BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR






In 1936, the acting awards were expanded to start recognizing supporting roles. Best Supporting Actor Oscars are traditionally given to actors who stand out in small roles.

Throughout Academy history, most of the winners in this category usually have no previous Oscar wins.

Within five years, Walter Brennan won three Best Supporting Actor awards. He was the first and - to date - is the only performer to win three supporting awards (and within the shortest period of time, and his three wins were in the category's first five years). Five other actors have received two Best Supporting Actor awards (among them is one performer who has won a consecutive statuette, Jason Robards)



Actors Winning at Least One Statuette in Both the Lead and Supporting Categories:

Six actors have won acting awards in both the lead and supporting categories:

• Jack Lemmon (1955, 1973)

• Jack Nicholson (1975, 1983, 1997)

• Gene Hackman (1971, 1992)

• Robert De Niro (1974, 1980)

• Kevin Spacey (1995, 1999)* - his only two career nominations (so far) (Helen Hayes has also won lead and supporting actress awards for her only career nominations)

• Denzel Washington (1989, 2001)

Victor McLaglen was the first performer to be nominated for a Best Supporting Oscar (for The Quiet Man (1952)) after having already won the Lead Performance Oscar for The Informer (1935).


With his win, Denzel Washington also became the first black actor to win two Academy Awards (as Best Supporting Actor for Glory (1989) and as Best Actor for Training Day (2001)). With his Best Actor nomination for Training Day (2001), Denzel Washington became the most-nominated black actor with five nominations (in supporting and lead roles).




There have only been fourteen nominations for black performers as Best Supporting Actor:

1. Rupert Crosse, nominated for The Reivers (1969)



2. Howard E. Rollins, nominated for Ragtime (1981)


3. Louis Gossett, Jr., nominated (and winning) for An Officer and a Gentleman (1982)



4. Adolph Caesar, nominated for A Soldier's Story (1984)


5. Denzel Washington, nominated for Cry Freedom (1987)


6. Morgan Freeman, nominated for Street Smart (1989)


7. Denzel Washington, nominated (and winning) for Glory (1989)


8. Jaye Davidson, nominated for The Crying Game (1992)


9. Samuel Jackson, nominated for Pulp Fiction (1994)


10. Cuba Gooding, Jr., nominated (and winning) for Jerry Maguire (1996)


11. Michael Clarke Duncan, nominated for The Green Mile (1999)


12. West African Djimon Hounsou, nominated for In America (2003) (Hounsou was the first African-born actor nominated for an acting Oscar)


13. Jamie Foxx, nominated for Collateral (2004)


14. Morgan Freeman, nominated (and winning) for Million Dollar Baby (2004)





Only six black performers have won the Oscar in the supporting category (four Best Supporting Actor, two Best Supporting Actress).




Only four black actors have won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar:

• Louis Gossett, Jr. for An Officer and a Gentleman (1982)



This is a stellar performance. What could have been a cookie cutter version of the Ole Serge With A Heart is given a fresh and interesting turn by Gossett. He’s strong, firm, grounded and fascinating. His disdain for anything that isn’t military is real. His lessons come through vigilance and hard work, and thus Mayo learns who he is and what he can do through mistakes and praise. Miraculous. Where the heck is he anyway????



• Denzel Washington for Glory (1989)



Washington is a wonderful actor. I have a slight problem with him in recent years in that I wish he wouldn’t take himself quite so seriously, I still consider him to be actor of consequence. His performance in Glory is magnetic The scene where he takes hi shirt off, spits on the round and is whipped mercilessly, is heart breaking. There’s also an unexplainable tear that falls down his face while his eye register a fierce defiance. I’ve never seen anything like it on film. He’s remarkable. I wish he’d lighten up a bit, but that might not be his fault. Most comedic roles for black actors fall into the unreliable hands of Cuba Gooding Jr, which is a mistake. Like Washington though, and I always go to see whatever he does.



• Cuba Gooding, Jr. for Jerry Maguire (1996)



Although not one of my favorite actors. Before Cruise went Cruise-azy, I saw this film and thought he was the best thing in it. His jubilant “Show me the money!” has become part of the American vernacular and party because Gooding infiltrated it with exuberance and a life that on the page merely looked like exclamations in a common rant. He is terrific here. A monumentally funny and touching performance.



• Morgan Freeman for Million Dollar Baby (2004)



There is a God. Long overdue. The problem with being Narrator Guy in a film is that you never get a chance to get your face on screen to show us what’s registering. That’s not a problem for Freeman. We hear the pain, the changes in his voice. We know when Eastwood disappears that Morgan is pining even though his voice is kept up and positive. His voice resonates throughout the film. That’s a real actor.





Latino, Asian and Other Minority Performers:

The first Mexican to win an Academy Award was Anthony Quinn. He won two Best Supporting Actor Oscars - for Viva Zapata! (1952) and Lust for Life (1956). (Quinn was also nominated twice as Best Actor for Wild is the Wind (1957) and Zorba the Greek (1964).) Puerto Rican-born Benicio Del Toro won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Traffic (2000), and was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for 21 Grams (2003). Puerto Rican-born Jose Ferrer was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for Joan of Arc (1948). Cuban-born Andy Garcia was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for The Godfather, Part III (1990).


Five Asian male actors have been nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. Japanese native Sessue Hayakawa was nominated for his role as a Japanese POW camp commander in The Bridge On the River Kwai (1957). Cambodian native Haing S. Ngor was the first Asian performer to win a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role in The Killing Fields (1984). Also in 1984, Noriyuki "Pat" Morita was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for The Karate Kid (1984). Japanese actor Ken Watanabe was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for The Last Samurai (2003). Almost 40 years earlier, Makoto Iwamatsu was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for The Sand Pebbles (1966).

White performer Jeff Chandler was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for playing the role of Apache chief Cochise in Broken Arrow (1950).

Chief Dan George was nominated as Best Supporting Actor in Little Big Man (1970) and became the first Native-American to receive an Oscar nomination. Native-American actor Graham Greene (from Canada) was nominated for his supporting role in Dances With Wolves (1990).

Ben Kingsley, with half-Indian (birth name Krishna Bhanji) and half-English descent, who won the Best Actor Oscar for Gandhi (1982) became the first South Asian performer to achieve such a feat. He has also been nominated as Best Actor for House of Sand and Fog (2003), and as Best Supporting Actor for Bugsy (1991) and Sexy Beast (2001).



I love Ben Kingsley. I know when he’s in a movie the movie’s going to great. He’s never made anything I’ve hated, and never been in anything where he doesn’t give one hundred percent. In “Sand and Fog” he was creepily self righteous. I loved his work. Then of course there’s Ghandi Again, as with any Bio flick, I am overwhelmed by actors when they can transform themselves into someone else. Gestures, the shape of them, they physically change without the use of a fat suit or computer graphics. Kingsley is the male Judy Dench. I believe absolutely everything that comes out of his mouth.


Six year old (and 310 days) Shirley Temple was the youngest performer to win an Academy Award when she won an unofficial 'juvenile' Academy Award in 1934 (an honorary award presented on February 27, 1935).

83 year old (and 182 days) Groucho Marx was the oldest performer to receive an honorary statuette in 1973, presented on April 2, 1974.




Cast Nominations:

Thirteen films have received nominations in all four acting categories:




• My Man Godfrey (1936)

is one of the 1930's most delightful, classic screwball comedies. It was directed by Gregory La Cava for Universal and is now considered the definitive screwball comedy, with its social commentary on life during the 30s. The film, filled with marvelous character actors (Alice Brady, Eugene Pallette, Gail Patrick, and Mischa Auer), resonated with Depression era audiences for its statements on morality and class. The film displays the mad-cap personalities of a wildly rich, eccentric family. One of its members - a flighty socialite/heiress, finds a down-and-out "forgotten man" tramp in a hobo colony during a scavenger hunt, and hires him as the family's butler. The bum teaches them the realities of life, ultimately regenerates their confused, scattered lives, and reverses the nobility of rich and poor. The entertaining film was both a commercial and critical success, with six Academy Award nominations (but no wins), including Best Actor (William Powell), Best Actress (Carole Lombard with her sole Oscar nomination), Best Supporting Actor (Mischa Auer), Best Supporting Actress (Alice Brady), Best Director, and Best Screenplay. However, it set a milestone as the first film to receive nominations in all four acting categories and it remains one of the few films with that distinction in addition to not being nominated for Best Picture.

A hilarious and fantastic romp showing us simultaneously what’s funny between the classes, and what’s funny period.



Mischa Auer, Best Supporting Actor





• Mrs. Miniver (1942)

• For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)

• Johnny Belinda (1948)

• Sunset Boulevard (1950)

A classic black comedy/drama, and perhaps the most acclaimed, but darkest film-noir story about "behind the scenes" Hollywood, self-deceit, spiritual and spatial emptiness, and the price of fame, greed, narcissism, and ambition. The mood of the film is immediately established as decadent and decaying by the posthumous narrator - a dead man floating face-down in a swimming pool in Beverly Hills. The eight unsuccessful nominations were for Best Picture, Best Actor (William Holden), Best Actress (Gloria Swanson, who lost to Judy Holliday for Born Yesterday in what was arguably one of the hottest years for Actresses ever), Best Supporting Actor (Erich von Stroheim), Best Supporting Actress (Nancy Olson), Best Director, Best B/W Cinematography (John Seitz), and Best Film Editing.
The major starring role in the film, an inspired casting choice, was held by legendary silent film diva Gloria Swanson (Mae West was also a possible choice for the role), who "autobiographically" portrayed Norma Desmond - a deluded, tragic, ambitious actress whose career declined with the coming of the talkies. [Her name was a combination of the names of two early Hollywood figures: comedy star Mabel Normand, and silent-film director William Desmond Taylor (Normand's lover), who was murdered in 1922. There was an intensive investigation but his murder case went unsolved.]

The best movie about movies ever made. Period.



Eric Von Stroheim, Best Supporting Actor




• A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)

A subversive, steamy film classic that was adapted from Tennessee Williams' 1947 Pulitzer Prize-winning play (his first) of the same name. [Early working titles for the play included The Moth, Blanche's Chair on the Moon, and The Poker Night.] Playwright Williams adapted his own play for the screen version. This film masterpiece was directed by independent director Elia Kazan (his first piece of work with Williams), a socially-conscious director who insisted that the film be true to the play (that he had also directed on Broadway). However, it was opened up to include places only briefly mentioned or non-existent in the play, such as the bowling alley, the pier of a dance casino, and the machine factory.

The electrifying film tells the feverish story of the pathetic mental and emotional demise of a determined, yet fragile, repressed and delicate Southern lady (Blanche) born to a once-wealthy family of Mississippi planters. Her impoverished, tragic downfall in the squalid, cramped and tawdry French Quarter one-bedroom apartment of her married sister (Stella) and animalistic brother-in-law (Stanley) is at the hands of savage, brutal forces in modern society. In her search for refuge, she finds that her sister lives (approvingly) with drunkenness, violence, lust, and ignorance.

The controversial film was nominated for a phenomenal twelve nominations and awarded four Oscars (an unprecedented three were in the acting categories): Best Actress for Vivien Leigh (her second Best Actress Oscar), and Best Supporting Awards to Kim Hunter and Karl Malden. This was the first time in Academy history that three acting awards were won by a single film (this feat was later repeated by Network

A classic. The performances in and of themselves are iconic enough, when you add Wiliam’s words to it, you have a masterpiece.



Karl Malden, Best Supporting Actor




• From Here To Eternity (1953)

This powerful, realistic story (and fierce indictment) of the lives of American military men (and their women) stationed in peacetime Hawaii (near Honolulu) in the summer and fall before the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in late 1941 and the US entrance into WW II is a weeper. And a true one filled with genuine pathos. The successful film, both critically and financially, soon became the second biggest hit of the year, behind The Robe (1953) (the first CinemaScope film) and ahead of Shane).

Three of the film's stars were cast against type and their wholesome images: Donna Reed as 'hostess' bar-girl (hooker) Lorene, British actress Deborah Kerr (instead of Joan Crawford who was announced for the part, but detested the costuming) as an unfaithful and adulterous sexpot wife, and Montgomery Clift as a former boxer and stubborn, insubordinate soldier. Burt Lancaster is outstanding as a rugged sergeant.

I love this film. It’s rich and beautifully filmed. A three hanky weeper and a disturbing character study. The performances are stunning. I’m always amazed when I think that Crawford turned down the lead. Unbelievable.



Frank Sinatra, Best Supporting Actor




• Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)

A famous and shocking black comedy, Woolf was based on Edward Albee's scandalous play (Ernest Lehman's screenplay left the dialogue of the play virtually intact). It was first performed in New York in October of 1962, and it captured the New York Drama Critics Circle Award and the Tony Award for the 1962-3 season.

The film's title refers to Virginia Woolf, an influential British feminist writer who pioneered the 'stream of consciousness' literary style while examining the psychological and emotional motives of her characters. Perhaps the 'fear' of VW refers to the film's characters who are suffering marital discord in the emotionally-draining film, and who may have 'known' that she suffered from mental illness and ultimately went insane and committed suicide. Just my two cents, really. The title is also a parody of Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?, a tune sung in Disney's Three Little Pigs animated short film. The names of the two major characters, George and Martha, are those of the first US President and his wife.

This searing film exhibited a fine sense of pacing, comic timing, and gripping buildup in a series of emotional climaxes.
Woolf won five Academy Awards from its thirteen nominations: Best Actress (Elizabeth Taylor), Best Supporting Actress (Sandy Dennis), Best B/W Cinematography (Haskell Wexler), Best Art Direction and Best Costume Design. The other eight nominations included Best Picture, Best Actor (Richard Burton), Best Supporting Actor (George Segal), Best Director (Mike Nichols), Best Screenplay (Ernest Lehman), Best Sound, Best Original Music Score, and Best Film Editing.

I’ve never found this film to be depressing. I know people who hate it so much (because it upsets them, not because it’s a bad film) that they physically can’t sit through it. I love what it says, and of course there are the words, the marvelous use of the camera as a third cast member, and Taylor and Burton at the peak of their careers. Magnificent.



George Segal, Best Supporting Actor Oscar Nominated





• Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967)

• Bonnie and Clyde (1967)

This is one of the sixties' most talked-about, volatile, controversial crime/gangster films combining comedy, terror, love, and ferocious violence. It was produced by Warner Bros. - the studio responsible for the gangster films of the 1930s, and it seems appropriate that this innovative, revisionist film redefined and romanticized the crime/gangster genre and the depiction of screen violence forever. Its producer, 28 year-old Warren Beatty, was also its title-role star Clyde Barrow, and his co-star Bonnie Parker, newcomer Faye Dunaway, became a major screen actress as a result of her breakthrough in this influential film. Likewise, unknown Gene Hackman was recognized as a solid actor and went on to star in many substantial roles (his next major role was in The French Connection).

Penn's masterpiece won two Oscars for Best Supporting Actress (Estelle Parsons in an over-the-top, brilliant, and often times hilarious performance) and Best Cinematography (Burnett Guffey) for its great evocation of period detail, with eight other nods for Best Picture and Best Actor (producer/actor Warren Beatty), Best Actress (Faye Dunaway), Best Supporting Actor (Gene Hackman), Best Supporting Actor (Michael J. Pollard), Best Director (Arthur Penn), Best Story and Screenplay (Newman and Benton), and Best Costume Design (Theadora Van Runkle, who later worked on The Godfather, Part II).

It was shocking when it came out, and it introduced us to a pre Mommie Dearest Faye Dunaway. The best ending of a picture I’ve ever seen. A Romeo and Juliet on cocaine. Miraculous.



Gene Hackman, Best Supporting Actor Nominated




• Network (1976)

Director Sidney Lumet's brilliant criticism of the hollow, lurid wasteland of television journalism where entertainment value and short-term ratings were more crucial than quality. Paddy Chayefsky's black, prophetic, satirical commentary/criticism of corporate evil (in the tabloid-tainted television industry) is an insightful indictment of the rabid desire for ratings. Indignation toward the network executives by an unbalanced news-anchorman (Finch) ("I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore") is manipulated by ruthless VP programming boss (Dunaway) for further ratings. One of the film's posters proclaimed: "Television will never be the same."
The film had a total of ten Academy Award nominations with four wins. To the film's credit, five cast members were nominated for Oscars (and three won) - Best Actor (posthumously awarded to Peter Finch - Finch became the first and only post-humous winner of an acting Oscar in Academy history), Best Actress (Faye Dunaway), and Best Supporting Actress (Beatrice Straight). The fourth win was for Chayefsky's Best Screenplay. The other six nominations were for Best Actor (William Holden), Best Cinematography (Owen Roizman), Best Director (Lumet's third directorial nomination without a win), Best Film Editing, Best Supporting Actor (Ned Beatty), and Best Picture.

Again with The Faye. And of course, William Holden, Peter Finch and Beatrice Straight who absolutely deserved without equivocation, her two scene Oscar. A film about TV and what it does to us as Americans and human beings. It says volumes while keeping its eye on the story. I love this film and I for a while, I watched it almost every week. I go through obsessive stages in my life.



Ned Beatty, Best Supporting Actor Nominated





• Coming Home (1978)

• Reds (1981)




…..Part 3 to follow.