top 25 greatest actors of all time
by samsamso-562-881397 | created - 23 Feb 2013 | updated - 25 Jan 2015 | Publicin order
1. Marlon Brando
Actor | Apocalypse Now
Marlon Brando is widely considered the greatest movie actor of all time, rivaled only by the more theatrically oriented Laurence Olivier in terms of esteem. Unlike Olivier, who preferred the stage to the screen, Brando concentrated his talents on movies after bidding the Broadway stage adieu in ...
naturalism: 10
icon: 10
role transformation: 9
influence: 10
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 10
range: 9
range in movie genre: 10
top 3 performances
1. the godfather: 10
2. streetcar named desire: 10
3. on the waterfront: 9
2. Daniel Day-Lewis
Actor | There Will Be Blood
Born in London, England, Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis is the second child of Cecil Day-Lewis, Poet Laureate of the U.K., and his second wife, actress Jill Balcon. His maternal grandfather was Sir Michael Balcon, an important figure in the history of British cinema and head of the famous Ealing ...
naturalism: 10
icon: 8
role transformation: 10
influence: 7
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 9
range: 10
range in movie genre: 9
top 3 performances
1. there will be blood: 10
2. in the name of the father: 10
3. gangs of new york: 10
3. James Stewart
Actor | Vertigo
James Maitland Stewart was born on May 20, 1908, in Indiana, Pennsylvania, to Elizabeth Ruth (Johnson) and Alexander Maitland Stewart, who owned a hardware store. He was of Scottish, Ulster-Scots, and some English descent. Stewart was educated at a local prep school, Mercersburg Academy, where he ...
naturalism: 10
icon: 10
role transformation: 7
influence: 10
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 10
range: 7
range in movie genre: 8
top 3 performances
1. it's a wonderful life: 10
2. vertigo: 10
3. mr smith goes to washington: 10
4. Laurence Olivier
Actor | Sleuth
Laurence Olivier could speak William Shakespeare's lines as naturally as if he were "actually thinking them", said English playwright Charles Bennett, who met Olivier in 1927. Laurence Kerr Olivier was born in Dorking, Surrey, England, to Agnes Louise (Crookenden) and Gerard Kerr Olivier, a High ...
naturalism: 9
icon: 10
role transformation: 9
influence: 10
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 8
range: 9
range in genre: 8
top 3 performances
1. rebecca: 9
2. marathon man: 8
3. spartacus: 8
5. Robert De Niro
Actor | Cape Fear
One of the greatest actors of all time, Robert De Niro was born on August 17, 1943 in Manhattan, New York City, to artists Virginia (Admiral) and Robert De Niro Sr. His paternal grandfather was of Italian descent, and his other ancestry is Irish, English, Dutch, German, and French. He was trained ...
naturalism: 10
icon: 9
role transformation: 10
influence: 9
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 9
range: 9
range in movie genre: 10
top 3 performances
1. raging bull: 10
2. king of comedy: 10
3. taxi driver: 9
6. Jack Nicholson
Actor | Chinatown
Jack Nicholson, an American actor, producer, director and screenwriter, is a three-time Academy Award winner and twelve-time nominee. Nicholson is also notable for being one of two actors - the other being Michael Caine - who have received an Oscar nomination in every decade from the '60s through ...
naturalism: 9
icon: 10
role transformation: 8
influence: 8
acting talent: 9
emotional effect on the audience: 10
range: 8
range in genre: 10
top 3 performances
1. one flew over the cuckoo's nest: 10
2. the shining: 9
3. as good as it gets: 9
7. Al Pacino
Actor | Serpico
Alfredo James "Al" 'Pacino established himself as a film actor during one of cinema's most vibrant decades, the 1970s, and has become an enduring and iconic figure in the world of American movies.
He was born April 25, 1940 in Manhattan, New York City, to Italian-American parents, Rose (nee Gerardi)...
naturalism: 10
icon: 10
role transformation: 8
influence: 10
acting talent: 9
emotional effect on the audience: 9
range: 8
range in movie genre: 9
top 3 performances
1. the godfather part 2: 10
2. scarface: 9
3. dog day afternoon: 9
8. Humphrey Bogart
Actor | Casablanca
Humphrey DeForest Bogart was born in New York City, New York, to Maud Humphrey, a famed magazine illustrator and suffragette, and Belmont DeForest Bogart, a moderately wealthy surgeon (who was secretly addicted to opium). Bogart was educated at Trinity School, NYC, and was sent to Phillips Academy ...
naturalism: 10
icon: 9
role transformation: 8
influence: 9
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 8
range: 8
range in genre: 9
top 3 performances
1. Treasure of the Sierra Madre: 10
2. Casablanca: 10
3. African Queen: 9
9. Dustin Hoffman
Actor | Tootsie
Dustin Lee Hoffman was born in Los Angeles, California, to Lillian (Gold) and Harry Hoffman, who was a furniture salesman and prop supervisor for Columbia Pictures. He was raised in a Jewish family (from Ukraine, Russia-Poland, and Romania). Hoffman graduated from Los Angeles High School in 1955, ...
naturalism: 9
icon: 9
role transformation: 9
influence: 9
acting talent: 9
emotional effect on the audience: 10
range: 8
range in genre: 9
top 3 performances
1. the graduate: 9
2. rain man: 8
3. marathon man: 8
10. Alec Guinness
Actor | Star Wars
Alec Guinness was an English actor. He is known for his six collaborations with David Lean: Herbert Pocket in Great Expectations (1946), Fagin in Oliver Twist (1948), Col. Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor), Prince Faisal in Lawrence...
naturalism: 10
icon: 8
role transformation: 8
influence: 9
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 10
range: 10
range in genre: 8
top 3 performances
1. bridge on the river kwai: 10
2. kind hearts and coronets: 10
3. star wars: 10
11. Anthony Hopkins
Actor | The Silence of the Lambs
Anthony Hopkins was born on December 31, 1937, in Margam, Wales, to Muriel Anne (Yeats) and Richard Arthur Hopkins, a baker. His parents were both of half Welsh and half English descent. Influenced by Richard Burton, he decided to study at College of Music and Drama and graduated in 1957. In 1965, ...
naturalism: 9
icon: 9
role transformation: 9
influence: 8
acting talent: 8
emotional effect on the audience: 8
range: 9
range in genre: 9
top 3 performances
1. silence of the lambs: 10
2. the elephant man: 9
3. the remains of the day: 8
12. Tom Hanks
Producer | Cast Away
Thomas Jeffrey Hanks was born in Concord, California, to Janet Marylyn (Frager), a hospital worker, and Amos Mefford Hanks, an itinerant cook. His mother's family, originally surnamed "Fraga", was entirely Portuguese, while his father was of mostly English ancestry. Tom grew up in what he has ...
naturalism: 10
icon: 9
role transformation: 9
influence: 8
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 10
range: 8
range in genre: 10
top 3 performances
1. forrest gump: 10
2. cast away: 10
3. saving private ryan: 9
13. Johnny Depp
Actor | Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
John Christopher "Johnny" Depp II was born on June 9, 1963 in Owensboro, Kentucky, to Betty Sue Palmer (née Wells), a waitress, and John Christopher Depp, a civil engineer. He was raised in Florida. He dropped out of school when he was 15, and fronted a series of music-garage bands, including one ...
naturalism: 9
icon: 10
role transformation: 10
influence: 9
acting talent: 10
emotional effect on the audience: 8
range: 10
range in genre: 8
top 3 performances
pirates of the carribbean: 10
ed wood: 9
finding neverland: 8
14. Henry Fonda
Actor | 12 Angry Men
This remarkable, soft-spoken American began in films as a diffident juvenile. With passing years, he matured into a star character actor who exemplified not only integrity and strength, but an ideal of the common man fighting against social injustice and oppression. He was born in Grand Island, ...
15. Kevin Spacey
Actor | The Usual Suspects
Kevin Spacey Fowler, better known by his stage name Kevin Spacey, is an American actor of screen and stage, film director, producer, screenwriter and singer. He began his career as a stage actor during the 1980s before obtaining supporting roles in film and television. He gained critical acclaim in...
16. Ralph Fiennes
Actor | The Constant Gardener
Actor Ralph Nathaniel Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes was born on December 22, 1962 in Suffolk, England, to Jennifer Anne Mary Alleyne (Lash), a novelist, and Mark Fiennes, a photographer. He is the eldest of six children. Four of his siblings are also in the arts: Martha Fiennes, a director; Magnus ...
17. George C. Scott
Actor | Patton
George C. Scott was an immensely talented actor, a star of the big screen, stage and television. He was born on October 18, 1927 in Wise, Virginia, to Helena Agnes (Slemp) and George Dewey Scott. At the age of eight, his mother died, and his father, an executive at Buick, raised him. In 1945, he ...
18. Christian Bale
Actor | The Dark Knight
Christian Charles Philip Bale was born in Pembrokeshire, Wales, UK on January 30, 1974, to English parents Jennifer "Jenny" (James) and David Bale. His mother was a circus performer and his father, who was born in South Africa, was a commercial pilot. The family lived in different countries ...
19. Jack Lemmon
Actor | The Apartment
Jack Lemmon was born in Newton, Massachusetts, to Mildred Lankford Noel and John Uhler Lemmon, Jr., the president of a doughnut company. His ancestry included Irish (from his paternal grandmother) and English. Jack attended Ward Elementary near his Newton, MA home. At age 9 he was sent to Rivers ...
20. Cary Grant
Actor | North by Northwest
Once told by an interviewer, "Everybody would like to be Cary Grant", Grant is said to have replied, "So would I."
Cary Grant was born Archibald Alec Leach on January 18, 1904 in Horfield, Bristol, England, to Elsie Maria (Kingdon) and Elias James Leach, who worked in a factory. His early years in ...
21. Robert Duvall
Actor | The Apostle
Veteran actor and director Robert Selden Duvall was born on January 5, 1931, in San Diego, CA, to Mildred Virginia (Hart), an amateur actress, and William Howard Duvall, a career military officer who later became an admiral. Duvall majored in drama at Principia College (Elsah, IL), then served a ...
22. Gene Hackman
Actor | The French Connection
Eugene Allen Hackman was born in San Bernardino, California, the son of Anna Lyda Elizabeth (Gray) and Eugene Ezra Hackman, who operated a newspaper printing press. He is of Pennsylvania Dutch (German), English, and Scottish ancestry, partly by way of Canada, where his mother was born. After ...
23. Orson Welles
Actor | Citizen Kane
His father, Richard Head Welles, was a well-to-do inventor, his mother, Beatrice (Ives) Welles, a beautiful concert pianist; Orson Welles was gifted in many arts (magic, piano, painting) as a child. When his mother died in 1924 (when he was nine) he traveled the world with his father. He was ...
24. Ben Kingsley
Actor | Sexy Beast
Ben Kingsley was born Krishna Bhanji on December 31, 1943 in Scarborough, Yorkshire, England. His father, Rahimtulla Harji Bhanji, was a Kenyan-born medical doctor, of Gujarati Indian descent, and his mother, Anna Lyna Mary (Goodman), was an English actress. Ben began to act in stage plays during ...
25. Kirk Douglas
Actor | The Final Countdown
Cleft-chinned, steely-eyed and virile star of international cinema who rose from being "the ragman's son" (the name of his best-selling 1988 autobiography) to become a bona fide superstar, Kirk Douglas, also known as Issur Danielovitch Demsky, was born on December 9, 1916 in Amsterdam, New York. ...
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