The Best Actor 1960

1. Jean-Paul Belmondo

The son of the renowned French sculptor Paul Belmondo, he studied at Conservatoire National Superieur d'Art Dramatique (CNSAD); after the minor stage performances he made his screen debut in À pied, à cheval et en voiture (1957) but the episodes with his participation were cut before ...

3038 points

2. John Gavin

Actor | Psycho

John Gavin, the American film and TV actor, businessman and diplomat who was Ronald Reagan's first Ambassador to Mexico, was born Juan Vincent Apablasa in Los Angeles, California.

The future "Jack" Gavin was a fifth-generation Angeleno, the son of Delia Diana Pablos and Juan Vincent Apablasa, and ...

2372 points

3. Marcello Mastroianni

Actor | La dolce vita

Marcello Mastroianni was born in Fontana Liri, Italy in 1924, but soon his family moved to Turin and then Rome. During WW2 he was sent to a German prison camp, but he managed to escape and hide in Venice. He debuted in films as an extra in Marionette (1939), then started working for the Italian ...

2332 points

4. Chishû Ryû

Actor | Tôkyô monogatari

What an amazing career! Few can boast a longer one (64 years of activity). Few have been able to have to relate to three generations. And it is pretty sure that no one can compare with him in terms of faithfulness to a director: Chishu Ryu indeed appeared in no fewer than fifty-two out of ...

1716 points

5. Masayuki Mori

Actor | Rashômon

Masayuki Mori was born on January 13, 1911 in Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan. He was an actor, known for Rashomon (1950), The Bad Sleep Well (1960) and The Idiot (1951). He died on October 7, 1973.

1658 points

6. Alain Delon

Actor | Le samouraï

Alain Fabien Maurice Marcel Delon was born in Sceaux, Hauts-de-Seine, France, to Édith (Arnold) and Fabien Delon. His father was of French and Corsican Italian descent, and his mother was of French and German ancestry. His parents divorced early on, and Delon had a stormy childhood, being ...

1621 points

7. Pierre Brasseur

Actor | Les yeux sans visage

Pierre Brasseur was born on December 22, 1905 in Paris, France. He was an actor and writer, known for Eyes Without a Face (1960), Children of Paradise (1945) and Gates of the Night (1946). He was married to Lina Magrini and Odette Joyeux. He died on August 14, 1972 in Bruneck, Trentino-Alto Adige, ...

1519 points

8. Woody Strode

Actor | Spartacus

An athlete turned actor, Strode was a top-notch decathlete and a football star at UCLA. He became part of Hollywood lore after meeting director John Ford and becoming a part of the Ford "family," appearing in four Ford motion pictures. Strode also played the powerful gladiator who does battle with ...

1492 points

9. Gabriele Ferzetti

Actor | C'era una volta il West

Elegant, urbane and well-spoken, Gabriele Ferzetti was one of Italy's most prominent international stars of the 1950's and 60's. His passion for the stage had begun with performing in university plays. This paved the way to a scholarship at the Rome Academy of Dramatic Art (Accademia d'arte ...

1489 points

10. Burt Lancaster

Actor | From Here to Eternity

Burt Lancaster, one of five children, was born in Manhattan, to Elizabeth (Roberts) and James Henry Lancaster, a postal worker. All his grandparents were immigrants from the north of Ireland. He was a tough street kid who took an early interest in gymnastics. He joined the circus as an acrobat and ...

1479 points

11. Nigel Patrick

Actor | Raintree County

This droll, urbane, dry-witted gent was born Nigel Dennis Patrick Wemyss-Gorman in London on May 2, 1912. Coming from a family of actors, his parents were actors Charles Wemyss and Dorothy Turner.

Nigel made his stage debut in the 1932 play "The Life Machine" and continued on the stock and repertory...

1473 points

12. Tony Curtis

Actor | Some Like It Hot

Tony Curtis was born Bernard Schwartz, the eldest of three children of Helen (Klein) and Emanuel Schwartz, Jewish immigrants from Hungary. Curtis himself admits that while he had almost no formal education, he was a student of the "school of hard knocks" and learned from a young age that the only ...

1471 points

13. 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 ...

1465 points

14. Richard Attenborough

Actor | Jurassic Park

Richard Attenborough, Baron Attenborough of Richmond-upon-Thames, was born in Cambridge, England, the son of Mary (née Clegg), a founding member of the Marriage Guidance Council, and Frederick Levi Attenborough, a scholar and academic administrator who was a don at Emmanuel College and wrote a ...

1442 points

15. Roger Livesey

Actor | The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

The son of Joseph Livesey and Mary Catherine (nee Edwards), Roger was educated at Westminster City School, London. His first stage appearance was the office boy in Loyalties at St. James' theatre in 1917. Subsequently, he played in everything from Shakespeare to modern comedies. He played various ...

1441 points

16. Anthony Perkins

Actor | Psycho

Anthony Perkins was born April 4, 1932 in New York City, to Janet Esselstyn (Rane) and Osgood Perkins, an actor of both stage and film. His father died when he was five. Anthony's paternal great-grandfather was engraver Andrew Varick Stout Anthony. Perkins attended the Brooks School, the Browne & ...

892 points

17. Shin Saburi

Actor | Shikkô yûyo

Shin Saburi was born on February 12, 1909 in Hokkaido, Japan. He was an actor and director, known for Shikkô yûyo (1950), The Fossil (1974) and The Flavor of Green Tea Over Rice (1952). He died on September 22, 1982 in Japan.

869 points

18. 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 ...

868 points

19. Fred MacMurray

Actor | Double Indemnity

Fred MacMurray was likely the most underrated actor of his generation. True, his earliest work is mostly dismissed as pedestrian, but no other actor working in the 1940s and 50s was able to score so supremely whenever cast against type.

Frederick Martin MacMurray was born in Kankakee, Illinois, to ...

868 points

20. Renato Salvatori

Actor | Z

Renato Salvatori was born on March 20, 1933 in Seravezza, Tuscany, Italy. He was an actor, known for Z (1969), Rocco and His Brothers (1960) and The Organizer (1963). He was married to Annie Girardot. He died on March 27, 1988 in Rome, Lazio, Italy.

868 points

21. Toshirô Mifune

Actor | Yôjinbô

Toshiro Mifune achieved more worldwide fame than any other Japanese actor of his century. He was born in Tsingtao, China, to Japanese parents and grew up in Dalian. He did not set foot in Japan until he was 21. His father was an importer and a commercial photographer, and young Toshiro worked in ...

847 points

22. Takashi Shimura

Actor | Shichinin no samurai

Japanese character actor Takashi Shimura was one of the finest film actors of the 20th century and a leading member of the "stock company" of master director Akira Kurosawa. A native of southern Japan, Shimura was a descendant of the samurai warrior class. Following university training, he founded ...

847 points

23. Max von Sydow

Actor | Flash Gordon

Max von Sydow was born Carl Adolf von Sydow on April 10, 1929 in Lund, Skåne, Sweden, to a middle-class family. He was the son of Baroness Maria Margareta (Rappe), a teacher, and Carl Wilhelm von Sydow, an ethnologist and folklore professor. His surname traces back to his partial German ancestry.

...

836 points

24. Spencer Tracy

Actor | Judgment at Nuremberg

Spencer Tracy was the second son born on April 5, 1900, to truck salesman John Edward and Caroline Brown Tracy in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. While attending Marquette Academy, he and classmate Pat O'Brien quit school to enlist in the Navy at the start of World War I. Tracy was still at Norfolk Navy Yard...

833 points

25. Fredric March

Actor | Inherit the Wind

Fredric March began a career in banking but in 1920 found himself cast as an extra in films being produced in New York. He starred on the Broadway stage first in 1926 and would return there between screen appearances later on. He won plaudits (and an Academy Award nomination) for his send-up of ...

833 points

26. Gene Kelly

Soundtrack | Singin' in the Rain

Eugene Curran Kelly was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the third son of Harriet Catherine (Curran) and James Patrick Joseph Kelly, a phonograph salesman. His father was of Irish descent and his mother was of Irish and German ancestry.

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was the largest and most powerful studio in...

833 points

27. Arturo de Córdova

Actor | En la palma de tu mano

Entering the Mexican film industry in the 1930s, it didn't take Arturo de Córdova long to become a major star, specializing in action and adventure films. At the height of his popularity he was beckoned to Hollywood in an attempt to make him a "Latin lover" type in the mold of Ricardo Montalban, ...

818 points

28. Raf Vallone

Actor | The Italian Job

Raf Vallone was an internationally acclaimed Italian movie star known for his rugged good looks. The athletic Vallone, a former soccer player who often was compared to Burt Lancaster, was born Raffaele Vallone in 1916 in Tropea in Calabria, Italy, the son of a prominent lawyer and his aristocratic ...

813 points

29. Innokentiy Smoktunovskiy

Actor | Gamlet

Innokenti Smoktunovsky (birth name Smoktunovich) was born in Siberian village of Tatianovka near Tomsk in 1925. There were some speculations that his ancestors were of Polish nobility or of Jewish ethnicity and that they were exiled to Siberia for participating in the January Uprising of 1863. But,...

813 points

30. Tatsuya Nakadai

Actor | Seppuku

Japanese leading man, an important star and one of the handful of Japanese actors well known outside Japan. Nakadai was a tall handsome clerk in a Tokyo shop when director Masaki Kobayashi encountered him and cast him in The Thick-Walled Room (1956). Nakadai was subsequently cast in the lead role in...

811 points

31. Montgomery Clift

Actor | From Here to Eternity

Edward Montgomery Clift (nicknamed 'Monty' his entire life) was born on October 17, 1920 in Omaha, Nebraska, just after his twin sister Roberta (1920-2014) and eighteen months after his brother Brooks Clift. He was the son of Ethel "Sunny" Anderson (Fogg; 1888-1988) and William Brooks Clift (1886-...

806 points

32. Aleksey Batalov

Actor | Dama s sobachkoy

Aleksei Vladimirovich Batalov was born on November 20, 1928, into the family of famous Russian theatrical actor Vladimir Batalov. He was born in the city of Vladimir, near Moscow, where his grandmother was the Doctor General at the Vladimir city hospital. His parents, Vladimir Petrovich Batalov and...

803 points

33. Bogumil Kobiela

Actor | Lalka

Bogumil Kobiela was born on May 31, 1931 in Katowice, Slaskie, Poland. He was an actor and writer, known for Lalka (1968), Goodbye, See You Tomorrow (1960) and Przeprowadzka (1982). He was married to Malgorzata Nowakowska. He died on July 10, 1969 in Gdansk, Pomorskie, Poland.

795 points

34. Charles Aznavour

Actor | Tirez sur le pianiste

Beloved French chanson entertainer Charles Aznavour, who wrote more than 800 songs, recorded more than 1,000 of them in French, English, Italian, German and Spanish and sold over 100 million records in all, was born Shahnour Vaghinag Aznavourian on May 22, 1924, in Paris, the younger of two ...

792 points

35. Götz George

Actor | Der Totmacher

Götz George, born in Berlin in 1938, is the son of the famous actor Heinrich George and his wife, the actress Berta Drews. After first appearances on the stage of Berlin's Hebbel Theater during his childhood, Götz George was trained as an actor by the recognized teacher Else Bongers. At the age of ...

791 points

36. Ignacio López Tarso

Actor | Macario

Ignacio López Tarso was born on January 15, 1925 in Mexico, Distrito Federal, Mexico. He was an actor, known for Macario (1960), El Pantera (2007) and Rosa blanca (1961). He was married to Clara Aranda. He died on March 11, 2023 in Mexico City, Mexico.

788 points

37. Frantisek Smolík

Actor | Vstanou noví bojovníci

Frantisek Smolík was born on January 23, 1891 in Prague, Bohemia, Austria-Hungary [now Czech Republic]. He was an actor and writer, known for Vstanou noví bojovníci (1951), Batalión (1937) and Babicka (1922). He was married to Milada Smolíková. He died on January 26, 1972 in ...

783 points

38. Laurent Terzieff

Actor | Tu ne tueras point

Laurent Terzieff was born on June 27, 1935 in Toulouse, Haute-Garonne, France. He was an actor, known for Thou Shalt Not Kill (1961), Germinal (1993) and The Big Night (1959). He died on July 2, 2010 in Paris, France.

778 points

39. Arthur Kennedy

Actor | Lawrence of Arabia

Arthur Kennedy, one of the premier character actors in American film from the late 1940s through the early 1960s, achieved fame in the role of Biff in Elia Kazan's historic production of Arthur Miller's Pultizer-Prize winning play "Death of a Salesman." Although he was not selected to recreate the ...

778 points

40. Giorgos Foundas

Actor | Pyretos stin asfalto

Giorgos Foundas was born in 1924 in Parnassida, Greece. He was an actor and producer, known for The Asphalt Fever (1967), Me ti lampsi sta matia (1966) and The Shepherdess' Lover (1955). He died on November 28, 2010 in Athens, Greece.

773 points

41. Tadeusz Lomnicki

Actor | Pan Wolodyjowski

Tadeusz Lomnicki began his education in the theatre arts in 1945 when he enrolled in the Theatre Studio at the Stary Teatr in Krakow. In 1946 he spent a season at the Teatr Slaski in Katowice. He returned to Krakow in 1947, appearing on stage at both the Teatr im. Juliusza Slowackiego and the Stary...

773 points

42. Paul Meurisse

Actor | Les diaboliques

Paul Meurisse was the son of a bank manager and it first looked as if he would follow in his father's footsteps when he became a solicitor's clerk in Aix-en-Provence. But his passion was elsewhere and he soon did the splits appearing as a chorus boy in music-hall revues. Leaving Aix for Paris, with...

768 points

43. Charles Vanel

Actor | Le salaire de la peur

Charles Vanel was a French actor. His film career lasted for 76 years, from 1912 to 1988. He appeared in over 200 films.

Vanel often worked under famous directors, such as Luis Buñuel, Henri-Georges Clouzot, Jacques Feyder, and Alfred Hitchcock. A career highlight was his role as truck driver Jo in ...

768 points

44. Sami Frey

Actor | Bande à part

Sami Frey was born on October 13, 1937 in Paris, France. He is an actor and director, known for Band of Outsiders (1964), En compagnie d'Antonin Artaud (1993) and Black Widow (1987).

768 points

45. 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. ...

763 points

46. Charles Laughton

Actor | Witness for the Prosecution

Charles Laughton was born in Scarborough, Yorkshire, England, to Eliza (Conlon) and Robert Laughton, hotel keepers of Irish and English descent, respectively. He was educated at Stonyhurst (a highly esteemed Jesuit college in England) and at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (received gold medal). ...

763 points

47. Peter Ustinov

Actor | Spartacus

Peter Ustinov was a two-time Academy Award-winning film actor, director, writer, journalist and raconteur. He wrote and directed many acclaimed stage plays and led numerous international theatrical productions.

He was born Peter Alexander Freiherr von Ustinow on April 16, 1921 in Swiss Cottage, ...

763 points

48. John Ireland

Actor | All the King's Men

Born in Canada, John Ireland was raised in New York. Performing as a swimmer in a water carnival, he moved into the legitimate theater, often appearing in minor roles in Broadway plays. His first big break in pictures came in 1945 when he appeared as Windy the introspective letter-writing G.I. in ...

763 points

49. Herbert Lom

Actor | The Pink Panther Strikes Again

Herbert Lom was born on September 11, 1917 as Herbert Charles Angelo Kuchacevich ze Schluderpacheru into an aristocratic family living in genteel poverty. His incredibly long surnames led him to select the shortest surname he could find extant ("Lom") and adopt it as his own, professionally. He ...

763 points

50. Soumitra Chatterjee

Actor | Apur Sansar

Soumitra Chatterjee is an Indian actor, playwright and poet. World-renowned film director Satyajit Ray has acted in multiple shadow films. He has made Bengali film a place in the court of the world. In his long acting career, he has received many awards from home and abroad. His films have also won...

760 points

51. Totò

Actor | Guardie e ladri

'Antonio Griffo Focas Flavio Angelo Ducas Comneno Porfirogenito Gagliardi De Curtis di Bisanzio' was a descendant of the 'Comneno di Bizanzio' and also one of the most popular Italian film stars in history. His genre was undoubtedly the comedy where he achieved world fame. From 1917 he was an actor...

757 points

52. Ben Gazzara

Actor | Road House

Ben Gazzara's screen career began with two critically acclaimed roles as heavies in the late 1950s. He turned to television in the 1960s but made a big screen comeback with roles in three John Cassavetes films in the 1970s. The 1980s and 1990s saw Gazzara work more frequently than ever before in ...

757 points

53. Maurice Ronet

Actor | Ascenseur pour l'échafaud

Maurice Ronet was born on April 13, 1927 in Nice, Alpes-Maritimes, France. He was an actor and writer, known for Elevator to the Gallows (1958), The Fire Within (1963) and Purple Noon (1960). He was married to Maria Pacôme. He died on March 14, 1983 in Paris, France.

753 points

54. Emil Karewicz

Actor | Cien

Emil Karewicz was born on March 13, 1923 in Wilno, Wilenskie, Poland [now Vilnius, Lithuania]. He was an actor, known for Cien (1956), Lalka (1978) and Der ungebetene Gast (1981). He was married to Delfina, Ewa and Teresa. He died on March 18, 2020 in Poland.

748 points

55. Leon Niemczyk

Actor | Nóz w wodzie

Leon Niemczyk was born on December 15, 1923 in Warsaw, Mazowieckie, Poland. He was an actor, known for Knife in the Water (1962), Inland Empire (2006) and Das unsichtbare Visier (1973). He was married to Diana, Krystyna, Dorit, Jadwiga and Tatiana Zuanar. He died on November 29, 2006 in Lódz, ...

748 points

56. 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 ...

743 points

57. Robert Mitchum

Actor | Out of the Past

Robert Mitchum was an underrated American leading man of enormous ability, who sublimated his talents beneath an air of disinterest. He was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, to Ann Harriet (Gunderson), a Norwegian immigrant, and James Thomas Mitchum, a shipyard/railroad worker. His father died in a ...

740 points

58. George Peppard

Actor | Breakfast at Tiffany's

Handsome and elegant George Peppard occasionally displayed considerable talent through his career, whether action roles or dramatic. Following Broadway and television experience, he made a strong film debut in The Strange One (1957). He started getting noticed when he played Robert Mitchum's ...

740 points

59. George Hamilton

Actor | Zorro: The Gay Blade

Noted these days for his dashing, sporting, jet-setting playboy image and perpetually bronzed skin tones in commercials, film spoofs and reality shows, George Hamilton was, at the onset, a serious contender for dramatic film stardom. Born George Stevens Hamilton in Memphis, TN, on August 12, 1939, ...

740 points

60. Jack Hawkins

Actor | Ben-Hur

In Britain, special Christmas plays called pantomimes are produced for children. Jack Hawkins made his London theatrical debut at age 12, playing the elf king in "Where The Rainbow Ends". At 17, he got the lead role of St. George in the same play. At 18, he made his debut on Broadway in "Journey's ...

739 points

61. Yul Brynner

Actor | The King and I

Exotic leading man of American films, famed as much for his completely bald head as for his performances, Yul Brynner masked much of his life in mystery and outright lies designed to tease people he considered gullible. It was not until the publication of the books "Yul: The Man Who Would Be King" ...

737 points

62. Steve McQueen

Actor | The Great Escape

He was the ultra-cool male film star of the 1960s, and rose from a troubled youth spent in reform schools to being the world's most popular actor. Over 40 years after his untimely death from mesothelioma in 1980, Steve McQueen is still considered hip and cool, and he endures as an icon of popular ...

737 points

63. Charles Bronson

Actor | Death Wish

The archetypal screen tough guy with weatherbeaten features--one film critic described his rugged looks as "a Clark Gable who had been left out in the sun too long"--Charles Bronson was born Charles Buchinsky, one of 15 children of struggling parents in Pennsylvania. His mother, Mary (Valinsky), ...

737 points

64. Eli Wallach

Actor | Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo

One of Hollywood's finest character / "Method" actors, Eli Wallach was in demand for over 60 years (first film/TV role was 1949) on stage and screen, and has worked alongside the world's biggest stars, including Clark Gable, Clint Eastwood, Steve McQueen, Marilyn Monroe, Yul Brynner, Peter O'Toole,...

737 points

65. Horst Buchholz

Actor | La vita è bella

On the cast list of The Magnificent Seven (1960), you will find several names that doubtless you know well: Charles Bronson, Steve McQueen, and Yul Brynner. But there is one name that you will have difficulty pronouncing, let alone identifying as an actor you have seen before. That man is Horst ...

737 points

66. Robert Vaughn

Actor | The Magnificent Seven

Robert Francis Vaughn was born on November 22, 1932 at Charity Hospital in New York City, the son of show business parents, Marcella Frances (Gaudel) and Gerald Walter Vaughn. His father was a radio actor and his mother starred on stage. Robert came to the public's attention first with his ...

737 points

67. James Coburn

Actor | The Great Escape

Lanky, charismatic and versatile actor with an amazing grin that put everyone at ease, James Coburn studied acting at UCLA, and then moved to New York to study under noted acting coach Stella Adler. After being noticed in several stage productions, Coburn appeared in a handful of minor westerns ...

737 points

68. Peter Finch

Actor | Network

Despite being one of the finest actors of his generation, Peter Finch will be remembered as much for his reputation as a hard-drinking, hell-raising womanizer as for his performances on the screen. He was born in London in 1916 and went to live in Sydney, Australia, at the age of ten. There, he ...

734 points

69. James Mason

Actor | Lolita

James Mason was born in Huddersfield and had a film career spanning over 50 years during which he appeared in over 100 films in England and America but never won an Oscar. Whatever role he played, from the wounded Belfast gunman in Odd Man Out to Rommel in The Desert Fox, his creamy velvet voice ...

734 points

70. Zachary Scott

Actor | Mildred Pierce

American leading man of suave or sinister roles. A collateral relative of George Washington and William Barclay 'Bat' Masterson, Scott was the son of a wealthy surgeon. Intending to follow his father into medicine, Scott studied at the University of Texas, but found he preferred the theater. He ...

734 points

71. Lino Ventura

Actor | Ascenseur pour l'échafaud

One of France's most beloved character stars from the 1950s through and including the 1980s was the Italian-born Lino Ventura. Born Angiolino Joseph Pascal Ventura to Giovanni Ventura and Luisa Borrini, on July 14, 1919, in Parma (northern) Italy, young Lino moved with his family at a young age to ...

731 points

72. Marcel Dalio

Actor | Sabrina

Sunday, November the 20th is the anniversary of Marcel Dalio's death in 1983. It was the end of a serendipitous life. You know him. He was a citizen of the world. Born Israel Moshe Blauschild, in Paris, in 1900, he became a much sought-after character actor. His lovely animated face with its great ...

731 points

73. Jeffrey Hunter

Actor | The Searchers

Jeffrey Hunter was born Henry Herman McKinnies Jr. on November 25, 1926 in New Orleans, Louisiana, an only child. His parents met at the University of Arkansas, and when he was almost four his family moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In his teens, he acted in productions of the North Shore Children's ...

729 points

74. Will Quadflieg

Actor | Lola Montès

Quadflieg attended high school, where he graduated with a high school diploma. He took acting lessons while he was still at school. In 1933 he played for the first time at the theater in Oberhausen. This was followed by engagements in Giessen, Gera and Düsseldorf. In 1936 he first played in Berlin ...

728 points

75. Gustaf Gründgens

Actor | M - Eine Stadt sucht einen Mörder

After his school education, Gustaf Gründgens volunteered for the Western Front in 1916. The following year he joined the Saarlouis front theater group, which he led two years later. After the war, he trained from 1919 to 1920 at the Düsseldorf Theater School of Stage Arts. He took on his first ...

728 points

76. Frank Sinatra

Actor | From Here to Eternity

Frank Sinatra was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, to Italian immigrants Natalina Della (Garaventa), from Northern Italy, and Saverio Antonino Martino Sinatra, a Sicilian boxer, fireman, and bar owner. Growing up on the gritty streets of Hoboken made Sinatra determined to work hard to get ahead. ...

727 points

77. Dean Martin

Soundtrack | The Dean Martin Show

Martin was born Dino Paul Crocetti in Steubenville, Ohio, to Gaetano Alfonso "Guy" Crocetti, an Italian immigrant and barber, and his Ohio-born wife, Angela (Barra) Crocetti. He spoke only Italian until age five. Martin came up the hard way, with such jobs as a boxer ("Kid Crochet"), a steel mill ...

727 points

78. Sammy Davis Jr.

Actor | The Cannonball Run

Sammy Davis Jr. was often billed as the "greatest living entertainer in the world".

He was born in Harlem, Manhattan, the son of dancer Elvera Davis (née Sanchez) and vaudeville star Sammy Davis Sr.. His father was African-American and his mother was of Cuban and African-American ancestry. Davis Jr....

727 points

79. Peter Lawford

Actor | The Longest Day

Born in London, England and son of a British World War I hero, Lawford had spent most of his childhood in Paris, France and began his acting career at a very young age. His parents were not married when their son was born. As a result of the scandal, The Lawfords fled to America.

As a young child, ...

727 points

80. Richard Conte

Actor | The Godfather

Richard Conte was born Nicholas Richard Conte on March 24, 1910, in Jersey City, New Jersey, the son of an Italian-American barber. He held a variety of jobs before becoming a professional actor, including truck driver, Wall Street clerk and singing waiter at a Connecticut resort. The gig as a ...

727 points

81. Alberto Sordi

Actor | Io e Caterina

One of Italy's most captivating and talented cinematic comedy stars, Italian veteran Alberto Sordi was known for satirizing his country's social mores in pungent black comedies, farcical tales and grim drama. He, along with peers Vittorio Gassman, Ugo Tognazzi and Nino Manfredi, arguably represent ...

725 points

82. Serge Reggiani

Actor | Il gattopardo

The notably gifted, multi-talented actor, chanteur, poet and painter Serge Reggiani was born in Reggio Emilia, a town in northern Italy, in 1922. His father, a highly visible anti-fascist, fled his Mussolini-dictated homeland due to his fervent political activities and emigrated to France in order ...

725 points

83. Martin Balsam

Actor | All the President's Men

Martin Henry Balsam was born on November 4, 1919 in the Bronx, New York City, to Lillian (Weinstein) and Albert Balsam, a manufacturer of women's sportswear. He was the first-born child. His father was a Russian Jewish immigrant, and his mother was born in New York, to Russian Jewish parents. ...

725 points

84. Albert Finney

Actor | Murder on the Orient Express

The son of a Lancashire bookmaker, Albert Finney came to motion pictures via the theatre. In 1956, he won a scholarship to RADA where his fellow alumni included Peter O'Toole and Alan Bates. He joined the Birmingham Repertory where he excelled in plays by William Shakespeare. A member of the Royal ...

722 points

85. Trevor Howard

Actor | The Third Man

The son of an insurance underwriter who represented Lloyd's of London in Ceylon, Trevor Wallace Howard-Smith was born in Margate, Kent. He spent his early childhood globetrotting with his mother, frequently left in the care of strangers. After attending private school he went on to study drama at ...

719 points

86. Dean Stockwell

Actor | Quantum Leap

Dean Robert Stockwell grew up in North Hollywood, the son of Broadway performers Harry Stockwell and Elizabeth "Betty" Stockwell (née Veronica). His vaudevillian father was a replacement Curly in the original production of "Oklahoma!". He was also a decent tenor whose voice was used for the part of...

719 points

87. Richard Todd

Actor | The Hasty Heart

British leading man who achieved some success in American films, as well. Born in Ireland as the son of a British officer, Todd grew up in Devon and (for a brief time) in India and attended Shrewsbury Public School. His interest in theatre led him to small roles in stock in England and Scotland and...

719 points

88. Peter Sellers

Actor | Being There

Often credited as the greatest comedian of all time, Peter Sellers was born Richard Henry Sellers to a well-off acting family in 1925 in Southsea, a suburb of Portsmouth. He was the son of Agnes Doreen "Peg" (Marks) and William "Bill" Sellers. His parents worked in an acting company run by his ...

719 points

89. Rex Harrison

Actor | My Fair Lady

Rex Harrison was born Reginald Carey Harrison in Huyton, Lancashire, England, to Edith Mary (Carey) and William Reginald Harrison, a cotton broker. He changed his name to Rex as a young boy, knowing it was the Latin word for "King". Starting out on his theater career at age 18, his first job at the ...

717 points

90. 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...

713 points

91. John Mills

Actor | Great Expectations

Sir John Mills, one of the most popular and beloved English actors, was born Lewis Ernest Watts Mills on February 22, 1908, at the Watts Naval Training College in North Elmham, Norfolk, England. The young Mills grew up in Felixstowe, Suffolk, where his father was a mathematics teacher and his ...

713 points

92. Dennis Price

Actor | Kind Hearts and Coronets

This urbane, sourly handsome British actor was born to privilege and most of his roles would follow suit. Born Dennistoun John Franklyn Rose-Price in Berkshire in 1915, Dennis Price, the son of a brigadier-general, was expected to abide by his family wishes and make a career for himself in the army...

713 points

93. Rik Battaglia

Actor | Esther and the King

Rik Battaglia was born on February 18, 1927 in Corbola, Veneto, Italy. He was an actor, known for Esther and the King (1960), Orlando e i Paladini di Francia (1956) and Duck, You Sucker! (1971). He died on March 27, 2015 in Corbola, Veneto, Italy.

712 points

94. Laurence Harvey

Actor | The Manchurian Candidate

Laurence Harvey was a British movie star who helped usher in the 1960s with his indelible portrait of a ruthless social climber, and became one of the decade's cultural icons for his appearances in socially themed motion pictures.

Harvey was born Zvi Mosheh Skikne on October 1, 1928 in Joniskis, ...

710 points

95. Karl Malden

Actor | A Streetcar Named Desire

Born to a Czech mother and a Serbian father in Chicago as Mladen Sekulovich, on March 22, 1912, Karl Malden did not speak English until he was in kindergarten. After graduating from high school in the nearby steel town of Gary, Indiana, Malden worked in the industry for three years until 1934, when...

708 points

96. Edmond O'Brien

Actor | The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Oscar-winner Edmond O'Brien was one of the most respected character actors in American cinema, from his heyday of the mid-1940s through the late 1960s. Born on September 10, 1915, in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, O'Brien learned the craft of performance as a magician, reportedly tutored by...

708 points

97. Arthur O'Connell

Actor | Anatomy of a Murder

Though stage, screen and TV veteran Arthur O'Connell was born in New York City (on March 29, 1908), he looked as countrified as the American Gothic painting or Mom's home-made apple pie. Looking much more comfy in overalls than he ever could in a tuxedo, he would find an equally comfortable niche ...

708 points

98. Van Heflin

Actor | Shane

Craggy-faced, dependable star character actor Van Heflin never quite made the Hollywood "A" list, but made up for what he lacked in appearance with hard work, charisma and solid acting performances. He was born Emmett Evan Heflin in Oklahoma in December 1908, the son of Fanny Bleecker (Shippey) and...

707 points

99. Richard Basehart

Actor | Moby Dick

Despite many a powerful performance, this actor's actor never quite achieved the stardom he deserved. Ultimately, Richard Basehart became best-known to television audiences as Admiral Harriman Nelson, commander of the glass-nosed nuclear submarine 'S.S.R.N Seaview' in Irwin Allen's Voyage to the ...

707 points

100. Robert Preston

Actor | The Music Man

American leading man of vast charisma, Robert Preston was the son of a garment worker and a record store clerk and grew up in Los Angeles. He was a trained musician, playing several instruments, and in high school became interested in theatre. He joined the Pasadena Community Playhouse, taking ...

707 points