4. Ray Romano
Huh? What? Sorry, I fell asleep. Why? Because I got to this section on Ray Romano and the sheer thought of writing words about him put me into a coma. You'll know him from the sarcastically-titled
Everybody Loves Raymond, of course, a sitcom vehicle that made way for the actor's, uh, dry and... um, dry... routine. That show was a huge success, of course, despite the placement of Romano right smack bang in the middle of proceedings, though he merely served as a kind of reactionary vessel for the show's other, more interesting characters. And part of the reason the show still got laughs was because it was genuinely hilarious to watch Ray's family stomping all over him. He just sat back and let it happen in a kind of vacant stupor. Ray Romano hasn't done much else since to help establish himself as a person of funny measures, save for voicing an equally dull and shrug-inducing mammoth in the
Ice Age film series, and starring in a TV show about
Men of a Certain Age, one that made the mistake of putting Romano front and centre without an interesting supporting cast to say things at him. It's perfectly possible that Romano is a great guy and amuses his friends at parties and stuff with his dry comments about the catering, but did he get lucky with this comedy career? Undoubtably so.