Top 20 Performances of 2023
These are my top 20 performances listed in order for each category (lead actor, lead actress, supporting actor & supporting actress).
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- Actor
- Producer
- Director
Paul Giamatti is an American actor who has worked steadily and prominently for over thirty years, and is best known for leading roles in the films American Splendor (2003), Sideways (2004), and Barney's Version (2010) (for which he won a Golden Globe), and supporting roles in the films Cinderella Man (2005), The Illusionist (2006), and San Andreas (2015).
Paul Edward Valentine Giamatti was born June 6, 1967 in New Haven, Connecticut, and is the youngest of three children. His mother, the former Toni Marilyn Smith, was an actress before marrying. His father, Bart Giamatti (Angelo Bartlett Giamatti), was a professor of Renaissance Literature at Yale University, and went on to become the university's youngest president (in 1986, Bart was appointed president of baseball's National League. He became Commissioner of Baseball on April 1, 1989 and served for five months until his untimely death on September 1, 1989. He was commissioner at the time Pete Rose was banned from the game). Paul's father also wrote six books. Paul's older brother, Marcus Giamatti, is also an actor. His sister, Elena, designs jewelry. His ancestry is Italian (from his paternal grandfather), German, English, Dutch, Scottish, and Irish.
Paul graduated from Choate Rosemary Hall prep school, majored in English at Yale, and obtained his Master's Degree in Fine Arts, with his major in drama from the Yale University School of Drama. His acting roots are in theatre, from his college days at Yale, to regional productions (Seattle, San Diego and Williamstown, Massachusetts), to Broadway.in The Holdovers (best performance by an actor in a leading role)- Actor
- Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Simon Morzé was born in 1996 in Wien, Austria. He is an actor and assistant director, known for Fast Forward (2009), The Fox (2022) and L'animale (2018).in The Fox (2nd choice)- Actor
- Director
- Writer
Koji Yakusho is an acclaimed and famed Japanese actor who has appeared in many notable films, including Tampopo, Unagi and Babel, but may be best known internationally for his role in Shall We Dance, which at the time of its release was Asia's biggest film export. He was born in the southern city of Nagasaki as Koji Hashimoto, but moved to Tokyo and began working in the city's municipality from which he borrowed his alias. Yakusho means 'government office.' While at acting school he met actress Saeko Kawatsu whom he soon married in 1982. He picked up stage roles, moved to a TV serial on Japan's national broadcaster NHK in 1983 and had his first major break playing a mostly silent role in the avant-garde food drama Tampopo. Koji has collaborated with director Kurosawa Kiyoshi several times, won the Best Actor Award at the Japanese Academy Awards more than once and been nominated for it and other awards even more often. He directed Gaman No Abura in 2009. In 2023, he received the Best Actor award at the 76th Cannes Film Festival for his lead role in Wim Wenders' Perfect Days.in Perfect Days (3rd choice)- Actor
- Music Department
Arieh Worthalter was born on 25 March 1985 in Paris, France. He is an actor, known for The Goldman Case (2023), The Take (2016) and Girl (2018).in The Goldman Case (4th choice)- Actor
- Soundtrack
Franz Rogowski is an actor. He was born on 2nd February 1986 in Freiburg, Germany. The actor is known for Victoria (2015) and Love Steaks (2013). Victoria (2015) is one of the few feature films shot in a single continuous take and won amongst other things the Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Contribution for Cinematography as well as the German Film Award in six categories. Since 2015 Franz Rogowski is member of the Kammerspiele Munich.in Passages (5th choice)- Actress
- Additional Crew
- Soundtrack
Sandra Hüller was born in Suhl. She studied acting at the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Arts in Berlin. For her performance of Anneliese Michel in Hans-Christian Schmid's drama Requiem she won The Silver Bear for Best Actress. She is internationally known for her starring role in Maren Ade's Toni Erdmann, for which she won among others the European Film Award and the Toronto Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress.in Anatomy of a Fall & The Zone of Interest (best performances by an actress in a leading role)- Actress
- Producer
- Director
Zar Amir Ebrahimi was born on 9 July 1981 in Tehran, Iran. She is an actress and producer, known for Holy Spider (2022), White Paradise (2022) and Tatami (2023).in Shayda (2nd choice)- Eli Krasteva Skorcheva is a Bulgarian cinema, television and theater actress. She was born in Plovdiv, Bulgaria on March 8, 1954. She graduated from the School of Engineering and Architecture, then - in "acting" from National Academy for Theatre and Film Art, Sofia, Bulgaria and later - in "management and marketing of insurance business". She stop shooting film in the early 1990th , but sometimes, though rarely, she has participated in theater productions. Some famous movies with her participation are "Adaptation" (1979), "Turnovo Queen" (1980), "Women on the third floor" (1987) and "Madame Bovary from Sliven" (1991).in Blaga's Lessons (3rd choice)
- Actress
- Soundtrack
Paula Beer was born on 23 February 1995 in Mainz, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. She is an actress, known for Undine (2020), Frantz (2016) and The Dark Valley (2014).in Afire & Stella. A Life.(4th choice)- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Emily Jean "Emma" Stone was born on November 6, 1988 in Scottsdale, Arizona to Krista Jean Stone (née Yeager), a homemaker & Jeffrey Charles "Jeff" Stone, a contracting company founder and CEO. She is of Swedish, German & British Isles descent. Stone began acting as a child as a member of the Valley Youth Theatre in Phoenix, Arizona, where she made her stage debut in a production of Kenneth Grahame's "The Wind in the Willows". She appeared in many more productions through her early teens until, at the age of fifteen, she decided that she wanted to make acting her career.
The official story is that she made a PowerPoint presentation, backed by Madonna's "Hollywood" and itself entitled "Project Hollywood", in an attempt to persuade her parents to allow her to drop out of school and move to Los Angeles. The pitch was successful and she and her mother moved to LA with her schooling completed at home while she spent her days auditioning.
She had her TV breakthrough when she won the part of Laurie Partridge in the VH1 talent/reality show In Search of the Partridge Family (2004) which led to a number of small TV roles in the following years. Her movie debut was as Jules in Superbad (2007) and, after a string of successful performances, her leading role as Olive in Easy A (2010) established her as a star.in Poor Things (5th choice)- Dominic Sessa was born on 25 October 2002 in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, USA. He is an actor, known for The Holdovers (2023), Tow and Oh. What. Fun..in The Holdovers (best performance by an actor in a supporting role)
- Archie Brigden is known for Silver Haze (2023).in Silver Haze (2nd choice)
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Milo Machado-Graner was born on 31 August 2008. He is an actor, known for Anatomy of a Fall (2023), Stuck Together (2021) and Waiting for Bojangles (2021).in Anatomy of a Fall (3rd choice)- Actor
- Producer
- Writer
Award-winning actor Mark Ruffalo was born on November 22, 1967, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, of humble means to father Frank Lawrence Ruffalo, a construction painter and Marie Rose (Hebert), a stylist and hairdresser; his father's ancestry is Italian and his mother is of half French-Canadian and half Italian descent. Mark moved with his family to Virginia Beach, Virginia, where he lived out most of his teenage years. Following high school, Mark moved with his family to San Diego and soon migrated north, eventually settling in Los Angeles.
Mark first took classes at the Stella Adler Conservatory and subsequently co-founded the Orpheus Theatre Company, an Equity-Waiver establishment, where he worked in nearly every capacity. From acting, writing, directing and producing to running the lights and building sets while building his resume.
Moving into film and TV, Mark's inauspicious movie debut was the drifter role of Christian in the horror opus Mirror Mirror 2: Raven Dance (1994) and returned to the film series in the role of Joey with Mirror Mirror 3: The Voyeur (1995). He continued on through the 1990's rather indistinctly with more secondary roles in the horror film The Dentist (1996) starring madman Corbin Bernsen; an amusing perf in the obscure dramedy The Last Big Thing (1996); a third billed role in the Jerry Stiller/Anne Meara bickering senior comedy A Fish in the Bathtub (1998); and the war drama Ceremony... The Ritual of Love (1976) directed by Ang Lee.
Bartending for nearly nearly a decade to make ends meet and discouraged enough to give it up, a chance meeting and resulting collaboration with playwright/screenwriter Kenneth Lonergan approaching the millennium changed everything. Ruffalo won NY success in Lonergan's 1996 off-Broadway play "This Is Our Youth," a story about troubled young adults. This led to his male lead in Lonergan's Oscar-winning film drama You Can Count on Me (2000), playing the ne'er-do-well brother of Laura Linney. The performance drew rave reviews and invited comparisons to an early Marlon Brando.
Ruffalo never looked back. Notable roles in The Last Castle (2001), XX/XY (2002), and Windtalkers (2002) followed, although in 2002 Ruffalo was diagnosed with an acoustic neuroma, a type of brain tumor. Though the tumor was benign, the resulting surgery led to a period of partial facial paralysis, from which he fully recovered. In 2003, Ruffalo scored leading roles alongside two popular female stars, playing a police detective opposite Meg Ryan in In the Cut (2003) and the love interest of Gwyneth Paltrow in the comedy View from the Top (2003).
Though both films were high-profile box office disappointments, Ruffalo went on to four notable (if highly disparate) films in 2004 -- We Don't Live Here Anymore (2004), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), 13 Going on 30 (2004), and Collateral (2004) -- which solidified his ability to be both a popular leading man and an acclaimed ensemble player in either comedy or drama.
After 2004, Ruffalo was consistently at work, with leads in popular Hollywood films and independent productions that continued to solidify him as one of film's most consistently strong actors: Just Like Heaven (2005), All the King's Men (2006), Zodiac (2007), Reservation Road (2007), and The Brothers Bloom (2008). He also made his Broadway debut as Moe Axelrod in the play "Awake and Sing!"
In 2010 Ruffalo achieved something of a breakthrough, by directing the indie film Sympathy for Delicious (2010), which won him the Special Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, and co-starring as the sperm-donor father to lesbian couple Annette Bening and Julianne Moore in The Kids Are All Right (2010). His role in the idiosyncratic domestic comedy/drama earned him Academy Award, Independent Spirit Award, Screen Actors Guild, and BAFTA nominations for Best Supporting Actor. He went on to earn two more Best Supporting Actor nominations as an Olympic-winning wrestling champion in Foxcatcher (2014) and as a journalist working to uncover the Catholic Church sex abuse scandal in Spotlight (2015). In 2017, the actor returned to Broadway in Arthur Miller's "The Price."
High-profile roles in Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island (2010) and Longeran's long-delayed film Margaret (2011) followed before Ruffalo's appearance as Dr. Bruce Banner, aka The Hulk, in Joss Whedon's movie blockbuster The Avengers (2012). Garnering highly positive reviews for a role in which actors Eric Bana and Edward Norton could not find success in previous films made Ruffalo a box office action star in addition to a critically-acclaimed actor. He returned to the Banner/Hulk role frequently in such Marvel movies as Iron Man 3 (2013), Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Captain Marvel (2019) and Avengers: Endgame (2019),
Reunited with former co-star Gwyneth Paltrow in the sex-addiction comedy-drama Thanks for Sharing (2012), he went on to earn a Golden Globe nomination for playing a bipolar Dad in Infinitely Polar Bear (2014). Ruffalo also took on the lead in Ryan Murphy's adaptation of Larry Kramer's AIDS-drama play The Normal Heart (2014) and earned a SAG Award and Emmy Nomination. He later took home the Emmy playing twin brothers, one a paranoid schizophrenic, in I Know This Much Is True (2020).
Ruffalo has been married to actress Sunrise Coigney since 2000; the couple has three children, two sons and a daughter.in Poor Things (4th choice)- Actor
- Producer
- Director
One of the greatest actors of all time, Robert De Niro was born on August 17, 1943 in Manhattan, New York City, to artists Virginia (Admiral) and Robert De Niro Sr. His paternal grandfather was of Italian descent, and his other ancestry is Irish, English, Dutch, German, and French. He was trained at the Stella Adler Conservatory and the American Workshop. De Niro first gained fame for his role in Bang the Drum Slowly (1973), but he gained his reputation as a volatile actor in Mean Streets (1973), which was his first film with director Martin Scorsese. He received an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in The Godfather Part II (1974) and received Academy Award nominations for best actor in Taxi Driver (1976), The Deer Hunter (1978) and Cape Fear (1991). He received the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull (1980).
De Niro has earned four Golden Globe Award nominations for Best Actor - Motion Picture Musical or Comedy, for his work in New York, New York (1977), opposite Liza Minnelli, Midnight Run (1988), Analyze This (1999) and Meet the Parents (2000). Other notable performances include Brazil (1985), The Untouchables (1987), Backdraft (1991), Frankenstein (1994), Heat (1995), Casino (1995) and Jackie Brown (1997). At the same time, he also directed and starred in such films as A Bronx Tale (1993) and The Good Shepherd (2006). De Niro has also received the AFI Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003 and the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2010.
As of 2022, De Niro is 79-years-old. He has never retired from acting, and continues to work regularly in mostly film.in Killers of the Flower Moon (5th choice)- Actress
- Soundtrack
Da'Vine Joy Randolph made her Broadway and West End debuts starring as Oda Mae Brown in Ghost the Musical (2012 Tony Award® Nomination, Best Featured Actress in a Musical). A Philadelphia native, she is an alum of Temple University in Theater with a concentration in Musical Theater and then attended Yale School of Drama for her Masters. Regional stage credits include Servant of Two Masters at Yale Repertory Theater and Hair at Prince Music Theater.in The Holdovers (best performance by an actress in a supporting role)- Born in Vienna, Adriane is Austrian with Polish roots. She moved from Vienna to Paris in 2006. From 2010 to 2012 she enrolls the Academy Cours Florent in Paris. Adriane is fluent in German, English, French and Polish and has an extensive list of hobbies as skiing, riding and kite-surfing. She's still young with a lot of potential.in The Fox (2nd choice)
- Angela Bruce was born in Leeds to an English mother and Trinidadian father. Despite an inauspicious start in life after her mother was forced to place her in a children's home, where the matron considered her "too coloured" to be adopted, her life changed dramatically at the age of three, when she chose the family she wanted to adopt her.
Bruce grew up as the only black child in a tiny mining village in England's northeast and enjoyed an idyllic rough-and-tumble childhood climbing trees and riding horses. Raised by her adoptive family to be happy in her own skin, she came of age after a Cinderella-like break into show business when the musical Hair came to Newcastle and she was plucked from the audience to dance on stage and later audition for the show, joining the cast ten days later to tour the UK for two years. Soon after that, she joined the original cast of The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975).
Since, then, in an acting career spanning five decades, she has played a myriad of characters on the stage, screen and radio. In 1975 she came to notice as Sandra Ling in the BBC's nursing-themed Angels (1975). Three years later, she was even more prominent as one half of a multiracial extramarital affair, the first of its kind, in Coronation Street (1960). In 2005, fittingly for an actress whose first big part was as a nurse, Bruce took the title role in the acclaimed TV drama-documentary Mary Seacole: The Real Angel of the Crimea (2005). (Mary Seacole being a Jamaican "doctress", a contemporary of Florence Nightingale during the Crimean War who was famous for using herbal remedies to treat British soldiers, and Victorian Britain's first black celebrity.)
Among the many television roles she has played, Bruce is popular among fans for her turns as D.S. Langford in EastEnders (1985), as Janice Stubbs in Coronation Street (1960), as prison warden Mandy Goodhue in Bad Girls (1999), as Brigadier Winifred Bambera in Doctor Who (1963), as Isabel in Takin' Over the Asylum (1994), and as Mrs. Justin in The Ghost Hunter (2000). Her theatre roles include the eponymous heroine in Educating Rita and Polly Peachum in The Threepenny Opera. She presented the BBC educational series Science Challenge and an episode of the BBC Civilisations series about the Roman presence in north-east England. She was made an ambassador for Derwentside, an honour bestowed upon local people who have raised the profile of England's northeast.in Silver Haze (3rd choice) - Actress
- Director
- Producer
Multi talented Leah Purcell is a Theatre, Film and Television Actress, Singer, Director, Playwright and Author. She is the youngest of seven children of Aboriginal Australian descent. Her father was a butcher and a boxing trainer. After a difficult adolescence, looking after her sick mother who died while Leah was in her late teens, problems with alcohol and teenage motherhood, Purcell left Murgon mission and moved to Brisbane and became involved with community theatre. In 1996 she moved to Sydney to become presenter on a music video cable television station, RED Music Channel. This was followed by roles in the ABC television series Police Rescue and Fallen Angels and the excellent Australian Drama starring Gabriel Byrne and Laura Linney, Jindabyne. She co-wrote and starred in a play called Box the Pony, which played at Sydney's Belvoir Street Theatre, the Sydney Opera House, the Queensland Performing Arts Complex (QPAC), the 1999 Edinburgh Festival and in 2000 at the Barbican Theatre in London. She then wrote and directed the documentary Black Chicks Talking, which won a 2002 Inside Film (IF) award. She appeared in the acclaimed Australian film Lantana and on stage in The Vagina Monologues. She went on to appear in three 2004 films including Somersault (starring Abbie Cornish) and The Proposition as well as playing the role of Condoleeza Rice in David Hare's play, Stuff Happens in Sydney and Melbourne.in Shayda (4th choice)- Stella Gonet was born on 8 May 1960 in Greenock, Scotland, UK. She is an actress, known for Nicholas Nickleby (2002), Spencer (2021) and How I Live Now (2013). She has been married to Nicholas Farrell since 2005. They have two children.in El Conde (5th choice)