Academy Award for Best Actor facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Academy Award for Best Actor
The 2026 recipient: Michael B. Jordan
Presented by	Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS)
Country	United States
First awarded	May 16, 1929; 96 years ago (1929-05-16) (for films released during the 1927/1928 film season)
Currently held by	Michael B. Jordan, Sinners (2025)

The Academy Award for Best Actor is a very special prize given out every year by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). It celebrates an actor who has given an amazing performance in a main role in a movie released that year. This award has been given out since the very first Academy Awards ceremony. Usually, the winner from the previous year's Best Actress category presents this award. However, sometimes, a past Best Actor winner might present it instead.

So far, the Best Actor award has been given 98 times to 86 different actors. The first person to win was Emil Jannings, a German actor, for his roles in The Last Command (1928) and The Way of All Flesh (1927). The most recent winner is Michael B. Jordan for his exciting dual role as twin brothers Elijah and Elias Moore in Sinners (2025). The record for winning this award the most times is held by Daniel Day-Lewis, who has won three times. Ten other actors have won twice. The record for being nominated the most times (nine nominations!) is shared by Spencer Tracy and Laurence Olivier. There was even a tie once at the 5th Academy Awards in 1932, when Fredric March and Wallace Beery both won!

How Actors Are Chosen

Actors are nominated for this award by other actors who are members of AMPAS. They use a special voting system to pick the best performances. After the nominees are chosen, all eligible members of the Academy (which includes people from many different parts of the film industry) vote to decide who the final winner will be.

In the early days of the awards, actors were nominated for all their work in a year, sometimes even for three different movies! But since the 4th Academy Awards, actors are nominated for one specific performance in a single movie. Since the 9th Academy Awards, there can be a maximum of five nominees in this category each year.

Amazing Achievements: Multiple Wins and Nominations

Some actors are so talented that they have won or been nominated for the Best Actor award many times!

Actors with Multiple Wins

Here are the actors who have won the Best Actor award two or more times:

Actors with Many Nominations

These actors have been nominated for the Best Actor award three or more times, showing their consistent excellence:

Record Breakers: Age of Winners and Nominees

This award has seen actors of many different ages achieve greatness. Here are some interesting facts about the youngest and oldest winners and nominees:

Movies with More Than One Nominated Actor

Sometimes, a movie is so good that two actors from the same film are nominated for Best Actor! Here are some examples:

• Mutiny on the Bounty (1935) – Clark Gable, Charles Laughton, and Franchot Tone were all nominated.
• Going My Way (1944) – Bing Crosby won, and Barry Fitzgerald was also nominated.
• From Here to Eternity (1953) – Montgomery Clift and Burt Lancaster were both nominated.
• Giant (1956) – James Dean and Rock Hudson were both nominated.
• The Defiant Ones (1958) – Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier were both nominated.
• Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) – Maximilian Schell won, and Spencer Tracy was also nominated.
• Becket (1964) – Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole were both nominated.
• Midnight Cowboy (1969) – Dustin Hoffman and Jon Voight were both nominated.
• Sleuth (1972) – Michael Caine and Laurence Olivier were both nominated.
• Network (1976) – Peter Finch won, and William Holden was also nominated.
• The Dresser (1983) – Tom Courtenay and Albert Finney were both nominated.
• Amadeus (1984) – F. Murray Abraham won, and Tom Hulce was also nominated.

Actors Playing the Same Character

It's interesting when different actors are nominated for playing the same famous character in different movies! Here are some examples:

• Cyrano de Bergerac from Cyrano de Bergerac (José Ferrer, 1950) and Cyrano de Bergerac (Gérard Depardieu, 1990).
• Eddie "Fast Eddie" Felson from The Hustler (Paul Newman, 1961) and The Color of Money (Paul Newman, 1986).
• Father Chuck O'Malley from Going My Way (Bing Crosby, 1944) and The Bells of St. Mary's (Bing Crosby, 1945).
• Joe Pendleton from Here Comes Mr. Jordan (Robert Montgomery, 1941) and Heaven Can Wait (Warren Beatty, 1978).
• King Henry II from Becket (Peter O'Toole, 1964) and The Lion in Winter (Peter O'Toole, 1968).
• King Henry V from Henry V (Laurence Olivier, 1946) and Henry V (Kenneth Branagh, 1989).
• King Henry VIII from The Private Life of Henry VIII (Charles Laughton, 1933) and Anne of the Thousand Days (Richard Burton, 1969).
• Mr. Chipping from Goodbye, Mr. Chips (Robert Donat, 1939) and Goodbye, Mr. Chips (Peter O'Toole, 1969).
• Norman Maine from A Star Is Born (Fredric March, 1937) and A Star Is Born (James Mason, 1954).
  • Jackson "Jack" Maine from A Star Is Born (Bradley Cooper, 2018).
• President Abraham Lincoln from Abe Lincoln in Illinois (Raymond Massey, 1940) and Lincoln (Daniel Day-Lewis, 2012).
• President Richard Nixon from Nixon (Anthony Hopkins, 1995) and Frost/Nixon (Frank Langella, 2008).
• Professor Henry Higgins from Pygmalion (Leslie Howard, 1938) and My Fair Lady (Rex Harrison, 1964).
• Rooster Cogburn from True Grit (John Wayne, 1969) and True Grit (Jeff Bridges, 2010).
• Vincent van Gogh from Lust for Life (Kirk Douglas, 1956) and At Eternity's Gate (Willem Dafoe, 2018).

Images for kids

• 

  Emil Jannings was the inaugural winner, for two films: The Last Command (1928) and The Way of All Flesh (1927).

• 

  Warner Baxter won for In Old Arizona (1928).

• 

  George Arliss won for Disraeli (1929).

• 

  Lionel Barrymore won for A Free Soul (1931).

• 

  Fredric March won twice, for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) and The Best Years of Our Lives (1946).

• 

  Wallace Beery won for The Champ (1931), in a tie with Fredric March.

• 

  Charles Laughton won for The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933).

• 

  Clark Gable won for It Happened One Night (1934).

• 

  Victor McLaglen won for The Informer (1935).

• 

  Paul Muni won for The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936).

• 

  Spencer Tracy was the first actor to consecutively win twice, for Captains Courageous (1937) and Boys Town (1938).

• 

  Robert Donat won for Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939).

• 

  James Stewart won for The Philadelphia Story (1940).

• 

  Gary Cooper won twice, for Sergeant York (1941) and High Noon (1952).

• 

  James Cagney won for Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942).

• 

  Paul Lukas won for Watch on the Rhine (1943).

• 

  Bing Crosby won for Going My Way (1944).

• 

  Ray Milland won for The Lost Weekend (1945).

• 

  Ronald Colman won for A Double Life (1947).

• 

  Laurence Olivier won for Hamlet (1948); first self-directed win (and simultaneous Best Picture).

• 

  Broderick Crawford won for All the King's Men (1949).

• 

  José Ferrer won for Cyrano de Bergerac (1950); Tony winner for the same role–first to accomplish this and the category's first latino winner.

• 

  Humphrey Bogart won for The African Queen (1951).

• 

  William Holden won for Stalag 17 (1953).

• 

  Marlon Brando won twice, for On the Waterfront (1954) and The Godfather (1972).

• 

  Ernest Borgnine won for Marty (1955).

• 

  Yul Brynner won for The King and I (1956); first Asian winner in category.

• 

  Alec Guinness won for The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957).

• 

  David Niven won for Separate Tables (1958).

• 

  Charlton Heston won for Ben-Hur (1959).

• 

  Burt Lancaster won for Elmer Gantry (1960).

• 

  Maximilian Schell won for Judgment at Nuremberg (1961).

• 

  Gregory Peck won for To Kill a Mockingbird (1962).

• 

  Sidney Poitier won for Lilies of the Field (1963); first black actor to win.

• 

  Rex Harrison won for My Fair Lady (1964).

• 

  Lee Marvin won for playing dual roles in Cat Ballou (1965).

• 

  Paul Scofield won for A Man for All Seasons (1966).

• 

  Rod Steiger won for In the Heat of the Night (1967).

• 

  Cliff Robertson won for CHAЯLY (1968).

• 

  John Wayne won for True Grit (1969).

• 

  George C. Scott won for Patton (1970).

• 

  Gene Hackman won for The French Connection (1971).

• 

  Jack Lemmon won for Save the Tiger (1973).

• 

  Art Carney won for Harry and Tonto (1974).

• 

  Jack Nicholson won twice, for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) and As Good as It Gets (1997).

• 

  Peter Finch won for Network (1976); first actor to win posthumously.

• 

  Richard Dreyfuss won for The Goodbye Girl (1977).

• 

  Jon Voight won for Coming Home (1978).

• 

  Dustin Hoffman won twice, for Kramer vs. Kramer (1979) and Rain Man (1988).

• 

  Robert De Niro won for Raging Bull (1980).

• 

  Henry Fonda won for On Golden Pond (1981).

• 

  Ben Kingsley won for Gandhi (1982).

• 

  Robert Duvall won for Tender Mercies (1983).

• 

  F. Murray Abraham won for Amadeus (1984).

• 

  William Hurt won for Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985).

• 

  Paul Newman won for The Color of Money (1986).

• 

  Michael Douglas won for Wall Street (1987).

• 

  Daniel Day-Lewis won thrice, for My Left Foot (1989), There Will Be Blood (2007), and Lincoln (2012).

• 

  Jeremy Irons won for Reversal of Fortune (1990).

• 

  Anthony Hopkins won twice, for The Silence of the Lambs (1991) and The Father (2020)—the latter rendering him the overall oldest acting nominee in a leading role and the overall oldest acting winner, at age 83.

• 

  Al Pacino won for Scent of a Woman (1992).

• 

  Tom Hanks won twice consecutively, for Philadelphia (1993) and Forrest Gump (1994).

• 

  Nicolas Cage won for Leaving Las Vegas (1995).

• 

  Geoffrey Rush won for Shine (1996).

• 

  Roberto Benigni won for Life Is Beautiful (1997); first Italian-spoken role to win for the category.

• 

  Kevin Spacey won for American Beauty (1999).

• 

  Russell Crowe won for Gladiator (2000).

• 

  Denzel Washington won for Training Day (2001).

• 

  Adrien Brody won twice, for The Pianist (2002) and The Brutalist (2024).

• 

  Sean Penn won twice, for Mystic River (2003) and Milk (2008).

• 

  Jamie Foxx won for Ray (2004).

• 

  Philip Seymour Hoffman won for Capote (2005).

• 

  Forest Whitaker won for The Last King of Scotland (2006).

• 

  Jeff Bridges won for Crazy Heart (2009).

• 

  Colin Firth won for The King's Speech (2010).

• 

  Jean Dujardin won for The Artist (2011).

• 

  Matthew McConaughey won for Dallas Buyers Club (2013).

• 

  Eddie Redmayne won for The Theory of Everything (2014).

• 

  Leonardo DiCaprio won for The Revenant (2015).

• 

  Casey Affleck won for Manchester by the Sea (2016).

• 

  Gary Oldman won for Darkest Hour (2017).

• 

  Rami Malek won for Bohemian Rhapsody (2018).

• 

  Joaquin Phoenix won for Joker (2019).

• 

  Will Smith won for King Richard (2021).

• 

  Brendan Fraser won for The Whale (2022); first Canadian winner in category.

• 

  Cillian Murphy won for Oppenheimer (2023).

See also

In Spanish: Anexo:Óscar al mejor actor para niños

• Academy Award for Best Actress
• All Academy Award acting nominees
• BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role
• Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Actor
• Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama
• Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy
• Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead
• Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role
• List of Academy Award–nominated films