Christopher Walken performs for his young neighbors at his home in Bayside, Queens. (1955)
Just when you thought you’d seen Christopher Walken at his creepiest, here he is as a clown to fuel your coulrophobia (it means fear of clowns). He’s only 12 years old in this shot, decades away from his chilling performances in The Deer Hunter, A View to a Kill, King of New York and Pulp Fiction, but he’s clearly already been bitten by the showbiz bug. Walken — known by his given name “Ronnie,” during his early career — would get his start acting on stage and TV and doing quite a bit of song-and-dance in New York’s nightclubs and cabarets. This would explain the bizarre dancing Walken you may have witnessed on Saturday Night Live, or in the video for “Weapon of Choice” by Fatboy Slim.