Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor

Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the award has commonly been referred to as the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. While actors are nominated for this award by Academy members who are actors and actresses themselves, winners are selected by the Academy membership as a whole. Under the system currently in place, an actor is nominated for a specific performance in a single film, and such nominations are limited to five per year.

History

Throughout the past 72 years, accounting for ties and repeat winners, AMPAS has presented a total of 72 Best Supporting Actor awards to 65 different actors. Winners of this Academy Award of Merit receive the familiar Oscar statuette, depicting a gold-plated knight holding a crusader's sword and standing on a reel of film. Prior to the 16th Academy Awards ceremony (1943), however, they received a plaque. The first recipient was Walter Brennan, who was honored at the 9th Academy Awards ceremony (1936) for his performance in "Come and Get It". The most recent recipient was Javier Bardem, who was honored at the 80th Academy Awards ceremony (2007) for his performance in "No Country for Old Men".

Until the 8th Academy Awards ceremony (1935), nominations for the Best Actor award were intended to include all actors, whether the performance was in either a leading or supporting role. At the 9th Academy Awards ceremony (1936), however, the Best Supporting Actor category was specifically introduced as a distinct award following complaints that the single Best Actor category necessarily favored leading performers with the most screen time. Nonetheless, Lionel Barrymore had received a Best Actor award ("A Free Soul", 1931) and Franchot Tone a Best Actor nomination ("Mutiny on the Bounty", 1935) for their performances in clear supporting roles. Currently, Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role, Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role, Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role, and Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role constitute the four Academy Awards of Merit for acting annually presented by AMPAS.

Superlatives

Walter Brennan, the winner of the inaugural award in 1936, is the only actor to win the award three times (from four nominations). Five actors have won the award twice: Anthony Quinn, Melvyn Douglas, Michael Caine, Peter Ustinov and Jason Robards. Robards was the only person to win consecutive Best Supporting Actor awards, for "All the President's Men" (1976) and "Julia" (1977).

Claude Rains and Arthur Kennedy share the greatest number of unsuccessful nominations, four each. The only other actors with four nominations were Walter Brennan (won three times) and Jack Nicholson (won once). Charles Bickford, Jeff Bridges, Robert Duvall, Ed Harris, and Al Pacino have all had three unsuccessful nominations (no wins).

Harold Russell was the first (and only) actor to win two Academy Awards for the same performance when he won both Best Supporting Actor and the Academy Honorary Award for "The Best Years of Our Lives" (1946). Thanks to a quirk of voting, in 1944 Barry Fitzgerald in "Going My Way" became the only actor nominated in both the Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor categories for the same performance, winning the latter. (Today, studios designate in which category they want a performer to compete.)

Robert De Niro's 1974 win as the young Vito Corleone in "The Godfather Part II" is unique as the only Supporting Oscar won for playing a part previously played by a Best Actor winner (Marlon Brando in "The Godfather"). De Niro and Benicio del Toro (who won for "Traffic") are the only winners for a foreign-language performance in this category.

John Mills was the only actor (along with five actresses) ever to receive an Oscar nomination for a non-speaking role. Mills was nominated for, and won, Best Supporting Actor for his performance as a mute brain-damaged in "Ryan's Daughter" (1970).

There have been no posthumous winners of this award, and Sir Ralph Richardson was the only person posthumously nominated - in 1984 for "" (1983). There has been widespread speculation that actor Heath Ledger will receive a posthumous nomination for his final performance, as the Joker in "The Dark Knight", at the 2008 awards.

The earliest nominee in this category who is still alive is James Whitmore (1949) followed by Karl Malden (1951). The earliest winner in this category who is still alive is Karl Malden (1951) followed by George Chakiris (1961).

Winners and nominees

Following the Academy's practice, the films below are listed by year of their Los Angeles qualifying run, which is usually (but not always) the film's year of release. For example, the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor of 1999 was announced during the award ceremony held in 2000. Winners are listed first in bold, followed by the other nominees. For a list sorted by actor names, please see List of Best Supporting Actor nominees. For a list sorted by film titles, please see List of Best Supporting Actor nominees (films).

1930s

*1936 Walter Brennan - "Come and Get It" as Swan Bostrom
** Mischa Auer - "My Man Godfrey" as Carlo
** Stuart Erwin - "Pigskin Parade" as Amos Dodd
** Basil Rathbone - "Romeo and Juliet" as Tybalt - Nephew to Lady Capulet
** Akim Tamiroff - "The General Died at Dawn" as Gen. Yang

*1937 Joseph Schildkraut - "The Life of Emile Zola" as Capt. Alfred Dreyfus
** Ralph Bellamy - "The Awful Truth" as 'Dan' Leeson
** Thomas Mitchell - "The Hurricane" as Dr. Kersaint
** H. B. Warner - "Lost Horizon" as Chang
** Roland Young - "Topper" as Cosmo Topper

*1938 Walter Brennan - "Kentucky" as Peter Goodwin
** John Garfield - "Four Daughters" as Mickey Borden
** Gene Lockhart - "Algiers" as Regis
** Robert Morley - "Marie Antoinette" as King Louis XVI
** Basil Rathbone - "If I Were King" as King Louis XI

*1939 Thomas Mitchell - "Stagecoach" as Doc Boone
** Brian Aherne - "Juarez" as Emperor Maximilian von Hapsburg
** Harry Carey - "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" as President of the Senate
** Brian Donlevy - "Beau Geste" as Sgt. Markoff
** Claude Rains - "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" as Sen. Joseph Harrison Paine

1940s

*1940 Walter Brennan - "The Westerner" as Judge Roy Bean
** Albert Basserman - "Foreign Correspondent" as Van Meer
** William Gargan - "They Knew What They Wanted" as Joe
** Jack Oakie - "The Great Dictator" as Benzini Napaloni (Dictator of Bacteria)
** James Stephenson - "The Letter" as Howard Joyce

*1941 Donald Crisp - "How Green Was My Valley" as Mr. Morgan
** Walter Brennan - "Sergeant York" as Pastor Rosier Pile
** Charles Coburn - "The Devil and Miss Jones" as John P. Merrick
** James Gleason - "Here Comes Mr. Jordan" as Max Corkle
** Sydney Greenstreet - "The Maltese Falcon" as Kasper Gutman

*1942 Van Heflin - "Johnny Eager" as Jeff Hartnett
** William Bendix - "Wake Island" as Pvt. Aloysius K. 'Smacksie' Randall
** Walter Huston - "Yankee Doodle Dandy" as Jerry Cohan
** Frank Morgan - "Tortilla Flat" as The Pirate
** Henry Travers - "Mrs. Miniver" as Mr. Ballard

Beginning with the 1943 awards, winners in the supporting acting categories were awarded Oscar statuettes similar to those awarded to winners in all other categories, including the leading acting categories. Prior to this, however, winners in the supporting acting categories were awarded plaques.

*1943 Charles Coburn - "The More the Merrier" as Benjamin Dingle
** Charles Bickford - "The Song of Bernadette" as Father Peyramale
** J. Carrol Naish - "Sahara" as Giuseppe
** Claude Rains - "Casablanca" as Captain Renault
** Akim Tamiroff - "For Whom the Bell Tolls" as Pablo

*1944 Barry Fitzgerald - "Going My Way" as Father Fitzgibbon
** Hume Cronyn - "The Seventh Cross" as Paul Roeder
** Claude Rains - "Mr. Skeffington" as Job Skeffington
** Clifton Webb - "Laura" as Waldo Lydecker
** Monty Woolley - "Since You Went Away" as Colonel William G. Smollett

*1945 James Dunn - "A Tree Grows In Brooklyn" as Johnny Nolan aka The Brooklyn Thrush
** Michael Chekhov - "Spellbound" as Dr. Alexander 'Alex' Brulov
** John Dall - "The Corn Is Green" as Morgan Evans
** Robert Mitchum - "The Story of G.I. Joe" as Lt. / Capt. Bill Walker
** J. Carroll Naish - "A Medal for Benny" as Charley Martin

*1946 Harold Russell - "The Best Years of Our Lives" as Homer Parrish
** Charles Coburn - "The Green Years" as Alexander Gow
** William Demarest - "The Jolson Story" as Steve Martin
** Claude Rains - "Notorious" as Alexander Sebastian
** Clifton Webb - "The Razor's Edge" as Elliott Templeton

*1947 Edmund Gwenn - "Miracle on 34th Street" as Kris Kringle
** Charles Bickford - "The Farmer's Daughter" as Joseph Clancy (major-domo)
** Thomas Gomez - "Ride the Pink Horse" as Pancho
** Robert Ryan - "Crossfire" as Montgomery
** Richard Widmark - "Kiss of Death" as Tommy Udo

*1948 Walter Huston - "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" as Howard
** Charles Bickford - "Johnny Belinda" as Black McDonald
** José Ferrer - "Joan of Arc" as The Dauphin, Charles VII, later King of France
** Oscar Homolka - "I Remember Mama" as Uncle Chris Halverson
** Cecil Kellaway - "The Luck of the Irish" as Horace (A Leprechaun)

*1949 Dean Jagger - "Twelve O'Clock High" as Major Stovall
** John Ireland - "All the King's Men" as Jack Burden
** Arthur Kennedy - "Champion" as Connie Kelly
** Ralph Richardson - "The Heiress" as Dr. Austin Sloper
** James Whitmore - "Battleground" as Kinnie

1950s

*1950 George Sanders - "All About Eve" as Addison De Witt
** Jeff Chandler - "Broken Arrow" as Cochise
** Edmund Gwenn - "Mister 880" as 'Skipper' Miller
** Sam Jaffe - "The Asphalt Jungle" as Doc Erwin Riedenschneider
** Erich von Stroheim - "Sunset Boulevard" as Max von Meyerling
*1951 Karl Malden - "A Streetcar Named Desire" as Harold 'Mitch' Mitchell
** Leo Genn - "Quo Vadis" as Petronius
** Kevin McCarthy - "Death of a Salesman" as Biff Loman
** Peter Ustinov - "Quo Vadis" as Nero
** Gig Young - "Come Fill the Cup" as Boyd Copeland
*1952 Anthony Quinn - "Viva Zapata!" as Eufemio Zapata
** Richard Burton - "My Cousin Rachel" as Philip Ashley
** Arthur Hunnicutt - "The Big Sky" as Zeb Calloway/Narrator
** Victor McLaglen - "The Quiet Man" as 'Red' Will Danaher
** Jack Palance - "Sudden Fear" as Lester Blaine
*1953 Frank Sinatra - "From Here to Eternity" as Pvt. Angelo Maggio
** Eddie Albert - "Roman Holiday" as Irving Radovich
** Brandon de Wilde - "Shane" as Joey Starrett
** Jack Palance - "Shane" as Jack Wilson
** Robert Strauss - "Stalag 17" as Stanislas 'Animal' Kasava
*1954 Edmond O'Brien - "The Barefoot Contessa" as Oscar Muldoon
** Lee J. Cobb - "On the Waterfront" as Johnny Friendly
** Karl Malden - "On the Waterfront" as Father Barry
** Rod Steiger - "On the Waterfront" as Charley 'the Gent' Malloy
** Tom Tully - "The Caine Mutiny" as Commander DeVriess
*1955 Jack Lemmon - "Mister Roberts" as Ens. Frank Thurlowe Pulver
** Arthur Kennedy - "Trial" as Barney Castle
** Joe Mantell - "Marty" as Angie
** Sal Mineo - "Rebel Without a Cause" as John 'Plato' Crawford
** Arthur O'Connell - "Picnic" as Howard Bevans
*1956 Anthony Quinn - "Lust for Life" as Paul Gauguin
** Don Murray - "Bus Stop" as Beauregard 'Bo' Decker
** Anthony Perkins - "Friendly Persuasion" as Josh Birdwell
** Mickey Rooney - "The Bold and the Brave" as Dooley
** Robert Stack - "Written on the Wind" as Kyle Hadley
*1957 Red Buttons - "Sayonara" as Airman Joe Kelly
** Vittorio De Sica - " A Farewell to Arms" as Major Alessandro Rinaldi
** Sessue Hayakawa - "The Bridge on the River Kwai" as Colonel Saito
** Arthur Kennedy - "Peyton Place" as Lucas Cross
** Russ Tamblyn - "Peyton Place" as Norman Page
*1958 Burl Ives - "The Big Country" as Rufus Hannassey
** Theodore Bikel - "The Defiant Ones" as Sheriff Max Muller
** Lee J. Cobb - "The Brothers Karamazov" as Fyodor Karamazov
** Arthur Kennedy - "Some Came Running" as Frank Hirsh
** Gig Young - "Teacher's Pet" as Dr. Hugo Pine
*1959 Hugh Griffith - "Ben-Hur" as Sheik Ilderim
** Arthur O'Connell - "Anatomy of a Murder" as Parnell Emmett McCarthy
** George C. Scott - "Anatomy of a Murder" as Asst. State Atty. Gen. Claude Dancer
** Robert Vaughn - "The Young Philadelphians" as Chester A. 'Chet' Gwynn
** Ed Wynn - "The Diary of Anne Frank" as Albert Dussell

1960s

*1960 Peter Ustinov - "Spartacus" as Lentulus Batiatus
** Peter Falk - "Murder, Inc." as Abe 'Kid Twist' Reles
** Jack Kruschen - "The Apartment" as Dr. Dreyfuss
** Sal Mineo - "Exodus" as Dov Landau
** Chill Wills - "The Alamo" as Beekeeper
*1961 George Chakiris - "West Side Story" as Bernardo
** Montgomery Clift - "Judgment at Nuremberg" as Rudolph Petersen
** Peter Falk - "Pocketful of Miracles" as Joy Boy
** Jackie Gleason - "The Hustler" as Minnesota Fats
** George C. Scott - "The Hustler" as Bert Gordon
*1962 Ed Begley - "Sweet Bird of Youth" as Tom 'Boss' Finley
** Victor Buono - "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?" as Edwin Flagg
** Telly Savalas - "Birdman of Alcatraz" as Feto Gomez
** Omar Sharif - "Lawrence of Arabia" as Sherif Ali ibn el Kharish
** Terence Stamp - "Billy Budd" as Billy Budd
*1963 Melvyn Douglas - "Hud" as Homer Bannon
** Nick Adams - "Twilight of Honor" as Ben Brown
** Bobby Darin - "Captain Newman, M.D." as Corporal Jim Tompkins
** Hugh Griffith - "Tom Jones" as Squire Western
** John Huston - "The Cardinal" as Cardinal Glennon
*1964 Peter Ustinov - "Topkapi" Arthur Simon Simpson
** John Gielgud - "Becket" as Louis VII of France
** Stanley Holloway - "My Fair Lady" as Alfred Doolittle
** Edmond O'Brien - "Seven Days in May" as Senator Raymond Clark
** Lee Tracy - "The Best Man" as President Art Hockstader
*1965 Martin Balsam - "A Thousand Clowns" as Arnold Burns
** Ian Bannen - "The Flight of the Phoenix" as 'Ratbags' Crow
** Tom Courtenay - "Doctor Zhivago" as Pasha Antipov
** Michael Dunn - "Ship of Fools" as Carl Glocken
** Frank Finlay - "Othello" as Iago
*1966 Walter Matthau - "The Fortune Cookie" as Willie Gingrich
** Mako - "The Sand Pebbles" as Po-han
** James Mason - "Georgy Girl" as James Leamington
** George Segal - "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" as Nick
** Robert Shaw - "A Man for All Seasons" as Henry VIII of England
*1967 George Kennedy - "Cool Hand Luke" as Dragline
** John Cassavetes - "The Dirty Dozen" as Victor P. Franko
** Gene Hackman - "Bonnie and Clyde" as Buck Barrow
** Cecil Kellaway - "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" as Monsignor Mike Ryan
** Michael J. Pollard - "Bonnie and Clyde" as C.W. Moss
*1968 Jack Albertson - "The Subject Was Roses" as John Cleary
** Seymour Cassel - "Faces" as Chet
** Daniel Massey - "Star!" as Noel Coward
** Jack Wild - "Oliver!" as The Artful Dodger
** Gene Wilder - "The Producers" as Leo Bloom
*1969 Gig Young - "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" as Rocky
** Rupert Crosse - "The Reivers" as Ned
** Elliott Gould - "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice" as Ted Henderson
** Jack Nicholson - "Easy Rider" as George Hanson
** Anthony Quayle - "Anne of the Thousand Days" as Cardinal Wolsey

1970s

*1970 John Mills - "Ryan's Daughter" as Michael
** Richard S. Castellano - "Lovers and Other Strangers" as Frank Vecchio
** Chief Dan George - "Little Big Man" as Old Lodge Skins
** Gene Hackman - "I Never Sang for My Father" as Gene Garrison
** John Marley - "Love Story" as Phil Cavalleri
*1971 Ben Johnson - "The Last Picture Show" as Sam the Lion
** Jeff Bridges - "The Last Picture Show" as Duane Jackson
** Leonard Frey - "Fiddler on the Roof" as Motel Kamzoil
** Richard Jaeckel - "Sometimes a Great Notion" as Joe Ben Stamper
** Roy Scheider - "The French Connection" as Detective Buddy 'Cloudy' Russo
*1972 Joel Grey - "Cabaret" as Master of Ceremonies
** Eddie Albert - "The Heartbreak Kid" as Mr. Corcoran
** James Caan - "The Godfather" as Sonny Corleone
** Robert Duvall - "The Godfather" as Tom Hagen
** Al Pacino - "The Godfather" as Michael Corleone
*1973 John Houseman - "The Paper Chase" as Charles W. Kingsfield Jr.
** Vincent Gardenia - "Bang the Drum Slowly" as Dutch Schnell
** Jack Gilford - "Save the Tiger" as Phil Greene
** Jason Miller - "The Exorcist" as Father Damien Karras
** Randy Quaid - "The Last Detail" as Larry Meadows
*1974 Robert De Niro - "The Godfather Part II" as Vito Corleone
** Fred Astaire - "The Towering Inferno" as Harlee Claiborne
** Jeff Bridges - "Thunderbolt and Lightfoot as Lightfoot
** Michael V. Gazzo - "The Godfather Part II" as Frankie Pentangeli
** Lee Strasberg - "The Godfather Part II" as Hyman Roth
*1975 George Burns - "The Sunshine Boys" as Al Lewis
** Brad Dourif - "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" as Billy Bibbit
** Burgess Meredith - "The Day of the Locust" as Harry Greener
** Chris Sarandon - "Dog Day Afternoon" as Leon Shermer
** Jack Warden - "Shampoo" as Lester
*1976 Jason Robards - "All the President's Men" as Ben Bradlee
** Ned Beatty - "Network" as Arthur Jensen
** Burgess Meredith - "Rocky" as Mickey Goldmill
** Laurence Olivier - "Marathon Man" as Dr. Christian Szell
** Burt Young - "Rocky" as Paulie Pennino
*1977 Jason Robards - "Julia" as Dashiell Hammett
** Mikhail Baryshnikov - "The Turning Point" as Yuri Kopeikine
** Peter Firth - "Equus" as Alan Strang
** Alec Guinness - "" as Obi-Wan Kenobi
** Maximilian Schell - "Julia" as Johann
*1978 Christopher Walken - "The Deer Hunter" as Nikonar 'Nick' Chevotarevich
** Bruce Dern - "Coming Home" as Captain Bob Hyde
** Richard Farnsworth - "Comes a Horseman" as Dodger
** John Hurt - "Midnight Express" as Max
** Jack Warden - "Heaven Can Wait" as Max Corkle
*1979 Melvyn Douglas - "Being There" as Benjamin Turnbull Rand
** Robert Duvall - "Apocalypse Now" as Lt. Col Bill Kilgore
** Justin Henry - "Kramer vs. Kramer" as Billy Kramer
** Frederic Forrest - "The Rose" as Huston Dyer
** Mickey Rooney - "The Black Stallion" as Henry Dailey

1980s

*1980 Timothy Hutton - "Ordinary People" as Conrad Jarrett
** Judd Hirsch - "Ordinary People" as Dr. Tyrone C. Berger
** Michael O'Keefe - "The Great Santini" as Ben Meechum
** Joe Pesci - "Raging Bull" as Joey LaMotta
** Jason Robards - "Melvin and Howard" as Howard Hughes
*1981 John Gielgud - "Arthur" as Hobson
** James Coco - "Only When I Laugh" as Jimmy
** Ian Holm - "Chariots of Fire" as Sam Mussabini
** Jack Nicholson - "Reds" as Eugene O'Neill
** Howard Rollins - "Ragtime" as Coalhouse Walker, Jr.
*1982 Louis Gossett, Jr. - "An Officer and A Gentleman" as Gunnery Sergeant Emil Foley
** Charles Durning - "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas" as Governor
** John Lithgow - "The World According to Garp" as Roberta Muldoon
** James Mason - "The Verdict" as Ed Concannon
** Robert Preston - "Victor/Victoria" as Carroll 'Toddy' Todd
*1983 Jack Nicholson - "Terms of Endearment" as Garrett Breedlove
** Charles Durning - "To Be or Not to Be" as Colonel Erhardt
** John Lithgow - "Terms of Endearment" as Sam Burns
** Sam Shepard - "The Right Stuff" as Chuck Yeager
** Rip Torn - "Cross Creek" as Marsh Turner
*1984 Haing S. Ngor - "The Killing Fields" as Dith Pran
** Adolph Caesar - "A Soldier's Story" as Sergeant Waters
** John Malkovich - "Places in the Heart" as Mr. Will
** Noriyuki Pat Morita - "The Karate Kid" as Mr. Kesuke Miyagi
** Ralph Richardson - "Greystoke - The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes" as The Sixth Earl of Greystoke (posthumous nomination)
*1985 Don Ameche - "Cocoon" as Arthur Selwyn
** Klaus Maria Brandauer - "Out of Africa" as Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke
** William Hickey - "Prizzi's Honor" as Don Corrado Prizzi
** Robert Loggia - "Jagged Edge" as Sam Ransom
** Eric Roberts - "Runaway Train" as Buck
*1986 Michael Caine - "Hannah and Her Sisters" as Elliot
** Tom Berenger - "Platoon" as Sgt. Barnes
** Willem Dafoe - "Platoon" as Sgt. Elias
** Denholm Elliott - "A Room with a View" as Mr. Emerson
** Dennis Hopper - "Hoosiers" as Shooter
*1987 Sean Connery - "The Untouchables" as Jim Malone
** Albert Brooks - "Broadcast News" as Aaron Altman
** Morgan Freeman - "Street Smart" as Fast Black
** Vincent Gardenia - "Moonstruck" as Cosmo Castorini
** Denzel Washington - "Cry Freedom" as Steve Biko
*1988 Kevin Kline - "A Fish Called Wanda" as Otto West
**Alec Guinness - "Little Dorrit" as William Dorrit
**Martin Landau - "" as Abe Karatz
**River Phoenix - "Running on Empty" as Danny Pope
**Dean Stockwell - "Married to the Mob" as Tony 'The Tiger' Russo
*1989 Denzel Washington - "Glory" as Pvt. Trip
**Danny Aiello - "Do the Right Thing" as Sal
**Dan Aykroyd - "Driving Miss Daisy" as Boolie Werthan
**Marlon Brando - "A Dry White Season" as Ian Mackenzie
**Martin Landau - "Crimes and Misdemeanors" as Judah Rosenthal

1990s

*1990 Joe Pesci - "Goodfellas" as Tommy DeVito
**Bruce Davison - "Longtime Companion" as David
**Andy García - "The Godfather Part III" as Vincent Mancini-Corleone
**Graham Greene - "Dances with Wolves" as Kicking Bird
**Al Pacino - "Dick Tracy" as Alphonse 'Big Boy' Caprice
*1991 Jack Palance - "City Slickers" as Curly Washburn
**Tommy Lee Jones - "JFK" as Clay Shaw
**Harvey Keitel - "Bugsy" as Mickey Cohen
**Ben Kingsley - "Bugsy" as Meyer Lansky
**Michael Lerner - "Barton Fink" as Jack Lipnick
*1992 Gene Hackman - "Unforgiven" as Little Bill Daggett
**Jaye Davidson - "The Crying Game" as Dil
**Jack Nicholson - "A Few Good Men" as Col. Nathan R. Jessep
**Al Pacino - "Glengarry Glen Ross" as Ricky Roma
**David Paymer - "Mr. Saturday Night" as Stan
*1993 Tommy Lee Jones - "The Fugitive" as Marshall Samuel Gerard
**Leonardo DiCaprio - "What's Eating Gilbert Grape" as Arnie Grape
**Ralph Fiennes - "Schindler's List" as Amon Göth
**John Malkovich - "In the Line of Fire" as Mitch Leary
**Pete Postlethwaite - "In the Name of the Father" as Giuseppe Conlon
*1994 Martin Landau - "Ed Wood" as Bela Lugosi
**Samuel L. Jackson - "Pulp Fiction" as Jules Winnfield
**Chazz Palminteri - "Bullets Over Broadway" as Cheech
**Paul Scofield - "Quiz Show" as Mark Van Doren
**Gary Sinise - "Forrest Gump" as Lieutenant Dan Taylor
*1995 Kevin Spacey - "The Usual Suspects" as Roger 'Verbal' Kint
**James Cromwell - "Babe" as Farmer Arthur Hoggett
**Ed Harris - "Apollo 13" as Gene Kranz
**Brad Pitt - "Twelve Monkeys" as Jeffrey Goines
**Tim Roth - "Rob Roy" as Archibald Cunningham
*1996 Cuba Gooding, Jr. - "Jerry Maguire" as Rod Tidwell
**William H. Macy - "Fargo" as Jerry Lundegaard
**Armin Mueller-Stahl - "Shine" as Peter Helfgott
**Edward Norton - "Primal Fear" as Aaron Stampler
**James Woods - "Ghosts of Mississippi" as Byron De La Beckwith
*1997 Robin Williams - "Good Will Hunting" as Sean Maguire
**Robert Forster - "Jackie Brown" as Max Cherry
**Anthony Hopkins - "Amistad" as John Quincy Adams
**Greg Kinnear - "As Good as It Gets" as Simon Bishop
**Burt Reynolds - "Boogie Nights" as Jack Horner
*1998 James Coburn - "Affliction" as Glen Whitehouse
**Robert Duvall - "A Civil Action" as Jerome Facher
**Ed Harris - "The Truman Show" as Christof
**Geoffrey Rush - "Shakespeare in Love" as Philip Henslowe
**Billy Bob Thornton - "A Simple Plan" as Jacob Mitchell
*1999 Michael Caine - "The Cider House Rules" as Dr. Wilbur Larch
**Tom Cruise - "Magnolia" as Frank 'T.J.' Mackey
**Michael Clarke Duncan - "The Green Mile" as John Coffey
**Jude Law - "The Talented Mr. Ripley" as Dickie Greenleaf
**Haley Joel Osment - "The Sixth Sense" as Cole Sear

2000s

*2000 Benicio del Toro - "Traffic" as Javier Rodriguez Rodriguez
**Jeff Bridges - "The Contender" as President Jackson Evans
**Willem Dafoe - "Shadow of the Vampire" as Max Schreck
**Albert Finney - "Erin Brockovich" as Edward L. Masry
**Joaquin Phoenix - "Gladiator" as Commodus
*2001 Jim Broadbent - "Iris" as John Bayley
**Ethan Hawke - "Training Day" as Jake Hoyt
**Ben Kingsley - "Sexy Beast" as Don Logan
**Ian McKellen - "" as Gandalf
**Jon Voight - "Ali" as Howard Cosell
*2002 Chris Cooper - "Adaptation." as John Laroche
**Ed Harris - "The Hours" as Richard Brown
**Paul Newman - "Road to Perdition" as John Rooney
**John C. Reilly - "Chicago" as Amos Hart
**Christopher Walken - "Catch Me If You Can" as Frank Abagnale, Sr.
*2003 Tim Robbins - "Mystic River" as Dave Boyle
**Alec Baldwin - "The Cooler" as Shelly Kaplow
**Benicio del Toro - "21 Grams" as Jack Jordan
**Djimon Hounsou - "In America" as Mateo
**Ken Watanabe - "The Last Samurai" as Katsumoto
*2004 Morgan Freeman - "Million Dollar Baby" as Eddie "Scrap-Iron" Dupris
**Alan Alda - "The Aviator" as Senator Owen Brewster
**Thomas Haden Church - "Sideways" as Jack
**Jamie Foxx - "Collateral" as Max Durocher
**Clive Owen - "Closer" as Larry Gray
*2005 George Clooney - "Syriana" as Bob Barnes
**Matt Dillon - "Crash" as Sergeant John Ryan
**Paul Giamatti - "Cinderella Man" as Joe Gould
**Jake Gyllenhaal - "Brokeback Mountain" as Jack Twist
**William Hurt - "A History of Violence" as Richie Cusack
*2006 Alan Arkin - "Little Miss Sunshine" as Edwin Hoover
**Jackie Earle Haley - "Little Children" as Ronald James McGorvey
**Djimon Hounsou - "Blood Diamond" as Solomon Vandy
**Eddie Murphy - "Dreamgirls" as James "Thunder" Early
**Mark Wahlberg - "The Departed" as Sgt. Sean Dignam
*2007 Javier Bardem - "No Country for Old Men" as Anton Chigurh
**Casey Affleck - "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" as Robert Ford
**Philip Seymour Hoffman - "Charlie Wilson's War" as Gust Avrakotos
**Hal Holbrook - "Into the Wild" as Ron Franz
**Tom Wilkinson - "Michael Clayton" as Arthur Edens

International presence

As the Academy Awards are based in the United States and are centered on the Hollywood film industry, the majority of Academy Award winners have been Americans. Nonetheless, there is significant international presence at the awards, as evidenced by the following list of winners of the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

*Cambodia: Haing S. Ngor
*Mexico: Anthony Quinn
*Puerto Rico: Benicio del Toro
*Republic of Ireland: Barry Fitzgerald
*Spain: Javier Bardem
*United Kingdom: Jim Broadbent, Michael Caine, Sean Connery, Donald Crisp, John Gielgud, Hugh Griffith, Edmund Gwenn, John Mills, George Sanders, and Peter Ustinov

At the 37th Academy Awards (1964), for the first time in history, all four of the top acting honors were awarded to non-Americans: Rex Harrison, Julie Andrews, Peter Ustinov, and Lila Kedrova. This occurred for the second time at the 80th Academy Awards (2007), when all four acting categories were similarly represented: Daniel Day-Lewis, Marion Cotillard, Javier Bardem, and Tilda Swinton.

See also

* Academy Award for Best Actor
* Academy Award for Best Actress
* Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress
* List of Academy Awards ceremonies
* List of actors
* List of Best Actor winners by age at win
* List of Best Actress winners by age at win
* List of Best Supporting Actor winners by age at win
* List of Best Supporting Actress winners by age at win
* Lists of films

External links

* [http://www.oscars.org/ Oscars.org] (official Academy site)
* [http://www.oscar.com/ Oscar.com] (official ceremony promotional site)
* [http://www.oscars.org/awardsdatabase/index.html The Academy Awards Database] (official site)