I originally posted a version of this list in early 2012. Mostly because I like making lists. There was no real methodology to it. I looked back at it at some point in the past four months and saw it skewed heavily toward personal preference. The performances I liked the best went to the top, and the performances I thought were terrible winners went straight to the bottom.
Since the Oscar Quest, Version 2 that I’ve been doing, I noticed the point of it was more to reflect what my thoughts were now five years later from the completion/posting of all the original articles. I tried to stay away from redoing everything I did the first time, because a lot of it felt like it begat negativity on my part. I really don’t want to shit on things now so much as I’d want to openly discuss what is or isn’t a good choice historically.
Because that’s now where I’m at, I think redoing these lists is something I can get away with. If only to give myself a marker for where my head is at now.
I’m not putting any stock into these whatsoever. I don’t even really want to make these easily findable for people, though I guess I should, if only to track changes over the years. I was going to write up actual opinions for each one, justifying its position, but that’s a fool’s errand. That’s for people looking for extra clicks and people writing in the comments. I don’t want that. This is purely for me.
The first time I wrote this up, I specified that the rankings were not me attempting to make a list for everyone to follow. It was just my favorites. This time, I think what I ended up doing was trying to factor in everything into the decision. How iconic the performance/film is, how good of a choice it was in its year (extremely strong choices get slight bumps, and extremely weak choices get slight deductions), and also how I feel about them.
So here’s where my head is at now on all the Best Supporting Actor winners:
1. Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
2. Javier Bardem, No Country for Old Men
3. Walter Huston, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
4. Joe Pesci, Goodfellas
5. Martin Landau, Ed Wood
6. Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds
7. J.K. Simmons, Whiplash
8. Donald Crisp, How Green Was My Valley
9. George Chakiris, West Side Story
10. George Sanders, All About Eve
11. Joel Grey, Cabaret
12. Jason Robards, All the President’s Men
13. Robert De Niro, The Godfather Part II
14. Mahershala Ali, Moonlight
15. Cuba Gooding Jr., Jerry Maguire
16. Christian Bale, The Fighter
17. Mark Rylance, Bridge of Spies
18. Walter Matthau, The Fortune Cookie
19. Karl Malden, A Streetcar Named Desire
20. Christopher Walken, The Deer Hunter
21. Haing S. Ngor, The Killing Fields
22. Jared Leto, Dallas Buyers Club
23. Gig Young, They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?
24. Kevin Spacey, The Usual Suspects
25. John Gielgud, Arthur
26. Melvyn Douglas, Hud
27. James Dunn, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
28. Kevin Kline, A Fish Called Wanda
29. Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained
30. George Burns, The Sunshine Boys
31. Ben Johnson, The Last Picture Show
32. Robin Williams, Good Will Hunting
33. Harold Russell, The Best Years of Our Lives
34. Edmund Gwenn, Miracle on 34th Street
35. Sean Connery, The Untouchables
36. George Kennedy, Cool Hand Luke
37. Benicio Del Toro, Traffic
38. Chris Cooper, Adaptation
39. Timothy Hutton, Ordinary People
40. Gene Hackman, Unforgiven
41. Jim Broadbent, Iris
42. Louis Gossett Jr., An Officer and a Gentleman
43. Peter Ustinov, Topkapi
44. Barry Fitzgerald, Going My Way
45. Burl Ives, The Big Country
46. Melvyn Douglas, Being There
47. Peter Ustinov, Spartacus
48. George Clooney, Syriana
49. Anthony Quinn, Viva Zapata!
50. Jason Robards, Julia
51. Michael Caine, Hannah and Her Sisters
52. Denzel Washington, Glory
53. Frank Sinatra, From Here to Eternity
54. Jack Albertson, The Subject Was Roses
55. Tim Robbins, Mystic River
56. Michael Caine, The Cider House Rules
57. Dean Jagger, Twelve O’Clock High
58. Christopher Plummer, Beginners
59. Tommy Lee Jones, The Fugitive
60. Charles Coburn, The More the Merrier
61. Thomas Mitchell, Stagecoach
62. Red Buttons, Sayonara
63. Jack Lemmon, Mister Roberts
64. Morgan Freeman, Million Dollar Baby
65. James Coburn, Affliction
66. Walter Brennan, The Westerner
67. Jack Palance, City Slickers
68. Hugh Griffith, Ben-Hur
69. Jack Nicholson, Terms of Endearment
70. Anthony Quinn, Lust for Life
71. John Houseman, The Paper Chase
72. John Mills, Ryan’s Daughter
73. Ed Begley, Sweet Bird of Youth
74. Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine
75. Edmond O’Brien, The Barefoot Contessa
76. Walter Brennan, Come and Get It
77. Van Heflin, Johnny Eager
78. Joseph Schildkraut, The Life of Emile Zola
79. Don Ameche, Cocoon
80. Walter Brennan, Kentucky
80. Martin Balsam, A Thousand Clowns
