Empire Magazine's 50 Greatest Actors Of All Time List, Revealed

These lists bore me to death.

R1- Especially when they include actors/actresses who can't act.

Has fewer mishaps than i expected, mostly for more recent actrors (Heath Ledger, Florence Pugh, Tom Harding, Nicholas Cage , Charlize Cruz are the ones that obviously do not belong, most of the others don’t bother me).

Forgot Michelle Williams from the above)

Compiled by idiots with no grounding in film or acting, the list is disgusting.

At least half the list has no reason to be there, except for color-guarding (by choosing the wrong tokens), overpraising African Americans out of the usual collective guilt, and ignoring both Europeans and non-first-world performers of tremendous range and talent.

Fuck them.

And fuck (in particular order) Denzel Washington. It's offensive.

Streisand

Jessica Lange! Where the hell is Jessica Lange?!

R5 is just a racist who thinks only white people can act.

How shitty does your taste have to be to complain about Denzel but not Natalie Portman?

Florence Pugh > Vanessa Redgrave

Where's Spencer Tracy?

Lmfao this can't be real!

Florence Poo?! I can't stop laughing. She's just.....okay. Certainly not one of the greats.

"Where's Joanne Woodward? The greatest genius in the history of acting!!!!" - Ethan Hawke

Marilyn but no Joan? But Bette made the cut?

Missing Judy Garland (and Judy Davis!).

Oh yeah R15! I just watched "The Ref" last night as I do every Christmas. I forgot how great she is and I've missed Kevin Spacey.

Maybe if they did it by decade…acting styles have evolved over time.

Cary Grant

Elizabeth Taylor

James Cagney

Charlie Chaplin

Audrey Hepburn

Julie Andrews

Jane Fonda

Julia Roberts

Gary Cooper

Clark Gable

Judy Garland

Vivien Leigh

James Dean

Jodie Foster

Robert Redford

Clint Eastwood

Are all missing

It's a testament to how little of note that Jodie Foster has accomplished - and how much her star has fallen - in the last two decades that she missed out.

Crap films, weird (and terrible) accents, an unwillingness to work with new and exciting directors, an insistence on pursuing directing despite her lack of talent.

She used to be THE serious actress of her generation. Empire staff and readership likely worshipped her.

At least they got Gene Hackman, I love him.

LOL at Duvall missing out.

Meryl Streep and Daniel Day Lewis certainly belong on this list but NOT Leonard DeCaprio or even worse that CLOWN 🤡

Tom Hanks

R7 Jessica is getting drunk in the afternoon, as usual.

Audrey Landers??

Buster but no Diane.

And where the fuck is Chaplin?

No people from France, Italy, Germany. Which have had film industries for more than a century.

Where's Helen Twelvetrees?

What is this stupid obsession of dubbing people and things the "greatest OF ALL TIME??!!" How about Thespis, the first actor to step out of the Greek chorus? Aeschylus? Or Richard Burbage? Booth? Maud Adams? Sarah Bernhardt? Chaplin? Eva LaGallienne? Walter Hampden? Barbara STANWYCK??!! And that's just off the top of my head -

"ALL TIME", my ass!

No Peter O'Toole

Glenn

Charlie Chaplin is a very egregious overlook on Empire’s part.

Hell, even Geraldine Chaplin deserves to be on there over some of these people!

Good points r28. Also, in a weird way, would the greatest con artists be the greatest actors? I suppose the greatest ones would be the ones that were never found out at all, so we wouldn't even know their names.

Where’s pia zadora?

Where’s Shirley MacLaine?

No James dean but James Stewart!?

Where's Waldo?

The same folly is applied to sports, artists, writers and musicians. It's STUPID.

Interesting that the greatest actors of all time were only English speaking actors. The rest of the world’s thespians must suck big time, and the end of times must be near for a list like this.

Stupid lists never stop.

Yeah, I did wonder r38 about all the Chinese actors. And really of course there are going to be a lot from a lot of countries at this point. The best a big list like this can do is throw in a few tokens, but of course only those who Hollywood would notice. There's a big world out there and it isn't focused on the U.S. 100% of the time.

Adjani, Huppert, Deneuve, Binoche. All better than Florence Fucking Pugh.

And no Zendaya! Literal violence.

R28, it's a film magazine. Of course they're not going to include stage actors from the Jurassic era. Come on.

R18, most of those people were great stars, but not great actors

Javier Bardem? Natalie Portman does not belong, neither does Pugh,

Listing Florence Pugh was a joke, right?

Nicole Kidman is one of the few movie actors who make me forget I'm watching someone act. Tyne Daly does too, but she's known for television.

Nicole Kidman is the Tyne Daly of movies.

Outside of a few loons on Datalounge, no one even thinks of Jessica Lange (whose last performance in The Politician was horrendous).

No Barbara Stanwyck

I'd rather cut off my hand.

[quote]For Empire’s February 2023 issue, [bold]we asked readers to vote for the best actors of all time[/bold]

Yeah, that explains it.

I thought Laurence Olivier was presumed by those in the know as the GREATEST actor EVAH!!! Personally I found him stiff and pretentious(that could be all Brit actors tho)

I actually don’t hate this list. The only ones that seem off are Charlize Theron and Natalie Portman (both of whom are very good but not sure about great).

Florence also seems off

Linebacker shouldered Flo Pew is absurd

Pugh? Really?

Nick Cage? since when? he only won that fucking oscar by playing himself!!!

John Hurt should be on that list. I don';t think he ever gave a bad performance.

R56, I think people have gone from hating Nic Cage to loving him to hating him to loving him (but only ironically), to actually loving him again. But that might have changed in the past ten minutes.

Every appraisal of Nicolas Cage has always felt like it should be said in air quotes.

This list consist mostly of TWO BIT American actors/actresses.

At least 3/4 of this list should consist of British actors/actresses like Helen Mirren.

I for one was fully expecting to see Joan Crawford.

Now I'm in a gardening mood.

TINA!!!!!!!

marylin monroe? this is a joke

Oh dear! Another useless list.

So, according to them, Florence Pugh and Marilyn Monroe are greater actors than Lillian Gish or Orson Welles.

People who compile these lists do not actually know anything about acting, who'd have thunk!

People who stand in front of a camera aren't actors.

The only ones who IMO, belong there are Bette Davis, Gene Hackman, Toshiro Mifune, Humphrey Bogart, Buster Keaton, Al Pacino, Ingrid Bergman and Philip Seymour Hoffman.

I'd also be fine with DDL, Marlon Brando, James Stewart, Paul Newman, Robert De Niro, Anthony Hopkins or Tilda Swinton, but not at the expense of the many glaring oversights already mentioned on this thread.

I have never been a Meryl fan, so crow away at me.

Isn’t this from a poll? It’s the view of their readers who are into movies.

R5 should go back to reading Stormfront.

I believe I was #51.

Olivia Colman, Natalie Portman? Yeah, oooookay.

When I see a “best actors” list, I scan it, and if it does not include Montgomery Clift, I don’t bother with it.

Florence Pugh? And no Monty Clift ? Fuk off to whoever compiled this.

(I do this with “greatest” music lists too…if The Clash isn’t on the list, it’s worthless.)

R71 Good taste on both counts.

Montgomery Clift was an amazing actor. A couple of years ago I had a phase where I just watched his movies - most of the films he made weren't "great," but my god, he gives some of the greatest performances I've ever seen in them - The Search made me cry. How are Brando and Dean the more acclaimed ones from the same era? What a fucking waste.

I bet Joe Strummer and Mick Jones would agree with us about Monty!

Toni Servillo

Antonio de la Torre

Daniel Auteuil

Gerard Depardieu

Fabrice Luchini

Lily Franky

Chen Daoming

Gong Li

Max von Sydow

Erland Josephson

Nina Hoss

Lillian Gish? She was a ham, complete with the cloves and canned pineapple.

Where the hell is JOYCE BULIFANT?

No Anna Magnani? No Jean Gabin? Walter Huston, Edward G. Robinson or Charles Laughton? Simone Signoret, Giulietta Masina, Jeanne Moreau, the Ingmar Bergman’s bunch? Irene Dunne? Debora Kerr, Thelma Ritter, Maggie Smith, Glenda Jackson, Gena Rawlands, Alfre Woodard?

And it’s not about the readers of Empire – it’s about the posters here… It is a no win situation, isn’t it?

Empire magazine? WTF is a magazine?

[quote] the Ingmar Bergman’s bunch?

One mentioned. See R73

[quote](I do this with “greatest” music lists too…if The Clash isn’t on the list, it’s worthless.)

The only hit The Clash ever had was Rock the Casbah, which is extremely problematic in its Islamophobia. It's an Islamophobic song and it you celebrate it you are contributing to racism and Islamophobia.

You should be ashamed of yourself for liking such a racist song.

[quote] One mentioned. See [R73]

actually two - point taken. (Although both male - none of the ladies).

Liv Ullmann, Bibi Andersson

Empire Magazine is published in Britian. It's the British readers opinions. That's why it's...the way it is.

[quote]No Anna Magnani? No Jean Gabin? Walter Huston, Edward G. Robinson or Charles Laughton? Simone Signoret, Giulietta Masina, Jeanne Moreau, the Ingmar Bergman’s bunch? Irene Dunne? Debora Kerr, Thelma Ritter,

They've all been dead for four generations, festering in the ground. Rotting. Stinking up the ground. The worms eating their flesh until all the flesh was gone and their remains were all skeletonized. Worms crawling out of their eye sockets. What used to be human beings are rotting, becoming one with the sludge and the soil.

And all that's left of their memory is an American Eldergay, close to death himself, typing on an internet forum. Knowing that when he dies (which is soon) no one will ever give a care. And he will be worm food. Just like his idols.

^Troll much?

^^eat worm food much?

R83 Worm food now. But great actors THEN.

"no one will ever give a care."

What language is this?

r84/r86/r87 are just waiting to die, watching their Dynasty tapes on VHS.

R83, an English fop trolling Americans...how NOVEL.

[quote]"no one will ever give a care."

[quote]What language is this?

"Don't let's think about it."

Watch out, R83 is gonna start another Meghan Markle thread. Then another. And another. And another. And then we'll have to scroll by AONTHER 30 threads about that boring Brit.

R88 Stereotypes! How clever!

I couldn't give a fuck about Harry or Meghan r91. But you go right ahead.

I don't give a care.

Meryl is the only actress of that general age group /generation who is even on there. And that’s (arguably) the greatest generation of actresses. So a lot of omissions right there.

But the readers voted, so it’s not like I was expecting much.

Also I think Denzel very much belongs on there so sue me.

But Meryl and Denzel are rotten and worm food and, and AND.....

Given that this is complied from the public sending in their selections it actually isn't that bad.

Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh are probably deemed too problematic to make it on the list, just because of their association with Gone with the Wind. Same with Olivia de Havilland.

But where is Joan Crawford, Judy Garland, Barbara Stanwyck, Angela Lansbury, and Deborah Kerr? Or Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Pfeiffer, Jessica Lange, Susan Sarandon, and Glenn Close? That's not even considering all the veteran Brits like Maggie Smith, Judi Dench, Helen Mirren, and Vanessa Redgrave or the younger ones like Rachel Weisz and Naomi Watts.

The biggest omission of all.

[quote]No people from France, Italy, Germany. Which have had film industries for more than a century.

Exactly, R26.

Only 6% of the greatest actors of all time in the universe are not from the U.S., the UK, or maybe Canada.

And of course these things always skew toward the present, but for fuck's saje.

[quote] the Ingmar Bergman’s bunch?

R76 Who?

It you can't be bothered to name them, a dopey American mag won't be bothered to describe them as 'great'.

[quote] "no one will ever give a care."

[quote] What language is this?

The word 'care' is used here as a noun.

I am glad Julianne made it.

The Brits have always had shitty taste.

R98, lol, no one would consider Gable a great actor. Or Joan Crawford. You're just naming dead movie stars

🎶 Magazine Shills and their lowly GOAT turds—

To repeat, and repeat, and repeat and repeat.

"The best actors of all time (so yeah, some of them might be dead by now, asshole)- the silver screen stars who always deliver, that have changed the game, and whose distinctive talents can never be replicated."

There is a wide range. And includes several actors who take risks and deliver (Nicholas Cage, Joaquin Phoenix), changed the game (Brando, Garbo) and who can't be replicated (Monroe, though many have tried).

Get over it.

R79 who the fuck are you and why do you bother me every time I make a comment? Stalk much?

Rock the Casbah was about the repression of free speech in Iran, even more relevant today. And Joe Strummer was extremely left wing and apparently was deeply hurt by the song being written on a bomb that was to be detonated in Iraq during the Gulf War.

The Clash also had hits with London Calling and Should I Stay or Should I Go, among others, but that's not the point.

R79 p.s. You are obviously a troll who lives under a rock. Ever hear of a little ditty by the name of Should I Stay Or Should I Go? Or a tv series called Stranger Things?

How about London Calling? I Fought the Law? (And yes, I am quite aware that was a cover song.)

Ever hear of a guy named Martin Scorsese? Ask him about the 1-hit wonder band. How about Bruce Springsteen? Ever hear of him? Ask him about The Clash’s canon of music.

Go fuck off, you wanker. Get a life.

Who the fuck is Florence Pugh?

That list lost me at Portman who has given one authentic performance in her life - as a kid.

Florence Pugh, Marilyn, Olivia Colman.

I'm embarrassed to have read that list, let alone evaluate it.

Julia Roberts also belongs on this list whether you like her or not.

Olivia Colman is WAY overrated

Roberts is a great star, not an actress.

For Sidney Poitier description, they mis-spelled "Lilies of the Field" They typed Lillies, incorrect. And where's Henry Fonda?

R116 as opposed to Marilyn Monroe? They also considered impact and influence. (And she’s a better actress than some of the people on this list, like Kidman or Portman for sure)

Stupid List

Stupid magazine.

Stupid name for a magazine. What is "Empire" supposed to denote?

The vanquished British Empire? The Aenemic British film industry?

I love Olivia Colman and think she’s great, but greatest actors of all time?? However, she belongs there more than Pugh—who I also like, but c’mon.

R118 I would not put Roberts or Monroe on a greatest actors of all time list. Actor ≠ Movie Star.

I'm assuming I made the list.

Where are the stahs?

who is the guy in the pic?

Cher and Grace Kelly need to be on this list.

Florence Pugh??

R124 The King

R125 Said no Glenn Close or Judy Garland devotee ever

These kinds of lists also put too much emphasis on film actors, which is ludicrous given that there are many TV actors who are every bit as deserving of such recognition. I like Leo DiCaprio but there is no way in hell he's a better actor than Andre Braugher, who could stand up to many on this list. But he works primarily in television, so would never be considered.

Does Andre Braugher display his acting skills in a live theatre. Or does he merely stand and get recorded in front of a camera?

Natalie Portman does not belong on that list!

Tom Cruise on this list? Ridiculous!

Natalie Hirschlag does not belong on that list

The most egregious inclusion are Natalie Portman, Nicholas Cage and Flo Pugh.

Ledger, Cruz and Tom Hardy have all done excellent work but not consistently enough to be called greats.

Cage has been excellent a few times but most of his work and acting is not good

This list is racist no non English speaking actors

Not true. Samuel L Jackson speaks jive.