Best drama actors (all time)

Diane Kruger (born Diane Heidkrüger; 15 July 1976) is a German actress and former fashion model. She is known for roles such as Helen in the epic war film Troy (2004), Dr. Abigail Chase in the adventure/heist film National Treasur...

Jackson DeForest Kelley (January 20, 1920 – June 11, 1999) was an American actor, screenwriter, poet and singer known for his roles in Westerns and as Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy of the USS Enterprise in the television and film seri...

Rupert Alexander Lloyd Grint (born 24 August 1988) is an English actor who rose to prominence playing Ron Weasley, one of the three main characters in the Harry Potter movie series. Grint was cast as Ron Weasley at the age of 11,...

James McAvoy (born 21 April 1979) is a Scottish actor. He made his acting debut as a teen in 1995's The Near Room and continued to make mostly television appearances until the late 2000s. His notable television work includes the d...

Benjamin Geza Affleck-Boldt (born August 15, 1972), better known as Ben Affleck, is an American actor and filmmaker. He has won two Academy Awards and three Golden Globe Awards. Affleck began his career as a child actor, starring...

Robert John Downey Jr. (born April 4, 1965) is an American actor, producer, and singer, whose career has included success in his youth, followed by a period of substance abuse and legal troubles, and a resurgence of commercial suc...

John Stephen Goodman (born June 20, 1952) is an American actor. Early in his career, he was best known for playing Dan Conner on the ABC TV series Roseanne (1988–1997), for which he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in 1993...

Emily Olivia Leah Blunt (born 23 February 1983) is an English actress. She has appeared in The Devil Wears Prada (2006), The Young Victoria (2009), The Adjustment Bureau (2011), Looper (2012), Edge of Tomorrow (2014), and Into the...

Daniel Wroughton Craig (born 2 March 1968) is an English actor. Craig trained at the National Youth Theatre and graduated from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 1991, before beginning his career on stage. His film debut w...

Clark Gable (February 1, 1901 – November 16, 1960) was an American film actor, often referred to as "The King of Hollywood" or just simply as "The King". Gable began his career as a stage actor and appeared as an extra in silent f...

Klaus Kinski (born Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski 18 October 1926 – 23 November 1991) was a German actor. He appeared in more than 130 films, and was a leading role actor in the films of Werner Herzog, including Aguirre, the Wrath o...

Bruce MacLeish Dern (born June 4, 1936) is an American actor. He frequently takes roles as a supporting character actor, often playing villains of unstable nature. He has appeared in over eighty films, and was nominated for the Ac...

Ava Lavinia Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990) was an American actress. She was signed to a contract by MGM Studios in 1941 and appeared mainly in small roles until she drew attention with her performance in The Killer...

Bryce Dallas Howard (born March 2, 1981) is an American film actress and director. The daughter of director Ron Howard, she made her acting debut as an extra in her father's film Parenthood (1989) and went on to have small roles i...

Hayden Christensen (born April 19, 1981) is an American-Canadian actor and producer. He began his career on Canadian television at the age of 13, then diversified into American television in the late 1990s. He was then seen as Sam...

Samuel Leroy Jackson (born December 21, 1948) is an American actor and film producer. He achieved prominence in the early 1990s with films such as Jungle Fever (1991), Patriot Games (1992), Amos & Andrew (1993), True Romance (1993...

River Jude Phoenix (born River Jude Bottom; August 23, 1970 – October 31, 1993) was an American actor, musician, and activist. He was the older brother of Rain Phoenix, Joaquin Phoenix, Liberty Phoenix and Summer Phoenix. Phoenix'...

Sir Alec Guinness (2 April 1914 – 5 August 2000) was an English actor. After an early career on the stage he was featured in several of the Ealing Comedies, including The Ladykillers and Kind Hearts and Coronets in which he played...

Benicio Monserrate Rafael Del Toro Sánchez, better known as Benicio del Toro (born February 19, 1967), is a Puerto Rican actor. He has won the Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Golden Globe Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award for his p...

Josh James Brolin (born February 12, 1968) is an American actor. His first role was in the 1985 film The Goonies. Since then he has appeared in a wide number of films, and is best known for his work as Llewellyn Moss in No Country...

Xavier Dolan (born 20 March 1989), sometimes credited as Xavier Dolan-Tadros, is a Canadian actor and filmmaker.

Jonathan Vincent "Jon" Voight (born December 29, 1938) is an American actor. He is the winner of one Academy Award, having been nominated for four. He has also won four Golden Globe Awards and nominated for ten. He is the father o...

George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) was an American actor, director, writer, and producer who worked in theatre, radio, and film.

Lupita Amondi Nyong'o (born March 1, 1983) is a Mexican-Kenyan actress and film director. She was born in Mexico, but was raised in Kenya. She attended college in the United States, earning a Bachelor's degree in film and theater...

Kevin Michael Costner (born January 18, 1955) is an American actor, film director, producer, musician, and singer. He has won two Academy Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, and one Emmy Award, and has been nominated for three BAFT...

Sir Patrick Stewart (born 13 July 1940) is an English film, television, and stage actor, who has had a distinguished career on stage and screen. He is most widely known for his roles as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Ne...

Sam Rockwell (born November 5, 1968) is an American actor known for his leading roles in Lawn Dogs (1997), Confessions of a Dangerous Mind (2002), Matchstick Men (2003), The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005), Choke (2008), M...

Walter Bruce Willis (born March 19, 1955) is an American actor, producer and singer. His career began on the Off-Broadway stage and then in television in the 1980s, most notably as David Addison in Moonlighting (1985–89). He is pe...

Saoirse Úna Ronan (born 12 April 1994) is an Irish actress. She came to international prominence in 2007 after co-starring as Briony Tallis in the film Atonement, for which she received nominations for the Academy Award for Best S...

Tony Leung Chiu-wai (born 27 June 1962) is a Hong Kong actor and C-pop singer. He was the winner of Cannes Film Festival for Best Actor for his role in Wong Kar-wai's film In the Mood for Love. Leung is also a seven-time winner of...

Zhang Ziyi (born 9 February 1979), is a Chinese actress and model. She is regarded as one of the "Four Dan Actresses" of China. Her first major role was in The Road Home (1999). She achieved fame for her role in Crouching Tiger, H...

Takeshi Kaneshiro (Japanese, Okinawan and Chinese: 金城 武, romaji: Kaneshiro Takeshi, Pinyin: Jīnchéng Wǔ, born October 11, 1973) is a Taiwanese-Japanese actor and singer.

Maggie Cheung Man-yuk (Chinese: 張曼玉; born 20 September 1964) is a Hong Kong actress. Raised in England and Hong Kong, she has over 70 films to her credit since starting her career in 1983. Some of her most commercially successful...

Donald Chow Yun-fat, (born May 18, 1955), commonly known by his transcribed Chinese name, is a Hong Kong actor. He is best known in Asia for his collaborations with filmmaker John Woo in the heroic bloodshed genre films A Better T...

Michelle Yeoh Choo-Kheng (born 6 August 1962) is a Malaysian actress, best known for performing her own stunts in the Hong Kong action films that brought her to fame in the early 1990s. Born in Ipoh, Malaysia, she was chosen by Pe...

Tommy Tam Fu-Wing (born 19 August 1946 in Guangdong, Republic of China), better known by his stage name Ti Lung, is a Hong Kong actor, known for his numerous starring roles in a string of Shaw Brothers Studio's films, particularly...

Jennifer Jason Leigh (born February 5, 1962) is an American actress. She has appeared in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Easy Money, Flesh + Blood, The Hitcher, The Hudsucker Proxy, Single White Female, Dolores Claiborne, Last Exit...

Timothy Simon "Tim" Roth (born 14 May 1961) is an English actor and director. He made his debut in the 1982 television film Made in Britain and the 1984 film The Hit, for which he was nominated for a BAFTA Award. He gained more at...

Björk Guðmundsdóttir (born 21 November 1965), known mononymously as Björk, is an Icelandic experimental singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and occasional actress. She initially became known as the lead singer of the alterna...

Winona Ryder (born Winona Laura Horowitz; October 29, 1971) is an American actress. She made her film debut in the 1986 film Lucas. She played as Lydia Deetz, a goth teenager in Tim Burton's Beetlejuice (1988). After various appea...

Keanu Charles Reeves (born September 2, 1964) is a Lebanese-born Canadian actor, producer, director and musician. Reeves is most well known for his acting career, beginning in 1985 and spanning for more than three decades. He gain...

Woodrow Tracy "Woody" Harrelson (born July 23, 1961) is an American actor, activist and playwright. He is a two-time Academy Award nominee and has won one Emmy Award out of seven nominations. His breakout role came in 1985, joinin...

Joseph Leonard Gordon-Levitt (born February 17, 1981) is an American actor and filmmaker. As a child actor, he appeared in the films A River Runs Through It, Angels in the Outfield and 10 Things I Hate About You, and as Tommy Solo...

Thomas William "Tom" Hiddleston (born 9 February 1981) is an English actor. He is best known for his role as Loki in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, appearing in Thor (2011), The Avengers (2012), and Thor: The Dark World (2013). He...

Sally Margaret Field (born November 6, 1946) is an American actress and director. She is known for her film roles in Smokey and the Bandit (1977), Norma Rae (1979), Places in the Heart (1984), Murphy's Romance (1985), Steel Magnol...

Dennis Lee Hopper (May 17, 1936 – May 29, 2010) was an American actor, filmmaker, photographer, and artist. He attended the Actors Studio, making his first television appearance in 1954, and soon after appeared in two films with J...

Idrissa Akuna "Idris" Elba (born 6 September 1972) is a British actor, musician and DJ. Elba is best known for his portrayal of drug lord and aspiring businessman Russell "Stringer" Bell in the HBO series The Wire, Detective John...

Stellan John Skarsgård (born 13 June 1951) is a Swedish actor. He is known for his roles as Jan Nyman in Breaking the Waves (1996), Prof. Gerald Lambeau in Good Will Hunting (1997), Bootstrap Bill in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead...

Timothy Francis "Tim" Robbins (born October 16, 1958) is an American actor, screenwriter, director, producer, activist and musician. He is well known for his portrayal of Andy Dufresne in the prison drama film The Shawshank Redemp...

Lucy Alexis Liu (born Lucy Liu; December 2, 1968) is an American actress, model and artist. She became known for playing the role of the vicious and ill-mannered Ling Woo in the television series Ally McBeal (1998–2002), for which...