the causes we believe in."

David Goldstone - Goodwin Procter LLP
"No question - Michael J. Fox in Back to the Future"

David Wilson - Hirsch Roberts Weinstein LLP
"Jason Bourne:  He’s so resourceful and his driving skills would come in handy around Boston

Dan Haley - McDermott Will & Emery
"I suppose the safe answer would be Atticus Finch, Jan Schlichtmann, or maybe even Vincent Gambini. But the truth is an excellent Yoda I would make."

Harvey Weiner - Peabody & Arnold LLP
"Aside from playing Atticus Finch, who surely is every lawyer’s first choice, I would most like to play the unflappable and determined Nazi fighter, Victor Laszlo, played by Paul Henreid in the 1942 movie, Casablanca. Respected by Humphrey Bogart, loved by Ingrid Berman, and feared by Conrad Veidt, Victor Laszlo’s vital work was an inspiration to the world and even caused the formerly indifferent Rick to sell his gin joint to join the war effort. Play it again, Netflix!"

Alicia Downey - Bingham McCutchen LLP
"I'd love to be be "Ellen," the mysterious female gunslinger played by Sharon Stone in The Quick and the Dead.  She has a cool Western wardrobe, well-choreographed action scenes, and some great lines. Also starring Gene Hackman, Gary Sinise, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Russell Crowe."

Colin Zick - Foley Hoag LLP
"If I could be a character in a movie, I've want to play Red Sox first/third baseman Kevin Youkilis in the upcoming movie, Moneyball (which is based on the Michael Lewis book).  Then I could be the "Greek God of Walks" and maybe I could also get some inside information on how to help my woeful fantasy baseball teams."

Lee Crews - Duane Morris LLP
"After much consideration, I’ve chosen Dory from Finding Nemo.  She’s completely adorable.  She isn’t afraid of adventure.  She isn’t afraid to trust.  She’s funny as all get out.  And she saves the day, finding Nemo through nothing more, but nothing less, than persistence.  Just keep swimming, just keep swimming."

J. W. Carney, Jr. - Carney & Bassil
"The Clint Eastwood character in the Western Unforgiven. Craggy, complicated, and gets the tough job done."

Joshua Davis - Ogletree, Deakins, Nash, Smoak & Stewart, P.C.
"George Bailey in Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life.  I admire the character's purpose in work (the Building and Loan is a vehicle for justice and opportunity in his small town) and understand his feeling of isolation and hopelessness in the day to day murk of life.  Except for the notion of snow as hopeful (forever ruined for me by this winter), the idea that family and friends are the antidote to the drudgery of life seems exactly right.  In some ways, I feel like I live George's cathartic day again and again.  So, like a good lawyer, I chose a part I am well prepared to play."

Mark Berman - Nixon Peabody
"I think I would want to be John Candy playing 'Barf' the Maug, the half-man, half-dog co-pilot in Space Balls, the Star Wars spoof written and directed by Mel Brooks'.  His intro line was "I'm a Maug,...half man, half dog..I'm my own best friend."

Chinh Pham - Greenberg Traurig, LLP 
"I think it would be lots of fun playing Neo (Mr. Anderson) from the movie The Matrix.  Just imagine, I can fly, stop bullets, or become an expert instantaeously in any area by merely uploading a program.  My kids will get a big kick out of it, as will my technology clients."

Michael Stone - Peabody & Arnold LLP
"One of my partners says that he has reached the age where he is older than all of the Red Sox Players, younger than all of the members of the Supreme Court and will never be on either team. In Field of Dreams, Archibald "Moonlight" Graham(aka "Doc Graham"), got to live out his fantasy of having one major league at bat before returning to life as a small town doctor.  What more could one wish for than to have a rewarding career helping people and also have a lifetime dream realized."

Rochelle Zapol - Behar & Kalman, LLP
"There are so many characters that I would love to play, but if I had to pick one it would be Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind.  It would be a challenge to play such a dramatic role and a character whose personality is so different from my own.  The role also would provide me with the opportunity to display the full range of human emotions in my acting.  Perhaps George Clooney could play Rhett Butler. Well, as Scarlett O’Hara would say, fiddle-dee-dee!"

John Ward - Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics
"I'd play Navy Petty Office Buddusky, Jack Nicholson’s character from the 1973 film, The Last Detail. A bit player in the military justice system, Buddusky nevertheless brings kindness, dignity, and humor to his sad tasks.  Or I’d play inventor Caractacus Potts, Dick Van Dyke’s character in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.  He has a cool flying ride and dates a candy heiress."

Robert Diettrich - Davis, Malm & D'Agostine, P.C.
"Frank Galvin (Paul Newman) in The Verdict.  Because who isn't inspired by watching a lonely, washed up, pathetic, has-been of a lawyer who has lost his handful of trial cases undergo a transformation and fight furiously, against all odds and in the face of a judge's hostility, to help good triumph over evil?  If that role were taken, then I'd want to play Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) in Pirates of the Caribbean, the "ethical pirate" who survives by using wit and negotiation rather than weapons or force, and who's about as ILL as they come."

Michael D'Orsi - Donnelly, Conroy and Gelhaar, LLP
"Chewbacca. Everyone loves a wookie."

Daniel Dain - Brennan, Dain, Le Ray, Wiest, Torpy & Garner
"For sheer fun, fun, it would be hard to beat playing Indiana Jones—great adventures, cool stunts, all the travel, so much history." 

Nicholas O'Donnell – Sullivan & Worcester LLP
"I would play Butch Cassidy, from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid--assuming that everyone would have to forget Paul Newman's performance. The sarcastic but bitterly doomed-from-the-start flight from the unseen pursuers, out in the Western landscape, would be a great deal of fun I think."

Sarah Ashby – Campbell, Campbell Edwards & Conroy, P.C.
"In a bio-pic about the comedian Wendy Liebman, I would want to play Wendy.  Her onstage demeanor is demure and unassuming, but her humor is very sly and smart.  She is just about the funniest person on the planet.  In the movie, I would get to use all her material."