Who was the best ever Best Actress Oscar winner, by decade? 1930s edition

Vivien should win this one hands down.

It’s embarrassing that Davis won for Dangerous and Jezebel. She should’ve won for All About Eve and Whatever Happened to Baby Jane.

R2 should she have won for "Of Human Bondage"? Then what about Claudette?

I’ve never seen “Min and Bill” but Dressler was a skilled and much beloved actress.

Then her career went straight down the shitter.

Love most of these but Leigh wins, hands-down. Her performance (meaning time on,screen,not length of the film) is the longest Best Actress performance, as well. (And her Streetcar performance also ranks in the Top 10, as well.) But that aside, it's a great performance--and she had to hold together a film that was a fucked up mess in production.

R4. You mean because she died of the cancer she already had when she made “Min and Bill.” Yes, too bad her career didn’t continue for DECADES after she died! (And she got a second nomination the year after she won and then played against type brilliantly in “Dinner at Eight.”

While “Min and Bill” is hardly an eternal classic of world cinema, Dressler did a brilliant job of moving between farce and pathos, always REAL. She gets my vote.

R2 the Dangerous Oscar is widely considered a make up one for not being even nominated for Of Human Bondage. I’ve got no issue with the Jezebel Oscar. She was great in that. Bette really should’ve had three or four Oscars. It doesn’t detract from her stellar work though. It’s just a matter of timing Oscar wise. Kate Hepburn wasn’t any better than Davis. Kate won her GWCTD Oscar mainly for Spencer Tracy and she hadn’t won in over 30 years. She barely won for Lion having to share it with Streisand. And the OGP Oscar was mainly due to the Academy being indifferent to the other nominees. Bette just had the misfortune being nominated the wrong years to clinch more wins.

R7 largely agree with you but I think Davis was the superior actress as she could disappear more into her roles (at least in the early days). Hepburn had a run of Oscar luck in her later years (as did Frances McDormand) where she won due to a confluence of fortuitous circumstances which elevated her status.

R8 yeah as much as I adore McDormand I think she won that third because of the Covid year and a lot of voters didn’t see as many of the nominated films. They’re voting for Nomadland anyway so just check off FM. Mulligan was robbed.

Not a vote for Kepburn?

Rainer shouldn't even have been nominated for Zeigfeld but she was compelling in The Good Earth.

I simply never get tiired of Jezebel.

R11 yeah The Good Earth is the better performance. GZ I believe she won the NY film critics best actress award too. A lot of film scholars make so much of her scene where she’s on the phone but it was no great shakes to me. Plus it was really a supporting performance.

R9: Her work in Nomadland is much better than her Three Billboards performance. She really redeemed herself. Her win isn’t horrible but in a perfect world Mulligan should’ve taken it.

I agree Nomadland’s best picture frontrunner status helped her. Also, don’t underestimate BAFTA. There’s a lot of overlap with BAFTA and Oscar voters and the fact that she won the last major precursor prior to the oscars likely helped her as well. Also, her A list director husband hasn’t hurt her career over the years. If it wasn’t for him, she would probably be a minor character at best. She’s talented but not amazing and her range is limited.

I really thought though that Viola or Andra was going to win. Even though they both had no business being nominated, you knew at least one acting award was going to a person of color and no woman of color has won best actress since Halle Berry. Best Actress seemed to be a logical choice.

Has Viola ever done nudity?

R14 yup the BAFTA s picked all four acting winners this year which is something the globes, who usually have a better batting average, couldn’t do. I think the Coens helped FM early on when she was just getting started, but she doesn’t work with them all that much. Being Mrs. Joel Coen is an asset, but I think she would’ve been fairly successful without them. A three time Oscar winner for acting is up to debate. (She won one of them directed by her husband). She’s just has this cache and cool factor the Academy loves. I’d love to see her in more comedic work. Her cameo in Raising Arizona was hilarious.

It is criminal and depressing that Bette Davis never won another Oscar after the 30s. The Little Foxes, All About Eve, and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? were all fantastic performances that I can't imagine anyone else surpassing.

R15: She hasn’t and personally I think it’s a little late for that. Still that won’t stop her from talking about how sexualized she is. Maybe next time she can show some skin and shit in a bucket. Perhaps then she’ll get that leading Oscar she so desperately wants.

I think McDormand’s three wins are divisive because they’ve all been in lead. She’s really not what you would call a leading lady. She can act but she doesn’t have the looks, charm, and personality.

It's a travesty Viola hasn't had a chance to show her tits.

R19 you don’t have to be a leading lady I.e. Julia Roberts to win in lead. Fargo was a borderline supporting win though.

Was Claudette any good in "It Happened One Night"?

Neck or no neck, left half profile or right - at her best, in IHON, Midnight, The Palm Beach Story and more, Colbert was a delightful and surprisingly modern comic actress, R22, No Wonder she was a favorite of Ernst Lubitsch. Of the actual nominees of 1934 she was the very clear winner. Had Davis been nominated I'd probably choose her. Her performance in far more dated than Colbert's, but certainly far more daring and quite revolutionary for its times.

^ "Her performance in Of Human Bondage is far more dated than Colbert's", that is.

No love for Helen Hayes?

Carole Lombard should have won in 37 for My Man Godfrey. She wouldn't have died in that plane crash

You have to wonder why David didn't receive an honorary Oscar later on. Mary Pickford and Sophia Loren did, although they only won a single competitive Oscar each.

"You have to wonder why David didn't receive an honorary Oscar later on."

Did Davis ever have a nice word for anyone other than herself? I'm not very knowledgeable about her outside her films but it seems from what few clips I've seen of her on talk shows andvwhat I've read here that she had a low opinion of everyone in Hollywood but herself. If that's the case, I can see why her peers would hold back on an honorary award.

r28, you must watch Dick Cavett's justly famous interview with Bette Davis from c.1971 in which she praises many actresses including Judy Garland, Olivia de Havilland, Katharine Hepburn, Alexis Smith and Gladys Cooper, to name just a few off the top of my head.

McDormand is an anomaly in that the older she gets the more popular she becomes. Even after her win for Fargo, she continued to be criminally underrated. Granted she never fit the mold of a Hollywood starlet. I think people took notice of her after Olive Kitteridge. That was really the first time she was the lead of a story. Her Fargo role was co-lead/borderline supporting.

Having said that, I think she's talented and can act but I'm getting kind of sick of her saying she's played a lot of supporting roles to mostly male protagonists and that supporting roles to male protagonists serve to make sure you understand that the story is male. Bitch just say you were primarily a supporting player/character actress and don't make it woke. That's why I think she's either bi or closeted lesbian. Also, not for nothing honey but if it wasn't for your husband and brother-in-law you wouldn't have had as many opportunities as you did in your career.

R30. So, because she points out the sexism in film-making, she’s probably bi or a lesbian. Great logic!

R30, I think it's interesting that one of her more memorable roles (for me) is in Friends with Money. She plays a middle-aged woman who thinks her best years are behind her and is depressed at the thought of what's ahead. In real life she looks no different to the character she played, but her mindset is worlds apart.

Op is nostalgic for the years when he started following the Oscars.

There are several good actresses on there but I'd say Bette is overall probably the best, though neither of those performances were her best. The Letter and All About Eve are both far better than either film, of course Of Human Bondage was terrific, and her Dangerous win is considered a make-up award for her not winning for OHB.

Of all the individual performances on that list though, Vivien's is superior.

Colbert's turn in It Happened One Night is possibly the best performance she ever gave, but I think she's very good in Palm Beach Story as well, and I think she's fantastic in Tomorrow Is Forever, a movie that most people don't seem to really care for, for whatever reason. Too soap opera-y, I suppose.

Luise Ranier should never have won an Oscar at all, not even once.

OP, you misspelled my name! It's KATHARINE!

R25 God, no. She really stinks up the joint.

Looks like Vivien has it. Will she carry the 50s too?

Bette Davis was fabulous in "Now, Voyager" and "Dark Victory" as well, among others. Claudette Colbert really terrific in comedy -- "Midnight", "Palm Beach Story", etc. She's fun in "It Happened One Night", though comedy is usually under-valued by the Academy.

Between 1938 and about 1944, Bette Davis put out a remarkable body of performances, after the mid-'40s it was a bit hit or miss, with definite hits like All About Eve and some dubious performances. That said, like almost all great actors, Davis erred on the side of over the top so even when she was ridiculous and not under the constraints of a good director/script etc. she was still very watchable..

Eldergays, spoil the Helen Hayes film for me: WHAT exactly was the sin of Madelon Claudet?

Child born out of wedlock

R40 A surfeit of hamminess.

R40 she allowed "paying guests" to park their privates up her "pussy-willow"!

Vivien wins the 1930's, although the actress that went on to have the most longevity in film and Oscar wins was Katharine.

If Claudette hadn't injured her back, she would have starred in All About Eve. I think she would have been terrific. She was very gracious though when asked years later. She said she was disappointed she couldn't make the movie but she couldn't fault Bette's performance. I wonder if Bette would have been as gracious.

Luise Rainer was a hammy, mannered actress. Neither one of her Oscar winning performances were deserving of the praise they have received over the years. She was the Hilary Swank of her generation.

McDormand is definitely the lead in Fargo. She's its heroine and it's her quest the audience follows. There are many other Best Actress wins where the role was more if a supporting one--Louise Fletcher's, Olivia Colman's to name two.

Hayes’ real sin was her awful scenery chewing as “sweet little old ladies” at the end of her career. She also dined out on her “First Lady of the stage” rep for far too long.

Vivien. There's not even a distant second-place candidate.

It's depressing that we see Bette on the list twice here (but not for Of Human Bondage), and we won't see her on another decades list.

The Letter, All About Eve, Baby Jane, even Now, Voyager are all performances that would be career bests for most actresses, but for Davis, they are part of a collected, majestic set for which she didn't win Oscar gold. Amazing.

Davis alienated a lot of people in Hollywood. I think that had she been more flexible and agreeable, she might have gotten at least three Oscars.

It's amazing to realize that Vivien Leigh was three years younger than Ariana Grande is now when she played Scarlett and that her performance endures as the most popular of all time.

Gene Tierney was quite excellent, too - considered the best dramatic actress over at her studio (Fox) during her time

oh, sorry, that should have been for actresses who should have won an Oscar

didn't we do these surveys about half a year ago -- Vivien Leigh won the 30s and she won for all-time for all the decades. But if you want to do it again, have at it!

“Hello, Flo? This is Anna.”

Now give me my fucking award.

Vivien won by a longshot which isn't a surprise. Makes me laugh how Bette Davis would claim Vivien couldn't play a southern belle when she would win two Oscars for exactly that.