The Best Actors of 2021 (Published 2021) (2024)

The Best Actors of2021

The Best Actors of2021

Kristen Stewart and Diana, Princess of Wales, are not obscure figures in contemporary culture. And like many celebrities, they can seem at once two-dimensional and endlessly mysterious, consumed by their own images. For just that reason, it may be that only someone like Stewart, with a firsthand knowledge of fame and its discontents, can find a way into the mystery of Diana. But the alchemy of this anti-biopic may rest on something much simpler: an actor in full and fearless command of her formidable gifts.

One of the biggest movie stars in the world, Will Smith is not the kind of performer who can disappear into a role no matter how hard he tries. This isn’t to say that his technique isn’t impressive: The accent, the body language, the research into real-life character are all there. But he isn’t exactly turning into Richard Williams, father of the future champions Venus and Serena. He is using the essence of his Will Smithness — his charm, his drive, his intelligence and guile — to let us see how it feels to be Richard Williams.

Ruth Negga’s performance is built around a series of puzzles. The most obvious is whether her character, Clare Kendry, is Black or white. The point of the movie, adapted by Rebecca Hall from Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel, “Passing,” is that the answer can never be simple. Clare doesn’t only pass as white; she skips back and forth over the color line as if it were a chalk mark on the sidewalk.

Ruth Negga’s performance is built around a series of puzzles. The most obvious is whether her character, Clare Kendry, is Black or white. The point of the movie, adapted by Rebecca Hall from Nella Larsen’s 1929 novel, “Passing,” is that the answer can never be simple. Clare doesn’t only pass as white; she skips back and forth over the color line as if it were a chalk mark on the sidewalk. Negga plays this endless self-invention as a risky kind of freedom, with a hint that Clare knows how dangerous the game really is.

Negga plays this endless self-invention as a risky kind of freedom, with a hint that the glamorous, seemingly fearless Clare knows how dangerous the game really is.

One of the rarest things in movies is the credible portrayal of an intellectual. What makes Gaby Hoffmann’s Viv an exception is not just that she seems smart, but also that thinking is clearly the central activity of her life. We see her as the patient caretaker of a mentally ill spouse, as the sometimes-exasperated mother of a precocious 9-year-old and as the sister of a kind and troubled man.

One of the rarest things in movies is the credible portrayal of an intellectual. What makes Gaby Hoffmann’s Viv an exception is not just that she seems smart, but also that thinking is clearly the central activity of her life. We see her as the patient caretaker of a mentally ill spouse, as the sometimes-exasperated mother of a precocious 9-year-old and as the sister of a kind and troubled man. Fundamentally, though, she is a teacher, writer and scholar — so convincingly that you want to enroll in her class or read one of her articles.

Hoffmann plays a teacher, writer and scholar — so convincingly that you want to enroll in her class or read one of her articles.

Yusuke Kaf*cku discovers his wife’s infidelity shortly before her death, and for much of the movie he is all but paralyzed by grief and betrayal. Or so it seems. The film, adapted by Ryusuke Hamaguchi from a Haruki Murakami story, quietly unravels our assumptions about Yusuke and his situation until we arrive at the kind of understanding that feels almost spiritual. Hidetoshi Nishijima is the key to this power: His unassuming, melancholy presence masks a sharp wit and a lacerating critical intelligence. It’s easy to feel sorry for him at first. What’s harder, and vastly more rewarding, is to understand him.

Denzel Washington and Shakespeare is an obvious recipe for greatness: the finest actor of our time performing the writer (as Ben Jonson said) “for all time.” But there is nothing obvious about Washington’s approach to “Macbeth.” This Thane of Cawdor is a loyal soldier and husband whose defining emotion, at first, seems to be weariness. How he gets from there to homicidal mania is a tour de force of tragic feeling.

Denzel Washington and Shakespeare is an obvious recipe for greatness: the finest actor of our time performing the writer (as Ben Jonson said) “for all time.” But there is nothing obvious about Washington’s approach to “Macbeth.” This Thane of Cawdor is a loyal soldier and husband whose defining emotion, at first, seems to be weariness. How he gets from there to homicidal mania is a tour de force of tragic feeling. Joel Coen’s production looks like a horror movie, and its scariest aspect is that the hero comes to be terrified of himself.

Joel Coen’s production looks like a horror movie, and its scariest aspect is that the hero comes to be terrified of himself.

Though he has acquired a reputation for extreme acts of transformation — this is the man who won an Oscar for “Joker” — Joaquin Phoenix’s real gift has always been for subtlety: burrowing into the mind and body of a character down to the smallest gesture. Here, playing a moderately messed-up radio journalist taking care of his young nephew, he seems — once again — physically transformed. You believe him because of his mumbling diction and the slump of his shoulders. He couldn’t possibly be anyone other than the sad, sweet guy he is pretending to be.

If Ruth Negga’s Clare is the puzzle in the film, she is one that Tessa Thompson’s Irene Redfield is determined to solve — or else to destroy. Respectable and careful where Clare is daring and impulsive, Irene suffers a mysterious malaise in her friend’s presence. Is it jealousy? Desire? Resentment? Love?

If Ruth Negga’s Clare is the puzzle in the film, she is one that Tessa Thompson’s Irene Redfield is determined to solve — or else to destroy. Respectable and careful where Clare is daring and impulsive, Irene suffers a mysterious malaise in her friend’s presence. Is it jealousy? Desire? Resentment? Love? Thompson, allowing Irene’s turmoil to seep into her voice, her eyes and her breath, shows how those feelings combine into a single storm of unexpressed emotion.

Thompson, allowing the demure Irene’s turmoil to seep into her voice, her eyes and her breath, shows how those feelings combine into a single storm of unexpressed emotion.

In this Netflix special — shot in a room during quarantine — Bo Burnham plays himself: a brainy, creative guy on the cusp of 30 trying to figure out what to do next. What he does is sing funny songs, bare his body and soul and reflect on the awfulness of the moment.

In this Netflix special — shot in a room during quarantine — Bo Burnham plays himself: a brainy, creative guy on the cusp of 30 trying to figure out what to do next. What he does is sing funny songs, bare his body and soul and reflect on the awfulness of the moment. Or to put it another way, Burnham plays not only himself but the whole internet, a cacophony of voices, moods, jokes and flattened personalities that lives in each of our heads. It’s all a little too real.

Burnham plays not only himself but the whole internet, a cacophony of voices, moods, jokes and flattened personalities that lives in each of our heads. It’s all a little too real.

The premise of this psychological drama is so strange and delicate that even to describe it is to risk spoilers. It unspools like a modern fairy tale, concerning the enchanted friendship of two girls who meet in the forest between their houses.

The premise of this psychological drama is so strange and delicate that even to describe it is to risk spoilers. It unspools like a modern fairy tale, concerning the enchanted friendship of two girls who meet in the forest between their houses. The twin sisters Gabrielle and Joséphine Sanz are perfectly natural and easy with each other, turning their warm, playful sisterly bond into something haunting and heartbreaking.

The twin sisters are perfectly natural and easy with each other, turning their warm, playful sisterly bond into something haunting and heartbreaking.

Benedict Cumberbatch has specialized in playing brilliant, cerebral men: Sherlock Holmes; Alan Turing; Doctor Strange. In some ways, Phil Burbank, the Montana rancher at the center of this mighty western, belongs in this company. He’s a Yale graduate, erudite and musically talented, with a quick mind and a gift for cruel sarcasm. The persona he shows to the world, though, is that of a barely civilized man of the West, an avatar of rough, mean, stoic masculinity. Who is he really? A monster or a martyr? The movie takes its time arriving at an answer, and Cumberbatch lets the mystery linger even after Phil is gone.

In some theatrical traditions — Japanese Noh, ancient Greek tragedy — actors wear masks. That’s also true in Radu Jude’s angry, funny culture-war fusillade, but for epidemiological rather than aesthetic reasons. The movie was shot in Bucharest in the summer of 2020, and it depends entirely on the Romanian stage actor Katia Pascariu’s ability to hold our attention while half her face is obscured. Playing a schoolteacher embroiled in an internet sex scandal, Pascariu becomes a heroic Everywoman for our nasty, anxious, argumentative age.

In both parts of Joanna Hogg’s autobiographical films, Honor Swinton Byrne faces a double challenge. As Julie Harte, she is portraying a version of the director, and frequently sharing the screen with her own mother, the formidable Tilda Swinton, who plays Julie’s genteel mother. “The Souvenir” is the two-part story of a young artist’s development, and Swinton Byrne’s confidence in her powers seems to grow alongside Julie’s.

In both parts of Joanna Hogg’s autobiographical films, Honor Swinton Byrne faces a double challenge. As Julie Harte, she is portraying a version of the director, and frequently sharing the screen with her own mother, the formidable Tilda Swinton, who plays Julie’s genteel mother. “The Souvenir” is the two-part story of a young artist’s development, and Swinton Byrne’s confidence in her powers seems to grow alongside Julie’s.

Which means, of course, that her confidence has been there all along.

Styling

BO BURNHAM

Groomer: Michelle Harvey

Coat: Balenciaga

BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH

Groomer: Donald McInnes

Clothing: vintage

GABY HOFFMANN

Hair: Serena Radaelli

Makeup: Jo Strettell

Manicure: Alex Jachno

Dress: Melitta Baumeister

RUTH NEGGA

Hair: Marcia Hamilton

Makeup: Rebecca Restrepo

Manicure: Aki Hirayama

Clothing: Melitta Baumeister; Balenciaga

HIDETOSHI NISHIJIMA

Stylist: Takafumi Kawasaki

Hair and makeup: Masa Kameda

Coat: Alexander McQueen

KATIA PASCARIU

Hair: Cyril Laloue

Makeup: Maria Olsson

Manicure: Brenda Abrial

Dress: Charles de Vilmorin Haute Couture

JOSÉPHINE AND GABRIELLE SANZ

Hair: Cyril Laloue

Makeup: Maria Olsson

Clothing: Simone Rocha; Yohji Yamamoto

WILL SMITH

Stylist: Fawn Boardley

Barber: Pierce Austin

Makeup: Judy Murdock

KRISTEN STEWART

Hair: Adir Abergel

Makeup: Jamie Greenberg

Clothing: Celine, vintage Yves Saint Laurent

HONOR SWINTON BYRNE

Hair: Cyril Laloue

Makeup: Maria Olsson

Manicure: Brenda Abrial

Clothing: Rick Owens; Balenciaga

TESSA THOMPSON

Hair: Malcolm Marquez

Makeup: Cedric Jolivet

Manicure: Tom Bachik

Clothing: Terrence Zhou; Ashi Studio Haute Couture

DENZEL WASHINGTON

Groomer: Shawn Janifer

Coat: Balenciaga

Additional Design and Development by Jacky Myint