Curated playlist

Best Actor Academy Award winners

Humphrey BogartHumphrey Bogart's ashes were buried with a small gold whistle from a bracelet he gave Lauren Bacall.
Al PacinoAl Pacino's mother told him poor people don't do acting. He went on to earn nine Oscar nominations.
Matthew McConaugheyMatthew McConaughey, the American actor, won the part that launched his career by walking up to a stranger in a hotel bar. At the time he was a film student at the University of Texas in Austin. He had gone out with his girlfriend to the…
Clark GableA Warner Bros. executive once rejected Clark Gable because his ears were too big. He said Gable looked like an ape.
James StewartJames Stewart gave his Oscar to his father for the shop window.
Marlon BrandoMarlon Brando sold back his Godfather profit points for $100,000, a sum that cost him an estimated $11 million.
Leonardo DiCaprioLeonardo DiCaprio owes his first name to a kick. His pregnant mother felt the baby move while she stood before a Leonardo da Vinci painting in the Uffizi museum in Florence, Italy. That child grew up to be an American actor and film…
William HurtBefore William Hurt became an Oscar winner, he studied theology. He earned that degree at Tufts University in 1972.
Nicolas CageNicolas Cage was 15 years old when he told his uncle, the director Francis Ford Coppola, "I'll show you acting." He wanted a screen test. What he got was silence in the car. His uncle had already directed Marlon Brando, Al Pacino, Gene…
Jack NicholsonJack Nicholson improvised one line in the 1980 horror film The Shining, and it was not in the script.
Robert DuvallRobert Duvall died at his farm in Middleburg, Virginia, on the 15th of February 2026, at the age of 95. His wife, Luciana Pedraza, announced his death in a public statement. He had worked for seven decades, and on screen he rarely seemed…
John WayneJohn Wayne was born Marion Robert Morrison and got his new name from a dog.
Anthony HopkinsAnthony Hopkins once delivered a seven-page courtroom speech in a single take on the set of Steven Spielberg's Amistad. The crew was astonished. Spielberg was so overawed that he could not bring himself to call the actor Tony, and he…
Michael DouglasMichael Douglas won a Best Picture Oscar before he was a star. He produced One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
Tom HanksTom Hanks lost 35 pounds to play a dying lawyer in Philadelphia. He thinned his hair and learned to walk differently.
Bing CrosbyBing Crosby had to re-record "White Christmas" in 1947 because the 1942 master had worn out.
Will SmithWill Smith turned down the lead role in The Matrix to make Wild Wild West. He later called that choice a mistake.
Denzel WashingtonIn 2025, on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the actor Denzel Washington said that the emphasis in his first name belongs on the first syllable. His mother had moved it to the second syllable so that young Denzel would answer to her call and not his…
Laurence OlivierLaurence Olivier's 1948 film Hamlet was the first non-American film to win Best Picture.
Sean PennIn Kyiv in November 2022, Sean Penn handed an Oscar statuette to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy. "This is for you. It's just a symbolic silly thing...When you win, bring it back to Malibu." That was the whole speech. Penn is an…
Michael B. JordanMichael B. Jordan won the Academy Award for Best Actor for Sinners, a 2025 period horror film in which he played twin brothers. The win made him the seventh Black performer in history to take an Oscar in a lead acting category. It is a…
Philip Seymour HoffmanPhilip Seymour Hoffman was an American actor whose career the director Joel Schumacher summed up in 2000 with bad news and good news. Schumacher put it this way: "The bad news is that Philip won't be a $25-million star. The good news is…
Daniel Day-LewisDaniel Day-Lewis collapsed sobbing during a 1989 Hamlet, in the scene where the ghost of Hamlet's father appears.
Joaquin PhoenixJoaquin Phoenix had just flipped his car on a winding canyon road in Hollywood when a voice at the window told him to relax. It was the 26th of January 2006. Gasoline was leaking into the cabin. A shaken Phoenix answered, "I'm fine. I am…
Paul NewmanAt the 1995 24 Hours of Daytona, Paul Newman was 70 years and eight days old, and his team won its class. That made him the oldest driver to date on a winning team in a major sanctioned race. Newman was best known as a film star, and he…
Alec GuinnessAlec Guinness privately called Star Wars "fairy-tale rubbish" in letters to friends.
Cillian MurphyCillian Murphy, the Irish actor and film producer born on the 25th of May 1976, once looked back on a single month as the hinge of his life. That month was August 1996. In 2023 he described the sort of domino effect that a handful of…
Ben KingsleyBen Kingsley turned down an offer to become a pop star in 1966. He auditioned for the Royal Shakespeare Company instead.
Rami MalekRami Malek watched a single concert video, the Live Aid performance of 1985, at least 1,500 times before he played Freddie Mercury. He did it on YouTube, while preparing for a role he would later call precious beyond anything else in his…
Kevin SpaceyLate in the 1995 thriller Se7en, Kevin Spacey walks into the story as the serial killer John Doe, and most of the audience had no idea he was coming. His name was missing from the opening credits. It was missing from the film's…
Brendan FraserIn September 2022, the film The Whale premiered at the Venice International Film Festival, and the audience gave its star, Brendan Fraser, a standing ovation that lasted six minutes. Fraser is an American and Canadian actor, and that night…
Yul BrynnerA few days after Yul Brynner died, a thirty-second warning from him appeared on all the major American television networks and in other countries. The Russian and American actor looked straight into the camera. He said: "Now that I'm gone,…
Gary OldmanGary Oldman needed 200 hours in a makeup chair to become Winston Churchill. The transformation also took 14 pounds of silicone rubber. Then came US$20,000 worth of Cuban cigars, which left the actor with nicotine poisoning. Oldman, an…