Every Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor: A Complete History of the Winners

The Oscars didn’t come out of the gate fully formed. Notably, the ceremony’s first nine years did not hand out an Academy Award for either best supporting actor or best supporting actress. Luckily, this was fixed, as these roles are oftentimes the most daring, most interesting, and most memorable ones recognized by the Academy.

Being awards-obsessed, we’ve taken a few moments to reflect on all the winners of the best-supporting-actor category. Who has won more than once? Who was the oldest winner? Who was the youngest winner? Has anyone won more than one Oscar for the same role? Did anyone win two years in a row? Did anyone say something embarrassing when they accepted their trophy? Did Alan Arkin win a best supporting Oscar? Did Alan Alda win a best supporting Oscar? What about other actors with the initials A.A.?

The good news is that, if you ever craved one page on the internet with every best-supporting-actor Oscar winner in one place, you have now found it. Enjoy!

Kevin Winter/Getty Images.

Robert Downey Jr. — 2024
Oppenheimer (2023)J. Robert Oppenheimer led the Manhattan Project because he couldn’t resist the idea of both defeating the Nazis and satisfying his own scientific curiosity. The Fates that eventually damned him were personified in Christopher Nolan’s best picture winner by Robert Downey Jr.’s conniving Lewis Strauss. Downey redirects all his Tony Stark smarm into this portrait of a sniveling, jealous political worm, a marvelous capstone to his Hollywood comeback story.

Ke Huy Quan — 2023
Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)Certainly the most joyful part of Everything Everywhere All at Once’s near total sweep of the Oscars—it also won best picture, best director(s), best actress for Michelle Yeoh, best supporting actress for Jamie Lee Curtis, best original screenplay, and best film editing—was Ke Huy Quan’s win. His performance as a cuddly, googly-eye-affixing wife guy in one reality who’s a suave tuxedo-clad looker in another was matched only by his Oscar narrative. The former Goonies star and Harrison Ford’s Temple of Doom pal had been neglected by Hollywood for years, only to come back on top.

Troy Kotsur — 2022
CODA (2021)Troy Kotsur’s marvelous turn as the fisherman paterfamilias in the heartwarming drama CODA made history among best supporting actor winners: He’s the first male deaf performer to win. (His costar Marlee Matlin had already broken the woman’s Oscar barrier for the 1986 film Children of a Lesser God, winning best actress at age 21.) CODA also won best picture (a first for a film launched on a streamer, in this case Apple TV +, rather than a traditional movie studio) and best adapted screenplay for writer/director Sian Heder. It’s best to focus on all that positivity and not the fact that this was the ceremony where Will Smith slapped Chris Rock across the face.

Daniel Kaluuya — 2021
Judas and the Black Messiah (2021)This was certainly the weirdest Oscars of all our lifetimes, and not just because Mank led with the most nominations at 10. Held at Union Station with social distancing among the attendees, this COVID-delayed event allowed for an extension of eligibility for films—which turned out well for winner Daniel Kaluuya. Judas and the Black Messiah, starring Kaluuya as slain civil rights leader Fred Hampton, was released in February 2021 on what was then called HBO Max, prior to a limited theatrical expansion. The curious nature of the ceremony, however, should not detract from this spectacular performance, or the greatness of Shaka King’s film in general.

Brad Pitt — 2020
Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood (2019)The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences took a vote, and they determined they’d like nothing more than to drive around the greater Los Angeles area with Brad Pitt. And who could blame them? As the stunt man/sidekick to Leonardo DiCaprio in Quentin Tarantino’s love letter to showbiz, the late 1960s, and alternate histories, Pitt’s Cliff Booth spends a lot of time in Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood looking cool cruising around the city, running errands, picking up hitchhikers, and occasionally getting into fights. Notably, the supporting actor Oscar this year was a five-headed Hydra of A-listers—Pitt won against Anthony Hopkins (The Two Popes), Al Pacino and Joe Pesci (The Irishman), and Tom Hanks (A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood). Of course, his competition had all won Oscars before, making Pitt’s first-time victory an even sweeter win.

Frazer Harrison/Getty Images.

Mahershala Ali — 2019
Green Book (2018)There are eight actors with more than one Oscar in the supporting actor category, and Mahershala Ali is the most recent addition to their ranks. Ali portrays the elegant Don Shirley, a classical and third stream jazz pianist, as he embarks on a tour through the Jim Crow South, chauffeured by a gruff (and casually racist) character played by Viggo Mortensen. While some critics felt that this well-meaning project still had reactionary elements to it, few found fault with Ali’s performance. The movie also won best picture and best original screenplay.

Sam Rockwell — 2018
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)Sam Rockwell beat out his Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri costar Woody Harrelson in this category (as well as previous category winner Christopher Plummer, who was the oldest nominee at the time at age 88 for his turn in All the Money in the World). Rockwell’s character in Martin McDonagh’s darkly comic story of a small town dealing with a rape and murder was controversial to many. He’s a likable bozo, but also a violently racist pig, who, some argue, never quite earns the story’s redemption arc. The film also won Frances McDormand her second of three best actress Oscars.

Mahershala Ali — 2017
Moonlight (2016)Mahershala Ali’s first best supporting actor win was, like Green Book, also for a film that won best picture. Moonlight, the extremely low-budget second feature from Barry Jenkins, jumps between three time periods in a young gay Black man’s life. Ali plays Juan, a tender and caring drug dealer in the Miami-set drama. And though there was a brief period of confusion over Moonlight’s best-picture win (with Faye Dunaway erroneously calling La La Land the champion), there was never any doubt in this category.

Mark Rylance — 2016
Bridge of Spies (2015)Who’d’ve ever bet that the mild British Shakespearean Mark Rylance would be the one to knock out Rocky? Most had their money on Sylvester Stallone to win this year for his supporting turn in Creed, but Rylance’s stoic Soviet spy who is swapped for Francis Gary Powers in the extremely dad-coded Steven Spielberg picture Bridge of Spies got the win instead. The film had five other nominations, including best picture, but Rylance, armed with his “Would it help?” catchphrase, was its only winner.

J.K. Simmons — 2015
Whiplash (2014)It was always his tempo. J.K. Simmons is explosive as the jazz teacher from hell in Whiplash. There he is, flinging cymbals (Not symbolically! Actually flinging them!) at poor Miles Teller, who only wants to learn how to play the drums. His impenetrable expression and deep, resonant baritone make him an unknowable force of nature, which ultimately leads to an explosive (but perhaps ultimately heartbreaking), wordless climax in Damian Chazelle’s Sundance winner that also won Oscars for best sound and best editing. It was nominated for best adapted screenplay and best picture as well.

Jared Leto — 2014
Dallas Buyers Club (2013)Though a cisgender person playing this role would never happen today, Jared Leto’s portrayal of the transgender woman Rayon in this somewhat-based-on-a-true scenario from the early years of the AIDS pandemic was a revelation for those who only knew him from My So-Called Life or 30 Seconds to Mars. Dallas Buyers Club was nominated for six Oscars in total, including Matthew McConaughey’s win for best actor.

Christoph Waltz — 2013
Django Unchained (2012)Christoph Waltz made history with his Django Unchained victory as the only best supporting actor to win twice while working with the same solo director. (Indeed, the dude ought to have a mini shrine to Quentin Tarantino somewhere in his home for casting him in such great roles.) What we mean by solo director will be explained in the very last entry on this list, so keep reading! This was a wild year—every best supporting actor Oscar nominee (Waltz, Alan Arkin, Robert De Niro, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Tommy Lee Jones) already had an Oscar to their name, so no hard feelings all around!

Christopher Plummer — 2012
Beginners (2011)This marvelous performance by Christopher Plummer in Mike Mills’s Beginners, based on the director’s own father’s decision to come out at the age of 75, made Plummer the oldest winner of a competitive acting Oscar at the time. (Anthony Hopkins has since surpassed him.) Oddly enough, he competed against the great Max Von Sydow from Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, who was a few months older than Plummer. This was also the year Jonah Hill got his first of two Oscar nominations (for Moneyball), which made for a funny gag in the 2013 comedy This Is the End.

Christian Bale — 2011
The Fighter (2010)Christian Bale’s performance as troubled Dicky Eklund in The Fighter, the half brother of boxer Micky Ward (played by Mark Wahlberg), is one of the all-time pitch-perfect New England Irish American dirtbags. And we mean that with nothing but love. Of note, this year also marked the first of four times Mark Ruffalo would lose in this category (for The Kids Are All Right; he’d later lose for Foxcatcher, Spotlight, and Poor Things. Fifth time’s a charm, Mark!)

Christoph Waltz — 2010
Inglourious Basterds (2009)Though already in his early 50s, Christoph Waltz was virtually unknown in Hollywood before his turn as the sadistic yet charismatic Hans Landa, the “Jew Hunter” in Quentin Tarantino’s WWII fantasy Inglourious Basterds. His was the only win of eight nominations for the film, including best picture, best director, and best original screenplay. As would happen again eight years later, both Christopher Plummer and Woody Harrelson were nominated in this category, but lost: this time, Plummer for The Last Station and Harrelson for The Messenger.

© Warner Bros/Everett Collection.

Heath Ledger — 2009
The Dark Knight (2008)Though there have been 16 competitive Oscars awarded posthumously, Heath Ledger’s turn as The Joker in Christopher Nolan’s second Batman picture, The Dark Knight, is the only posthumous Oscar ever awarded in this category. (The only other performer to win a posthumous Oscar is Peter Finch, who got best actor for Network.) The Dark Knight was a massive popular success, but it somehow wasn’t nominated for best picture—the leading catalyst for the Academy’s decision to expand the number of eligible best-picture candidates from 5 to as many as 10. In the earliest days of the Oscars, large numbers of movies had been cited for best picture; the count was reduced to five in 1944.

Javier Bardem — 2008
No Country for Old Men (2007)Spanish actor Javier Bardem’s eerie, demonic killer in the Coen brothers’s adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men won him the best supporting actor Oscar in an extremely competitive year that also featured Casey Affleck, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Hal Holbrook, and Tom Wilkinson. Two performers, Michael Lerner and William H. Macy, had been nominated in this category for previous Coen brothers films, but neither won. No Country for Old Men also won best picture.

Alan Arkin — 2007
Little Miss Sunshine (2006)Alan Arkin’s Little Miss Sunshine win was controversial for the many who were pulling for Eddie Murphy in Dreamgirls—but not to those who recognize the greatness of Arkin, who had two best-actor nominations in the 1960s for The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming and The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. He’d get another best-supporting-actor nomination after this, for best-picture winner Argo.

George Clooney — 2006
Syriana (2005)Beloved A-lister George Clooney gave one of the realest Academy Award acceptance speeches when he picked up his trophy and recognized that “Oscar winner” will be part of the opening sentence of his future obituary. As he joked: “It’ll be: Oscar winner George Clooney, Sexiest Man Alive 1997, Batman, died today in a freak accident.”

Morgan Freeman — 2005
Million Dollar Baby (2004)Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby was a wild night for double Oscar winners. It gave Hillary Swank her second best-actress prize (the first was for Boys Don’t Cry), and Eastwood his second, for both best director and best picture (both previously for Unforgiven). Though Freeman also appeared in that earlier Eastwood film, he was not nominated for it (though Gene Hackman was). This was, however, Freeman’s third time at bat for an Oscar, and he finally came away with the win. Among others, Freeman beat Alan Alda, whose Oscar nomination for The Aviator remains his only one. Imagine breaking Alan Alda’s heart!

Tim Robbins — 2004
Mystic River (2003)Eight years after a best-director nomination for Dead Man Walking, Tim Robbins took home the best-supporting-actor award for his performance as an adult survivor of abuse in Clint Eastwood’s Mystic River. Sean Penn also won best actor for the film, which was also nominated for best picture, director, and supporting actress (Marcia Gay Harden).

Chris Cooper — 2003
Adaptation (2002)Indie film stalwart Chris Cooper took home supporting actor for his fabulist spin on horticulturist John Laroche in Charlie Kaufman’s bonkers Adaptation, an unusual quasi-adaptation of The Orchid Thief. This was, for many, a surprise win over Christopher Walken in Catch Me If You Can, a terrific performance that also came at a time of peak Walken love in popular culture (hashtag more cowbell).

Jim Broadbent — 2002
Iris (2001)This was a notable Oscars ceremony, as it was the first following the 9/11 attacks—as well as the first held at the Kodak Theatre (now Dolby Theatre), a “return” to the heart of Hollywood after the event spent decades elsewhere in Los Angeles at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion or Shrine Auditorium. A Nora Ephron–edited salute to New York City was included in the telecast, introduced by notable Oscars hater Woody Allen, offering his first stand-up routine in over 30 years. Anyhow: Jim Broadbent won best supporting actor for his turn opposite Judi Dench in Iris, a biopic about writer Iris Murdoch.

Benicio del Toro — 2001
Traffic (2000)Benicio del Toro made history with his best supporting actor win in Traffic as the first Puerto Rican performer ever to win in this category. (José Ferrer had previously won best actor, and Rita Moreno won for best supporting actress.) Director Steven Soderbergh also won the best-director award this year, beating (in addition to Stephen Daldry, Ang Lee, Ridley Scott) himself for Erin Brockovich, which won Julia Roberts the best-actress prize.

Michael Caine — 2000
The Cider House Rules (1999)Michael Caine took home his second trophy in this category for his performance in Lasse Halström’s adaptation of John Irving’s beloved novel. This was a particularly tough year: He was up against Tom Cruise in Magnolia, Michael Clarke Duncan in The Green Mile, Jude Law in The Talented Mr. Ripley, and, the performance that in retrospect may have been best, Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense.

James Coburn — 1999
Affliction (1998)Paul Schrader’s grim adaptation of Russell Banks’s novel Affliction won a late-career best-supporting-actor trophy for perennial tough guy James Coburn as the brutal alcoholic father to Nick Nolte, who was nominated for best actor. You may recall Nolte (among others) definitely not applauding when director Elia Kazan took the stage to receive an honorary Oscar that night—a protest of Kazan for “naming names” before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1952.

HAL GARB/Getty Images.

Robin Williams — 1998
Good Will Hunting (1997)Everyone liked these apples. After three nominations (for Good Morning, Vietnam, Dead Poets Society, and The Fisher King), human warmth generator Robin Williams finally took home a statue for his performance as Matt Damon’s therapist in Good Will Hunting. The movie, a surprise box office smash, also won Damon and Ben Affleck an Oscar for best original screenplay, as well as nominations for Minnie Driver, director Gus Van Sant, and best picture.

Cuba Gooding Jr. — 1997
Jerry Maguire (1996)Perhaps the most exuberant Oscars acceptance speech in history, few can forget Cuba Gooding Jr. hootin’ and hollerin’ when he won the best supporting Oscar for Jerry Maguire. The sports-centric romantic comedy got five nominations in total, including best picture and best actor for Tom Cruise—but this was its only win.

Kevin Spacey — 1996
The Usual Suspects (1995)Kevin Spacey (oy!) in a film directed by Bryan Singer (double oy!) is a hard thing to recommend today, but the truth is that this twisty-turny crime caper is a rewatchable classic, and Spacey’s malevolent performance as Verbal Kint is the heart of it. The Usual Suspects also won Christopher McQuarrie a well-deserved best-original-screenplay award.

Martin Landau — 1995
Ed Wood (1994)Many great personalities were best-supporting-actor nominees this year, including Samuel L. Jackson, Chazz Palminteri, Paul Scofield, and Gary Sinise. But this category has always been an opportunity to occasionally let a weird one through. Martin Landau, nominated twice before for Tucker: The Man and His Dream and Crimes and Misdemeanors, and known for decades of television, was the perfect pick for his zany but heartfelt portrayal of late-in-life Bela Lugosi in Tim Burton’s Ed Wood.

Tommy Lee Jones — 1994
The Fugitive (1993)Tommy Lee Jones, addressing the other nominees who may have been disappointed to lose: “I don’t care.” We’re joking, of course. But Jones’s turn as the matter-of-fact US marshal hunting down Harrison Ford in the based-on-an-old-TV-show film The Fugitive did a lot to elevate this from a simple police drama into a massive hit and best-picture nominee. (It also inspired a sequel, farther removed from the original premise, based solely around Jones’s character.)

Gene Hackman — 1993
Unforgiven (1992)Gene Hackman took home his second Oscar (the first was for The French Connection) as part of the big win for Unforgiven, which also got picture, director, and editing. He was up against previous winner Jack Nicholson, Al Pacino, who took home the best-actor award that night, David Paymer, and newcomer Jaye Davidson, nominated for The Crying Game, his first film performance.

Jack Palance — 1992
City Slickers (1991)Though far from a masterpiece of cinema, City Slickers, in which Billy Crystal does some gags and stunts with cattle, was a great late-career boost for Jack Palance—who, at the age of 73, proceeded to do one-arm push-ups onstage when he picked up his Oscar as a diss to producers who preferred to hire younger actors and age them with makeup.

Joe Pesci — 1991
Goodfellas (1990)Winning the unofficial award for one of the shortest Oscar acceptance speeches at just a few seconds, Joe Pesci certainly upended expectations based on his loquacious and opinionated character in Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas. Though it is now considered one of the best movies ever made, Goodfellas somehow only took home this one win from its six nominations (which included best picture). Pesci had previously been nominated in this category for Scorsese’s Raging Bull and would be nominated again for Scorsese’s The Irishman.

Denzel Washington — 1990
Glory (1989)The first Oscar for Denzel Washington came for his heroic turn in Glory, a drama about a Black regiment that fought in the American Civil War. Four of the five supporting-actor nominees that year were in films about race relations. In addition to Washington was Danny Aiello in Do The Right Thing, Dan Aykroyd in best-picture winner Driving Miss Daisy, and Marlon Brando in the South African–set A Dry White Season. The fifth nominee was Martin Landau in Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Kevin Kline — 1989
A Fish Called Wanda (1988)Though his career began on Broadway in both musicals and Shakespeare plays, Kevin Kline’s most notable role will forever be his dunderheaded would-be criminal in the Monty Python–adjacent comedy A Fish Called Wanda. This British import was a surprise smash at the box office, and it also got John Cleese a nomination for cowriting the screenplay.

Sean Connery — 1988
The Untouchables (1987)“That’s the Chicago way.” Anyone who thinks Sean Connery’s win for The Untouchables was some kind of, “Oh, he’s due for something after all these years,” needs to watch the movie again. His performance opposite Kevin Costner in Brian De Palma’s juicy look at the gang that took down Al Capone is the heart of the entire picture. Too bad that Albert Brooks in Broadcast News and Vincent Gardenia in Moonstruck had to go up against him. It was a strong year!

Michael Caine — 1987
Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)“I’m walking on air.” Michael Caine’s win for Woody Allen’s Hannah and Her Sisters was shared with his costar Dianne Wiest, who won for best supporting actress, though the two barely had a scene together. That’s how wide this film—which also got Allen an Oscar for best original screenplay and a best-picture nomination—casts its net across an extended family of 1980s New York neurotics.

Don Ameche — 1986
Cocoon (1985)It’s a Hollywood truism: Get a guy in his late 70s breakdancing, and you’ll have a shot at an Academy Award. Don Ameche is one of several old-timers who, for reasons involving checked interstellar luggage, get a second shot at youth in this heartwarming Ron Howard hit. The only bad thing about Ameche’s win is that he beat out Eric Roberts in Runaway Train.

Haing S. Ngor — 1985
The Killing Fields (1984)One of the most unusual wins at the Oscars, Dr. Haing S. Ngor had never acted before Roland Joffé cast him as journalist Dith Pran in this based-on-a-true-story tale of terror and escape from Communist Cambodia. Ngor’s imprisonment in a Khmer Rouge concentration camp mirrored Pran’s experience, bringing an eerie verisimilitude to the role. While he continued to work in Hollywood, Ngor was fatally shot in Los Angeles a decade after his Oscar win.

Bob Riha Jr/Getty Images.

Jack Nicholson — 1984
Terms of Endearment (1983)Jack Nicholson’s win in Terms of Endearment was part of a big sweep for the film, which also took home best picture, best director, best adapted screenplay (James L. Brooks), and best actress (Shirley MacLaine). Though one could argue that Nicholson won for “Best Jack,” in that the small role was a perfect match for the devilish screen charisma that only he possessed.

Louis Gossett Jr. — 1983
An Officer and a Gentleman (1982)An officer and a gentleman?!?! Wow, that 80s economy truly was something. This working-class romance costarring Richard Gere and Debra Winger (and the Oscar-winning track “Up Where We Belong”) was a gift to any actor who played the tough-as-nails sergeant supporting role. Gosset was only the third African American to get a best supporting actor nomination, and the first to win.

John Gielgud — 1982
Arthur (1981)Here’s a little-known fact: When most Americans imitate British people, they have two options. One is to do Amy Winehouse. The other is to impersonate John Gielgud’s Hobson the butler in Arthur, one of the funniest performances in the history of cinema. Imagine a role that can outshine Dudley Moore and Liza Minnelli! You may think it can’t be done, but somehow he did it.

Timothy Hutton — 1981
Ordinary People (1980)Only 20 years old when he won, Timothy Hutton’s performance in the best-picture and best-director (for Robert Redford) winner Ordinary People was a surprising pick for some over Judd Hirsch in the same category and in the same film. Hutton’s turn as Conrad Jarrett was ahead of its time in accurately portraying PTSD, though, and the movie did a great deal to expose legitimate mental health practices to a wider audience.

Melvyn Douglas — 1980
Being There (1979)One of the stranger movies to get Academy Awards recognition—including a best-actor nomination for Peter Sellers, in his final film role—Being There is (in part) a spoof on political kingmakers. Melvyn Douglas, winning his second Oscar as best supporting actor, plays an ailing millionaire who redirects Sellers’s soft-spoken simpleton toward fame and power in this not-so-far-fetched story.

Christopher Walken — 1979
The Deer Hunter (1978)Though there is no record of Viet Cong pressing American POWs into tournaments of Russian Roulette, that didn’t bother Michael Cimino. He centered his best-picture-winning epic on that premise. Christopher Walken is mesmerizing in this blue-collar tale of war and its effects that came as American society was beginning to reconcile with its engagement in Vietnam.

Jason Robards — 1978
Julia (1977)This was Jason Robards’s second win in this category, coming just one year after his first. Fred Zinnemann’s Julia also won Vanessa Redgrave a trophy for best supporting actress and Alvin Sargent an award for best adapted screenplay, from Lillian Hellman’s book.

Jason Robards — 1977
All The President’s Men (1976)“Fuck it, let’s stand by the boys.” All The President’s Men, which also won William Goldman an Oscar for best adapted screenplay, remains the juiciest, most watchable film about two guys making telephone calls and occasionally going to the library. This was one of the most stacked best-picture years, with All The President’s Men, Network, Taxi Driver and Bound For Glory (good, but maybe not a masterpiece like the others) all losing to the ultimate champion, Rocky.

George Burns — 1976
The Sunshine Boys (1975)There is no sequence in cinema as funny as the doctor sketch between George Burns and Walter Matthau in Herbert Ross’s adaptation of Neil Simon’s play The Sunshine Boys. Luckily, the rest of the picture, about two aging vaudevillians burying the hatchet after a decades-long feud, is also pretty solid. “Say, knock knock knock!”

From the Everett Collection.

Robert De Niro — 1975
The Godfather Part II (1974)Robert De Niro’s first Oscar win was, in a way, shared with Marlon Brando, who had won the best actor award for playing the same character later in life in The Godfather just two years earlier. De Niro’s performance here is almost entirely in Italian, and the win was part of a sweep for the film, which included prizes for best picture and best director. De Niro beat out two of his costars (Michael V. Gazzo and Lee Strasberg) as well as Jeff Bridges (for Thunderbolt and Lightfoot) and Fred Astaire (for the somewhat ignoble The Towering Inferno).

John Houseman — 1974
The Paper Chase (1973)John Houseman had a whole career as a producer (he worked with Orson Welles and was involved in preproduction for Citizen Kane) before a late career turn as an actor. He’s hilarious and terrifying as the tough Harvard Law professor in The Paper Chase, a role that didn’t just win him an Oscar but also cemented him as a figure of authority in the American mind, earning him a position as a television pitchman for Smith Barney for years.

Joel Grey — 1973
Cabaret (1972)Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome! How did theater kids even live before Joel Grey and his performance as the master of ceremonies in Cabaret? This was a heck of an Oscar year, with three of the other nominees in this category all coming from The Godfather: James Caan, Robert Duvall, and Al Pacino (who was really the lead in the movie, but let’s not get into that). Also in the mix was Eddie Albert as the stern father in Elaine May’s comedy masterpiece The Heartbreak Kid.

Ben Johnson — 1972
The Last Picture Show (1971)The characters in Peter Bogdanovich’s 1970s salute to the 1950s had their own nostalgia for an earlier time, and this was perfectly represented by Ben Johnson’s old-timer character, Sam the Lion. Johnson beat out his costar Jeff Bridges in the same category. Cloris Leachman similarly won best supporting actress for this film, also beating out her Last Picture Show costar Ellen Burstyn.

John Mills — 1971
Ryan’s Daughter (1970)Sir David Lean’s Ryan’s Daughter is mostly remembered by cinephiles as the picture that ended the great director’s run of globe-spanning masterpieces, following on the heels of Summertime, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Lawrence of Arabia and Doctor Zhivago—a misstep that sent Lean into temporary retirement before a triumphant return with A Passage to India. The Irish nationalist drama Ryan’s Daughter (a tweaked version of Madame Bovary) is, indeed, a bit of a dud, but the 195-minute epic does have some bright spots, especially the ubiquitous British character actor John Mills as the “village idiot,” an unexpected turn from the typically heroic characters he was known for.

Gig Young — 1970
They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (1969)“Yowsa! Yowsa! Yowsa!” One of the most depressing motion pictures ever made, Gig Young plays an emcee during a seaside dance marathon in which poor people suffer exhaustion, ridicule, and torment for a free meal and the promise of a few dollars. These real-life Squid Game scenarios actually existed during the Great Depression (my grandparents remembered them!), though perhaps Sydney Pollack amped things up a little bit for the movie.

Jack Albertson — 1969
The Subject Was Roses (1968)The Subject Was Roses is a terrific generation gap drama, though set a generation earlier, from director Ulu Grosbard. Albertson and Patricia Neal (who was nominated for best actress) see the cracks in their marriage grow wider when their son, the young Martin Sheen, returns from World War II. Though this is a strong performance, it robbed Gene Wilder of a trophy for the part of Leo Bloom in The Producers, and that is a crime.

George Kennedy — 1968
Cool Hand Luke (1967)If you want to look for religious symbolism in the counterculture prison drama Cool Hand Luke (and you wouldn’t be the first), you could say that the enormous George Kennedy is St. Peter to Paul Newman’s Christ. Kennedy beat out Gene Hackman and Michael J. Pollard from that year’s other anti-establishment classic, Bonnie and Clyde, plus the devilish John Cassavetes in The Dirty Dozen, showing that New Hollywood had arrived. (Only Cecil Kellaway, the monsignor in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, represented the old guard.)

Walter Matthau — 1967
The Fortune Cookie (1966)Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon made several movies opposite each other, and The Fortune Cookie, directed by Billy Wilder, was the first—and quite possibly the best. Matthau plays the shyster lawyer “Whiplash” Willie Gingrich, who has dollar signs in his eyes when his sports cameraman brother-in-law (Lemmon) is injured by a star football player. Deception spirals out of control, building to a wonderfully wacky climax.

Martin Balsam — 1966
A Thousand Clowns (1965)One of the great portraits of a disheveled New York writer, Jason Robards finds himself caring for his young nephew in the scrappy, touching comedy A Thousand Clowns, based on Herb Gardner’s play. Martin Balsam plays Robards’s sweaty agent. The two would work together again in All The President’s Men, but that time with Robards winning the Oscar.

Peter Ustinov — 1965
Topkapi (1964)Peter Ustinov’s second Oscar for best supporting actor, after deliciously chomping up the scenery in Spartacus, is as the deceptively daffy crook in Jules Dassin’s marvelous Topkapi, an Ocean’s Eleven–esque team of international bandits looking to pull off a heist in Istanbul. This was the second of Dassin’s heist pictures—he’d previously made the Paris-set Rififi—but this one is even more extravagant.

Melvyn Douglas — 1964
Hud (1963)He’d win in this category again 16 years later for Being There, but Melvyn Douglas’s turn in the Texas-set Hud was his first Oscar. Douglas is the “good rancher” struggling with his rebellious son (played by Paul Newman in one of his darkest roles). Among the other nominees that year was the unexpected nomination of singer Bobby Darin in the delightful Captain Newman, M.D.

Ed Begley — 1963
Sweet Bird of Youth (1962)Seeing a pattern here? Appear in a movie in which Paul Newman is the star during this period in Hollywood history, and you’ve got a real shot of winning the Academy Award for best supporting actor. Joining Melvyn Douglas and George Kennedy was Ed Begley in Richard Brooks’s adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s Sweet Bird of Youth.

Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images.

George Chakiris — 1962
West Side Story (1961)Though he doesn’t do too much singing, and he and several costars are unfortunately wearing brownface as per the era, George Chakiris is remarkable in the movie version of West Side Story as Bernardo. (That’s Maria’s brother and Anita’s boyfriend, if you were trying to place him.) Chakiris was one of the ten Oscar wins for this musical masterpiece, alongside best supporting actress Rita Moreno and best picture. He also beat out two contenders—Jackie Gleason and George C. Scott—both of whom were nominated for The Hustler (see Paul Newman note above.) Also in the mix were Montgomery Clift and Peter Falk, who was nominated in this category the previous year and also lost.

Peter Ustinov — 1961
Spartacus (1960)Peter Ustinov was the only actor nominated for Stanley Kubrick’s all-star sandal epic Spartacus, in which Kirk Douglas and Jean Simmons costarred with Laurence Olivier, Charles Laughton, Tony Curtis and several others. Ustinov had been nominated in this category nine years earlier for his turn as the Emperor Nero in the not-dissimilar Quo Vadis, but Academy voters found his portrayal as the nastier Albus Dumbledore of gladiator school in Spartacus to be irresistible.

Hugh Griffith — 1960
Ben-Hur (1959)Hugh Griffith was part of Ben-Hur’s massive victory at the 1960 Oscars, one of 11 wins, which is still tied (with Titanic and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King) for the record. He played Sheik IIderim, who takes in the wandering Judah Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston) after his years as a Roman galley slave, and aids him in his epic shot at vengeance via chariot race.

Burl Ives — 1959
The Big Country (1958)There are a few things you must know about Burl Ives, who you might think of mostly as the Frosty the snowman guy. First is that his full name was Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives. Second is the incredible year he had as an actor in 1958. In addition to costarring opposite Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (which itself got six Oscar nominations), he got the Oscar win for playing the villain in William Wyler’s expansive Western The Big Country.

Red Buttons — 1958
Sayonara (1957)The dramatic part of Airman Joe Kelley opposite Marlon Brando in Joshua Logan’s adaptation of James A. Michener’s Sayonara came as a surprise for audiences who knew Red Buttons from his years doing vaudeville and his variety series on television. Buttons’s character intends to marry a Japanese woman, played by Miyoshi Umeki, which causes a hubbub at the Air Force base. Umeki also won an Oscar that year, for best supporting actress, making her the first woman of Asian descent to win an Academy Award for acting. One year earlier, Brando wore yellowface in another post-WWII stage adaptation, the cringeworthy Teahouse of the August Moon.

Anthony Quinn — 1957
Lust For Life (1956)Four years after winning in the same category for Viva Zapata!, Mexican-born Anthony Quinn won again, this time for his portrayal of the strapping, mustachioed, beret-wearing and bawdy French painter Paul Gauguin opposite Kirk Douglas’s cursed-but-brilliant Vincent Van Gogh in Lust For Life. Alas, Douglas was nominated for best actor—his third at-bat—but he did not win. He received an honorary Oscar in 1996.

Jack Lemmon — 1956
Mister Roberts (1955)By the end of his career, Jack Lemmon would have another Oscar (best actor for Save the Tiger) plus six more nominations, but this was his first and only time in the running for best supporting actor. His character of Ensign Pulver in the adaptation of the popular play Mister Roberts was such a hit the character was brought back for a sequel (simply called Ensign Pulver, starring Robert Walker Jr.) nine years later. The comic naval drama, which was also nominated for best picture, starred Henry Fonda, James Cagney, and William Powell, and was codirected by John Ford and Mervyn LeRoy.

Edmond O’Brien — 1955
The Barefoot Contessa (1954)This is not an Ina Garten biopic, but rather a stylish, juicy drama written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz (the titular Mank’s younger brother!) starring Ava Gardner as a sexy Spanish performer and Humphrey Bogart as a washed-up film director. O’Brien is quite entertaining as the not-particularly-honest publicity agent in this industry tale.

Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images.

Frank Sinatra — 1954
From Here to Eternity (1953)Fred Zinnemann’s adaptation of the wartime romance novel by James Jones, which starred Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr as two lovers so hot for one another they didn’t care if they got sand in their bathing suits, won eight Oscars in total, including best picture, best director, and best supporting actress for Donna Reed.

Anthony Quinn — 1953
Viva Zapata! (1952)Anthony Quinn won the Oscar for best supporting actor for playing Eufemio Zapata, brother to Marlon Brando’s version of revolutionary Emiliano Zapata. Director Elia Kazan hired John Steinbeck to write the screenplay, his last Hollywood credit before eventually winning the Nobel Prize for literature. Among the other nominees this year was Jack Palance, who’d have to wait 39 years before doing one-arm push-ups while picking up the same award for City Slickers.

Karl Malden — 1952
A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)Won it…by a nose? Karl Malden’s performance as Mitch in Elia Kazan’s adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire was one of three acting Oscar wins for the film, joining Vivien Leigh for best actress and Kim Hunter for best supporting actress. Somehow Marlon Brando did not win (but was nominated), losing to Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen. (That’s a tough match-up.) Two of the other supporting-actor nominees, Peter Ustinov and Gig Young, would both win in this category in later years (Ustinov won twice).

George Sanders — 1951
All About Eve (1950)The urtext for catty, feuding women, All About Eve also won best picture, best director, and best screenplay (both for Joseph L. Mankiewicz). But, in classic form, all the actresses knocked each other out. Bette Davis and Anne Baxter both lost for best actress; Celeste Holm and Thelma Ritter both lost for best supporting actress. George Sanders, though, managed to come away with the lone performance trophy. Men!

Dean Jagger — 1950
Twelve O’Clock High (1949)Also nominated for best picture and best actor (for Gregory Peck), Twelve O’Clock High was part of a burgeoning genre for the period that reflected on WWII. Dean Jagger’s Major Stovall, experiencing a flashback upon stumbling upon an item in a London shop, recalls his wartime experiences with a tense bombing group in the Air Force.

Walter Huston — 1949
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)Walter Huston, father of Oscar winner John Huston, grandfather of Oscar winner Anjelica Huston and great-grandfather of Jack Huston—who could win an Oscar someday, no pressure—was directed by his son to the best-supporting-actor prize in this classic Humphrey Bogart–led meditation on avarice. John also won best director and screenplay for The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, making this the only year of father-and-son winners.

Edmund Gwenn — 1948
Miracle on 34th Street (1947)Santa won an Oscar? I dunno, shouldn’t he be giving out baubles to others, not collecting them himself? Then again, the way Edmund Gwenn made monkey faces with the adorable moppet Natalie Wood in this feel-good holiday classic is pretty damn charming. One wonders if the ballots of all the Academy members were dumped out on a table at the last minute in dramatic form.

Harold Russell — 1947
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)Harold Russell’s win in this category may have caught the Academy off guard. Disabled WWII soldier Russell, who had never acted before, was also presented with an honorary award for “bringing hope and courage to his fellow veterans” for his turn in The Best Years of Our Lives. But then he also won the competitive trophy, making him the only person to win two Oscars for the same performance. The film won eight awards in total that night, including best picture, best director for William Wyler, and best actor for Fredric March.

© 20th Century Fox/Everett Collection.

James Dunn — 1946
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945)Elia Kazan’s first feature film, and he’s already directing people to Academy Awards! James Dunn played Johnny Nolan, one of the film’s broad canvas of striving Irish Americans in Williamsburg. Today, that’s a neighborhood that specializes in art galleries and gyms that offer ayahuasca experiences.

Barry Fitzgerald — 1945
Going My Way (1944)Going My Way was a huge hit in 1945, winning best picture, best director for Leo McCarey, best actor for Bing Crosby, and several other awards. The film also won Barry Fitzgerald the supporting-actor prize for his turn as Father Fitzgibbon, an old-fashioned priest in this generation gap musical comedy. Weird footnote: Oscar voting was still sorting itself out back then, and Fitzgerald was also nominated for best actor for this same part—a one-time fluke. This film gave us Bing’s recording of one of his signature tunes, “Swinging on a Star,” which won an Oscar and is listed in the Grammy Hall of Fame despite being (forgive me, Bing, I love you) one of the most annoying songs in the history of music.

Charles Coburn — 1944
The More the Merrier (1943)Charles Coburn beat out Claude Rains in Casablanca, which might be ne plus ultra of a performance for a best-supporting-actor Oscar. Criminal! (And worse, Rains would be nominated in this category four times in total, but would never win.) Anyhow, The More the Merrier, a zany look at unlikely housemates during the WWII housing shortage, was also nominated for best picture, and George Stevens was nominated for best director.

Van Heflin — 1943
Johnny Eager (1941)Van Heflin (later beloved by Jasper on The Simpsons) took home the Oscar for best supporting actor for his turn in Mervyn LeRoy’s sleazy noir Johnny Eager. Heflin plays a philosophizing drunk and best pal to Robert Taylor’s titular Johnny, who runs a crime syndicate facing a crisis. The brassy score was composed by the great Bronislaw Kaper, who also composed the jazz standard “On Green Dolphin Street.”

Donald Crisp — 1942
How Green Was My Valley (1941)John Ford’s sweeping Welsh family epic is best remembered these days for being the movie that, bafflingly, in retrospect, won best picture over Citizen Kane. But don’t let that steer you away from checking out the film, led by Walter Pidgeon, Maureen O’Hara, and a young Roddy McDowall. Donald Crisp’s Gwilym Morgan is a hardworking coal miner doing his best to provide for his family during a time of unease. He also beat Walter Brennan this year—who, as we will soon see, didn’t need any more best-supporting-actor Oscars at this point.

Walter Brennan — 1941
The Westerner (1940)And here comes Walter Brennan, the Michael Jordan of the Academy Award for best supporting actor—the category’s only three-time winner. His final win in The Westerner (beating Jack Oakie as a thinly-veiled Benito Mussolini in The Great Dictator) is a great villain performance of the power-mad Judge Roy Bean (“the only law west of the Pecos”) opposite the righteous Gary Cooper. The true-life character would be revived 32 years later by Paul Newman in The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean.

Thomas Mitchell — 1940
Stagecoach (1939)John Ford’s Western masterpiece Stagecoach was nominated for seven Oscars, but only won two—for Thomas Mitchell’s best supporting actor turn, and best scoring. (John Wayne didn’t even get nominated! Why I oughta sock someone in the jaw and spit tobacco on the floor!) Mitchell played a drunken physician (“Doc”), one of many passengers on a treacherous journey through Apache country.

Walter Brennan — 1939
Kentucky (1938)Walter Brennan’s second win as best supporting actor was for the horse racing romantic drama Kentucky. (Now the title makes sense.) There are 50 states in the United States of America, and more than you may think have lent their names for the titles of motion pictures. Sure, there’s the classic musical Oklahoma!, the James A. Michener adventure Hawaii, and the Jennifer Jason Leigh vehicle Georgia, but I find it amusing that in 1940 some young gentleman may have been on a first date when he told a ticket-seller, “Two for Maryland, please.”

Joseph Schildkraut — 1938
The Life of Emile Zola (1937)The Austrian actor Joseph Schildkraut won the second-ever Oscar for best supporting actor for the part of Captain Alfred Dreyfus in The Life of Emile Zola. Dreyfus, of course, was at the center of “The Dreyfus Affair,” a French controversy that inspired movies as early as 1899 (by Georges Méliès) and as recently as 2019 (by Roman Polasnki), with José Ferrer and Ken Russell (among others) in between.

Walter Brennan — 1937
Come and Get It (1936)The ninth Academy Awards were the first ceremony to include best supporting actor and best supporting actress—and Walter Brennan, who won it three times, will always be remembered as the granddaddy of the category. Come and Get It, a rags-to-riches story about lumberjacks (the ’30s!), was codirected by William Wyler and Howard Hawks. Wyler directed Brennan to his win in The Westerner, so this makes Christoph Waltz and Quentin Tarantino the only solo director-and-performer double-winners in this category. Hooray!

Has anyone ever won best actor and best supporting actor?Yes! Jack Nicholson has two best-actor statuettes and one best-supporting-actor Oscar. Denzel Washington has one Oscar in each category, as do Jack Lemmon, Robert De Niro, Gene Hackman, and Kevin Spacey.

Who has the most Oscars?Walt Disney has the most Oscars of any individual, with 26 trophies to his name (22 competitive Oscars 4 honorary awards), while Katharine Hepburn is the most decorated performer in the history of the Oscars (she won best actress four times). The most decorated supporting actor in Oscar history is Walter Brennan, who won in that category three separate times—for Come and Get It (1936), Kentucky (1938), and The Westerner (1940). He was also the very first actor to win in this category.

Who is the only person to receive two Oscars for the same role in the same film?Harold Russell, who won both an honorary award and the competitive award for best supporting actor in 1947 for his performance in The Best Years of Our Lives.

Who is the youngest person to win the Oscar for best supporting actor?Timothy Hutton, who was just 20 years old when he won best supporting actor for Ordinary People in 1981.

Behind Anatomy of Lies: The True Lies of Elisabeth Finch, Part 1 and Part 2

Rudy Giuliani’s Daughter: Trump Took My Dad From Me. Please Don’t Let Him Take Our Country Too

Melania Trump’s New Book Is Truly Bad, If Jam-Packed

From the Archive: How the Menendez Brothers’ Murder Turned Family Tragedy Into a Marathon Courtroom Drama