I don't know if it's harder but when you're playing a real person you want to honor their memory - even if they're a criminal or someone that the public loathed. That can be challenging.
I sometimes wonder if the inability to find oneself makes one seek oneself in other people, in characters.
People that have had genuine abduction experiences that I've met that seem very genuine to me, but they're just confused about why it happened. I've met a lot of people like which I regard as being very genuine... but there's a lot of crazy people out there.