An idea for a halloween party theme recently came to me. But a) halloween is eleven months away, and b) I'm not the type to throw parties, so I'm putting this out there in the hope that someone else can use it.
→[More:]Also, it takes a fair bit of coordination on the part of the guests.
Anyway, I recently heard from an acquaintance that he had been Willy Wonka for halloween--the Johnny Depp version. "Wouldn't it have been great," I said, "if someone else at the same party had been the Gene Wilder version of Willy Wonka?"
Which grew into the theme: a halloween party where the attendees coordinate in twos or threes or so to come as different versions of the same character. Whether portrayed by different actors, or at different times of life, or having undergone a significant character change, or from parallel universes, etc. Here's just a few possibilities:
Caesar Romero's Joker/Jack Nicholson's Joker/Heath Ledger's Joker (really, you can do this for quite a few Batman characters)
Bela Lugosi's Dracula/Gary Oldman's Dracula (and you could even throw in Gary Oldman's creepy old Dracula vs. Gary Oldman's charming young Dracula)
Indiana Jones/Young Indiana Jones
Nerdy comic book geek Hiro Nakamura/Badass future Hiro Nakamura
Gandalf the Grey/Gandalf the White
Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader
Spock/Goateed parallel universe Spock (or any of the pairs from the Star Trek mirror universe)