This page of Top 100 Movie Stars comes from two lists. The first list is the American Film Institute’s Top 50 Classic Stars. The second list is our list of the Top 50 Current Stars. Current at least compared to the AFI list. There are 50 Actors and 50 Actresses Listed Here. Yes some great performers were left off…but overall we feel this is an outstanding Top 100.
- AFI’s Top 50 Stars – stars before 1950
- UMR’s Top 25 Actors – actors who became stars after 1950
- UMR’s Top 25 Actresses – actresses who became stars after 1950
Top 100 Movie Stars by Category
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies any way you want.
- Sort Top 100 Movie Stars by the number of their movies in our database
- Sort Top 100 Movie Stars by career adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost.
- Sort Top 100 Movie Stars by career average critics and audience rating…all their movies combined
- Sort Top 100 Movie Stars by how many career Oscar® nominations and Oscar® wins their combined movies earned
- Sort Top 100 Movie Stars by their career average Ultimate Movie Ranking (UMR) Score. UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.
- The actor link takes you to our UMR page on that performer
Our Top 100 Stars Are Ranked By Using All The Stats In The Table – James Stewart is our “Best of the Best” while Sophia Loren is the “Worst of the Best”.
| Rank | Top 100 Star | Overall Rank | Movies | Total Adjusted Domestic Box Office | AVG Review % | Oscar Noms / Wins | AVG UMR Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| James Stewart | 1st | 76 | $10,571,600,000 | 70.3 % | 081 / 014 | 79.10 | |
| Cary Grant | 2nd | 65 | $9,373,000,000 | 72.6 % | 071 / 009 | 79.90 | |
| Gary Cooper | 3rd | 73 | $10,767,500,000 | 67.7 % | 101 / 018 | 79.50 | |
| Spencer Tracy | 4th | 62 | $9,606,156,000 | 68.4 % | 090 / 017 | 77.70 | |
| Tom Hanks | 5th | 50 | $8,355,000,000 | 68.8 % | 090 / 020 | 73.10 | |
| Gregory Peck | 6th | 53 | $7,875,800,000 | 67.2 % | 095 / 022 | 73.90 | |
| Humphrey Bogart | 7th | 70 | $8,624,000,000 | 69.8 % | 052 / 010 | 76.70 | |
| Fred Astaire | 8th | 39 | $5,850,000,000 | 69.7 % | 059 / 007 | 81.50 | |
| Clark Gable | 9th | 64 | $11,475,200,000 | 67.5 % | 047 / 017 | 82.70 | |
| Marlon Brando | 10th | 38 | $5,874,800,000 | 69.1 % | 092 / 023 | 72.60 | |
| Burt Lancaster | 11th | 69 | $7,010,400,000 | 69.5 % | 088 / 020 | 70.10 | |
| Harrison Ford | 12th | 52 | $11,996,400,000 | 67.0 % | 088 / 022 | 68.90 | |
| Judy Garland | 13th | 31 | $5,784,600,000 | 72.5 % | 039 / 006 | 87.60 | |
| Paul Newman | 14th | 60 | $7,512,000,000 | 66.7 % | 102 / 022 | 67.40 | |
| John Wayne | 15th | 94 | $12,154,200,000 | 64.5 % | 077 / 014 | 73.80 | |
| Olivia de Havilland | 16th | 48 | $7,483,200,000 | 65.4 % | 081 / 025 | 74.50 | |
| Ingrid Bergman | 17th | 32 | $4,899,200,000 | 72.3 % | 066 / 013 | 74.00 | |
| Clint Eastwood | 18th | 65 | $7,065,500,000 | 69.5 % | 049 / 013 | 74.30 | |
| Jack Nicholson | 19th | 51 | $5,599,800,000 | 69.9 % | 097 / 022 | 66.30 | |
| Leonardo DiCaprio | 20th | 26 | $3,842,800,000 | 71.1 % | 095 / 031 | 73.30 | |
| Tom Cruise | 21st | 42 | $7,047,600,000 | 66.7 % | 055 / 009 | 78.40 | |
| Robert Redford | 22nd | 47 | $7,256,800,000 | 67.6 % | 070 / 027 | 70.00 | |
| Daniel Day-Lewis | 23rd | 17 | $1,052,300,000 | 80.2 % | 082 / 021 | 78.10 | |
| Meryl Streep | 24th | 59 | $4,489,900,000 | 69.5 % | 119 / 028 | 67.30 | |
| Katharine Hepburn | 25th | 43 | $5,314,800,000 | 69.0 % | 063 / 014 | 71.30 | |
| Cate Blanchett | 26th | 47 | $4,577,800,000 | 69.9 % | 094 / 029 | 61.80 | |
| Dustin Hoffman | 27th | 55 | $7,067,500,000 | 66.5 % | 088 / 023 | 63.70 | |
| William Holden | 28th | 66 | $7,510,800,000 | 64.6 % | 088 / 028 | 66.60 | |
| Jack Lemmon | 29th | 53 | $5,225,800,000 | 67.9 % | 073 / 015 | 69.70 | |
| Brad Pitt | 30th | 45 | $4,315,500,000 | 68.3 % | 076 / 013 | 71.70 | |
| James Cagney | 31st | 61 | $6,801,500,000 | 66.8 % | 046 / 008 | 75.30 | |
| Myrna Loy | 32nd | 74 | $9,057,600,000 | 65.3 % | 041 / 013 | 73.40 | |
| Marlene Dietrich | 33rd | 32 | $3,952,000,000 | 70.1 % | 043 / 008 | 77.00 | |
| Gene Hackman | 34th | 76 | $7,083,200,000 | 65.7 % | 092 / 017 | 57.50 | |
| Deborah Kerr | 35th | 39 | $4,543,500,000 | 67.0 % | 071 / 022 | 71.10 | |
| Irene Dunne | 36th | 31 | $4,067,200,000 | 67.9 % | 042 / 007 | 79.40 | |
| Vivien Leigh | 37th | 15 | $3,196,500,000 | 71.6 % | 041 / 015 | 78.00 | |
| Claudette Colbert | 38th | 48 | $6,273,600,000 | 66.4 % | 041 / 008 | 74.60 | |
| Bette Davis | 39th | 79 | $6,351,600,000 | 65.2 % | 084 / 014 | 65.00 | |
| Henry Fonda | 40th | 83 | $8,690,100,000 | 64.2 % | 058 / 013 | 66.60 | |
| Grace Kelly | 41st | 11 | $2,338,600,000 | 77.2 % | 028 / 008 | 89.50 | |
| Audrey Hepburn | 42nd | 25 | $2,862,500,000 | 71.9 % | 058 / 015 | 69.50 | |
| Shirley Temple | 43rd | 37 | $5,072,700,000 | 67.6 % | 013 / 002 | 80.00 | |
| Charles Chaplin | 44th | 13 | $2,860,000,000 | 81.9 % | 007 / 001 | 83.00 | |
| James Dean | 45th | 3 | $930,300,000 | 85.5 % | 017 / 002 | 98.70 | |
| Edward G. Robinson | 46th | 72 | $7,365,600,000 | 66.6 % | 033 / 002 | 68.70 | |
| Gene Kelly | 47th | 40 | $5,140,000,000 | 64.8 % | 052 / 013 | 72.30 | |
| Ginger Rogers | 48th | 55 | $6,644,000,000 | 64.7 % | 039 / 003 | 72.30 | |
| Marilyn Monroe | 49th | 25 | $3,217,500,000 | 70.8 % | 030 / 007 | 73.40 | |
| Greta Garbo | 50th | 24 | $2,217,600,000 | 71.9 % | 014 / 001 | 80.00 | |
| Laurence Olivier | 51st | 49 | $3,856,300,000 | 67.2 % | 073 / 017 | 64.50 | |
| Doris Day | 52nd | 39 | $4,945,200,000 | 65.2 % | 029 / 004 | 78.20 | |
| Steve McQueen | 53rd | 26 | $3,400,800,000 | 69.7 % | 030 / 005 | 71.80 | |
| Robert DeNiro | 54th | 95 | $5,937,500,000 | 62.2 % | 099 / 019 | 51.50 | |
| Denzel Washington | 55th | 47 | $3,886,900,000 | 68.2 % | 035 / 007 | 71.10 | |
| Jean Harlow | 56th | 22 | $2,844,600,000 | 69.7 % | 004 / 000 | 80.20 | |
| Barbara Stanwyck | 57th | 81 | $7,484,400,000 | 64.8 % | 029 / 001 | 67.40 | |
| Elizabeth Taylor | 58th | 48 | $6,840,000,000 | 58.4 % | 076 / 023 | 61.20 | |
| Al Pacino | 59th | 46 | $4,117,000,000 | 65.6 % | 078 / 016 | 59.70 | |
| Morgan Freeman | 60th | 70 | $7,028,000,000 | 62.3 % | 061 / 018 | 58.00 | |
| Mary Pickford | 61st | 33 | $4,596,900,000 | 65.8 % | 001 / 001 | 79.70 | |
| Julie Andrews | 62nd | 28 | $5,862,920,000 | 64.7 % | 064 / 012 | 69.18 | |
| Barbra Streisand | 63rd | 19 | $4,005,200,000 | 59.1 % | 044 / 008 | 78.00 | |
| Michael Caine | 64th | 100 | $6,500,000,000 | 62.3 % | 072 / 013 | 48.80 | |
| Kirk Douglas | 65th | 71 | $5,580,600,000 | 64.1 % | 048 / 015 | 59.70 | |
| Lillian Gish | 66th | 31 | $3,865,700,000 | 68.6 % | 006 / 001 | 69.60 | |
| Robert Mitchum | 67th | 85 | $7,335,500,000 | 62.1 % | 037 / 006 | 58.50 | |
| Mel Gibson | 68th | 44 | $5,253,600,000 | 63.8 % | 038 / 011 | 66.20 | |
| Julie Christie | 69th | 34 | $3,002,200,000 | 67.8 % | 054 / 012 | 58.20 | |
| Natalie Wood | 70th | 44 | $4,822,400,000 | 61.7 % | 051 / 015 | 66.00 | |
| Shirley MacLaine | 71st | 51 | $4,411,500,000 | 61.1 % | 075 / 017 | 57.60 | |
| Sidney Poitier | 72nd | 46 | $4,140,000,000 | 63.6 % | 054 / 012 | 62.40 | |
| Diane Keaton | 73rd | 48 | $4,387,200,000 | 63.6 % | 067 / 017 | 54.80 | |
| Robin Williams | 74th | 66 | $6,923,400,000 | 57.1% | 056 / 010 | 54.59 | |
| Anne Bancroft | 75th | 50 | $3,495.000000 | 63.9% | 044 / 003 | 55.50 | |
| Sean Connery | 76th | 57 | $6,857,100,000 | 62.8 % | 034 / 007 | 57.00 | |
| Sally Field | 77th | 33 | $4,669,500,000 | 61.0 % | 046 / 013 | 63.30 | |
| Jane Fonda | 78th | 45 | $3,978,000,000 | 62.2 % | 063 / 013 | 58.80 | |
| Rita Hayworth | 79th | 35 | $3,790,500,000 | 64.0 % | 035 / 005 | 69.20 | |
| Lauren Bacall | 80th | 36 | $3,272,400,000 | 68.0 % | 018 / 005 | 62.60 | |
| Richard Burton | 81st | 47 | $4,032,600,000 | 61.0 % | 073 / 018 | 53.80 | |
| Joan Crawford | 82nd | 78 | $6,762,600,000 | 58.8 % | 032 / 003 | 60.50 | |
| Peter O'Toole | 83rd | 37 | $2,834,200,000 | 66.0 % | 054 / 021 | 57.30 | |
| Will Smith | 84th | 32 | $5,574,400,000 | 58.4 % | 012 / 003 | 69.50 | |
| Marx Brothers | 85th | 18 | $1,704,600,000 | 68.0 % | 001 / 000 | 67.70 | |
| Kate Winslet | 86th | 36 | $2,354,400,000 | 66.0 % | 054 / 016 | 52.10 | |
| Ava Gardner | 87th | 42 | $4,569,600,000 | 60.3 % | 030 / 003 | 61.70 | |
| Buster Keaton | 88th | 29 | $664,888,000 | 66.6% | 003 / 002 | 64.60 | |
| Orson Welles | 89th | 56 | $3,382,400,000 | 66.0 % | 034 / 009 | 50.50 | |
| Jodie Foster | 90th | 40 | $2,568,000,000 | 66.7 % | 027 / 007 | 59.00 | |
| Carole Lombard | 91st | 39 | $3,279,900,000 | 63.4 % | 008 / 000 | 68.30 | |
| Julia Roberts | 92nd | 46 | $4,926,600,000 | 58.1 % | 022 / 001 | 60.50 | |
| Faye Dunaway | 93rd | 43 | $3,186,300,000 | 60.3 % | 049 / 011 | 44.90 | |
| Susan Sarandon | 94th | 76 | $3,724,000,000 | 62.1 % | 034 / 002 | 47.00 | |
| Sandra Bullock | 95th | 37 | $3,977,500,000 | 54.2 % | 025 / 014 | 54.80 | |
| Mae West | 96th | 12 | $1,515,600,000 | 60.4 % | 002 / 000 | 67.60 | |
| Charlize Theron | 97th | 44 | $2,455,200,000 | 59.8 % | 029 / 010 | 48.30 | |
| Goldie Hawn | 98th | 30 | $2,649,000,000 | 57.1 % | 016 / 004 | 57.80 | |
| Angelina Jolie | 99th | 35 | $3,178,000,000 | 56.2 % | 016 / 001 | 53.10 | |
| Sophia Loren | 100th | 35 | $2,261,000,000 | 58.4 % | 018 / 001 | 51.20 |
So what do you think of our rankings? Look good? Think we are crazy? Left somebody out? Look forward to some feedback.
Want more stats? The following link takes you to a page that ranks over 500 Movie Stars…..because more people were involved in the database…the rankings are different. Ranking 564 Movie Stars.
Academy Award® and Oscar® are the registered trademarks of the Academy of Motion Arts and Sciences.
(Visited 1 times)
RANKER Listing Organisation
THE 20 GREATEST AMERICAN ACTRESSES OF ALL TIME
[In ranking order]
1Meryl Streep
2Katharine Hepburn
3JOAN CRAWFORD
4Jodie Foster
5Bette Davis
6Sally Field
7Judy Garland
8Jessica Lange
9Diane Keaton
10Anne Bancroft
11Glenn Close
12Kathy Bates
13Lauren Bacall
14Frances McDormand
15Elizabeth Taylor
16MYRNA LOY
17Jane Fonda
18Grace Kelly
19Shirley MacLaine
20Mary Tyler Moore
NOTE: The above is the RANKER Organisation’s official list of the greatest actresses ever but the good news is that the page has Cogerson type resortable buttons that enable the readers to play about with the order and come up with their own list and substitute other names. However guys like Bruce and Steve who tend to take personally lists of which they disapprove are NOT permitted to vent their spleen by slightly amending the lettering in the organisation’s name!
1 In Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray Lord Henry Wotton and Dorian are seated at a lavish banquet in Lady Londonderry’s mansion attended by about thirty people and after a while Dorian asks Lord Henry who was the young man sitting beside Lady Londonderry halfway down the table and Lord Henry tells Dorian that the person concerned is the 35 year old Lord Havisham. Dorian remarks that Lady Londonderry must be very bored as Havisham had not spoken a word to her or any of the other guests all evening. “And yet for years he was the life and soul of the party,” said Lord Henry to which Dorian enquired “What on earth happened to him?” “Oh when he reached the age of 30 he decided that he had said everything in life that was worth saying and has practised quietude ever since,” explained Lord Henry.
2 In short I agree that John and I have most likely said everything we can say about the billing issue and as we are probably now deep into Groundhog Day territory it is time to draw a line under the matter by agreeing to differ. However in fairness to John as well as myself I will point out that we have not exactly been stuck on one track for the past two months and that we have commented on a wide range of subjects other than the billing issue with John for example imparting useful well thought out technical information about colour films and colour techniques. Also I do not think a lively debate does any site a bit of harm and that it would for my money be very boring if John and I had contented ourselves with simply mouthing psychopathic platitudes about our idols like Peck, Brando and Cooper
Hey Bob…good quotes for Dorian Gray….I have no issues talking about billing….and I agree a lively debate is appreciated….still…..we have more than covered some of these issues (Crawford vs Loy). So we all agree to “agree to disagree”…I think G. Gordon Liddy came up with that saying….or he was the first person I remember saying it.
Your billing knowledge has me thinking…..that a UMR page on the best billing conflicts might make a good page…..the Gable vs Spencer tale, the McQueen vs Newman tale….and the others that you think are the best in movie history…..actually if you could come up with 10 to 20 stories….I could put together a page.
Thanks for the comments….and thanks for the cease fire.
You guys are making great points….and offering up great examples of why your thinking is the best way. At this point….I think the only thing you can agree on…. is to…agree to disagree on this subject. I think it is time to close the chapter on this argument….it has been going on for almost two months now….and I feel pretty confident….neither person is going to change their mind. So I vote for a cease fire….if only to get the wounded off the battlefield….lol.
Cogerson & Bob
“So I vote for cease fire”
Okay. I agree. It is time to cease the moment and declare a truce. I agree to disagree with Bob on this subject.
Thank you John.
1 From 1940 at the age of just 26 until his premature death in 1957 at only 44 Tyrone Power made 29 films and was billed first in all of them. The 29 films will be listed in the next post and they will demonstrate that from 1940 onward Power was always billed above some of the biggest stars of his day Attention is particularly invited to Tyrone’s last two films in which Ava Gardner, Errol Flynn, Marlene Dietrich and Charles Laughton all were billed after Tyrone. Yet Flynn, Marlene and Laughton were each major stars before Ty and all were older than he, Flynn by 5 years, Marlene by 13 years and Charles by 15 years.
2 The foregoing clearly demonstrates that the idea that career seniority and/or age preference was a Hollywood industry policy is rather fanciful and the reason for Power’s permanent top billing from the young age of 26 was simple – he was the biggest star in each of his films at the time at which it was made. Of course there is really no need to demonstrate that for nowhere has Hollywood stated that it had an age/seniority preference policy and such concepts are merely being plucked out of the air on a subjective basis without supporting evidence and are at odds with general reality.
3 There will always of course be exceptions to any practice and if those are clung to against the entire weight of evidence pointing to a general practice in the opposite direction then I suppose that that is best summed up by the old saying “better a fool’s paradise than no paradise at all.” For example the Marion Davies situation that has been seized upon was an anomaly that was actually the exception that proves the rule as it was negligible in the overall scale of things and happened only because MGM foolishly surrendered control of Gable on loan to people who represented Marion’s interests and built the film around her so that according to Gable’s fan site on the internet she was allowed to dominate virtually every scene in the movie and Clark didn’t even appear until 16 minutes into the film. The upshot of all of this was that critics deemed Gable miscast and it was a flop. Clark was powerless in the matter under the terms of his then existing contract but such a situation never again occurred after Gone With the Wind when Clark’s contract ever after guaranteed him top billing and a say in his choice of film roles – and rightly so.
TY POWER 1940-1957 WITH STARS IN BILLING ORDER
1940/Tyrone Power and Dorothy Lamour in JOHNNY APOLLO
1940/Tyrone Power and Linda Darnell in BRIGHAM YOUNG
1940/Tyrone Power and Linda Darnell in THE MARK OF ZORRO
1941/Tyrone Power Linda Darnell and Rita Hayworth in BLOOD & SAND
1941/Tyrone Power and Betty Grable in A YANK IN THE RAF
1942/Tyrone Power & Maureen O’Hara in THE BLACK SWAN
1942/Tyrone Power and Gene Tierney in SON OF FURY
1942/Tyrone Power and Joan Fontaine in THIS ABOVE ALL
1943/Tyrone Power, Anne Baxter and Dana Andrews in CRASH DIVE
1946/Tyrone Power, Gene Tierney, Clifton Webb in THE RAZOR’s EDGE
1947/Tyrone Power in NIGHTMARE ALLEY [No other stars]
1947/Tyrone Power & Jean Peters in CAPTAIN FROM CASTILE
1948/Tyrone Power & Anne Baxter in LUCK OF THE IRISH
1948/Tyrone Power & Gene Tierney in THAT WONDERFUL URGE
1949/Tyrone Power & Orson Welles in PRINCE OF FOXES
1950/Tyrone Power & Orson Welles in THE BLACK ROSE
1950/Tyrone Power in I SHALL RETURN [No other stars]
1950/Tyrone Power and Susan Hayward in RAWHIDE
1951/Tyrone Power & Ann Blyth in THE HOUSE IN THE SQUARE
1952/Tyrone Power & Patricia Neal in DIPLOMATIC COURIER
1952/ Tyrone Power in PONY SOLDIER [No other stars]
1953/Tyrone Power & Piper Laurie in MISSISSIPPI GAMBLER
1953/Tyrone Power & Terry Moore in KING OF THE KHYBER RIFLES
1955/Tyrone Power & Susan Hayward in UNTAMED
1955/Tyrone Power & Maureen O’Hara in THE LONG GREY LINE
1956/Tyrone Power & Kim Novak in TED EDDIE DUCHIN STORY
1957/Tyrone Power in SEVEN WAVES AWAY [No other stars]
1957/Tyrone Power Ava Gardner & Errol Flynn in SUN ALSO RISES
1957/Tyrone Power, Marlene Dietrich & Charles Laughton WITNESS FOR THE PROSECUTION
The trend is unmistakable in that Ty like mega stars such as Tracy, Crawford, Dunne, Bogie, Bing, Cooper and Gable were always billed first once they became mega stars and while their heyday lasted. Indeed one would suppose that most if not all of them had a billing protection clause in their contracts as Gable did – long live the King!
Attention is invited to the super new billing column that Bruce has added to Cameron Diaz’s page.
Bob & Cogerson
Your listing of Power’s and others top billing raises a couple of issues for me. Yes, you definitely show that actors can lose or yield billing position. Gardner was not senior to Power so she is beside the point. Flynn, Dietrich, and Laughton were. This does reflect that they had lost status, certainly relative to Power, but probably also absolutely. Laughton got top billing in big movies such as Mutiny on the Bounty back in the thirties. He still pulled in a prestige role now and then, but generally not top billed. Dietrich? Well, as a 56 year old actress if she wanted such a choice role top billing demands were out of the question. Like Hepburn she put being in a top movie above petty ego. Flynn? No question he had slipped in a way his 1930’s peers, Gable, Cooper, Grant, and yes Power, had not. He was not only billed under Power and Gardner, he was billed under Mel Ferrer.
But this also shows the unsteadiness of obsessing over billing. To modern fans is Power generally considered the more important star over Flynn or Dietrich? I have no evidence, but that is not my impression.
It is also intriguing to me which actor was indeed top-billed most often?
Bob & Cogerson
Well, I am going to check who got top billing the most and the most consistently. You have spurred my interest Bob.
What I have found so far.
William Boyd (best known as Hopalong Cassidy) made 82 movies during the 1930’s and 1940’s. He was top-billed in all of them.
Charles Starrett (the Durango Kid) was I think top billed in 116 straight movies from 1938 until his retirement in 1952.
Gene Autry made 93 films from 1935 to 1953. He was top-billed in all but one of them.
Now, I know I am going to hear outrage about these not being top stars. Okay. But it shows that just being top-billed doesn’t exactly put one in the top tier of stars. One can be the biggest fish in a pond of small movies.
My point is that Hepburn and Loy and others who often accepted secondary billing were swimming in the ocean, not just in their own private pool.
Hi John, regarding your question of who had the most top billings – of the major Hollywood stars I would guess John Wayne had the most. No? Elvis? Bruce Lee?
Hey Steve….I am thinking you are right…John Wayne has to be number one in this category.
1 Not comparing apples with apples unfortunately. Another great B movie cowboy actor Roy Rogers got top billing in all his own B movies but when he made Son of Paleface the billing was Bob Hope, Jane Russell and Roy Rogers.
2 Those cowboy actors were big fish in small ponds. Did you know for example that Bogie used to take his son to an archery shooting forest park and on one occasion his son was injured and Humph rushed him to the park’s medical centre where Roy Rogers was receiving treatment on the surgery table and Bogie unceremoniously bundled him off it and placed his son on the table?
3 There is an old saying that “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing?” Did you know that Katherine Hepburn was not pleased about taking 2nd billing to Grant in the Philadelphia Story?
HI JOHN
I was going to dub you the Robert Webber of this site but I think I’ll now call you Fu Manchu “The world shall hear from me again.”
1 Your post encouraged me to look up some information on the B movie cowboys all of whom I remember well. Larry Buster Crabbe was a B movie actor who was in serials like Flash Gordon and The Sea Hound and in cheapie westerns such as Gunfighters of Abilene and The Comeback Trail. He revealed that the A movie actors would not sit at the same table as the B movie boys in the studio canteen and that the likes of Tracy and John Ford had more respect for A movie supporting actors such as Walter Brennan, Lee J Cobb and Pat O’Brien who regularly supported the likes of Cagney and Tracy than Ford and Spence had for the top B movie stars.
Accordingly whilst Autry was I gather regarded as a cut above the rest Charles Starrett would not have been permitted to dine with Tracy at the studio let alone be given billing above him and Tracy would not have had even a passing interest in how many movies Hopalong Cassidy got top billed in Tracy used to regularly socialise with Pat O’Brien but Larry Crabbe claims that the A list top stars ostracised Crabbe. That is what I mean about the necessity of comparing apples with apples..As my Joan once said to have been regarded as a bona fide star in old Hollywood you had to pull your weight at the box office in A quality movies.
2 Your military analogy would have been relevant to Stewart and Gable when they were away fighting the war but Hollywood was not the military and the bigger stars at all levels almost always got top billing within their own levels, and age or ‘being there first’ had nothing to do with it as I think I have amply demonstrated with numerous fine examples. Flynn had to take lower billing or not work and why? – because his status was diminished. In other words billing generally equals status which in Hollywood usually meant box office. It’s common sense really.
3 Anyway as usual you have made some interesting points and even if I don’t agree with you they were worth exploring. I hop you are enjoying your New Year – so best wishes
1 Not comparing apples with apples unfortunately. Another great B movie cowboy actor Roy Rogers got top billing in all his own B movies but when he made Son of Paleface the billing was Bob Hope, Jane Russell and Roy Rogers.
2 Those cowboy actors were big fish in small ponds. Did you know for example that Bogie used to take his son to an archery shooting forest park and on one occasion his son was injured and Humph rushed him to the park’s medical centre where Roy Rogers was receiving treatment on the surgery table and Bogie unceremoniously bundled him off it and placed his son on the table?
3 There is an old saying that “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing?” Did you know that Katherine Hepburn was not pleased about taking 2nd billing to Grant in the Philadelphia Story?
Bob
“Katherine Hepburn was not pleased”
She still did it.
Bogart and Rogers story. You make Bogart sound rude. I assume the medical staff controls who is receiving treatment and why. My guess is Roy would gladly yield to an injured child if his own problems weren’t severe.
“Apples and apples”
Of course. That is exactly my point. But what exactly is an equivalent apple? Is it preferable to be second billed in The Philadelphia Story or The African Queen to being first billed in a typical potboiler (my term for ordinary films) of the time,
or is your position it is critical to be top-billed regardless of how ordinary of even bad the movies are?
1 John I love reading your stuff but you do take the biscuit at times. I always remember a scene from 12 Angry Men where Robert Webber who plays a smart talking sales executive keeps changing his vote from guilty to not guilty and back again as the arguments among the other jurors flow and sway and Lee J Cobb who is a die-hard Guilty voting juror finally loses his temper and shout in his frustration “The boy in the grey flannel suit here has been bouncing back and forward like a rubber ball all day!”
2 May I dub you the Robert Webber of the Cogerson site? because you started out by arguing that seniority was a big factor in determining billing but now you are saying that Marlene was too old to get 1st billing over a younger top star whilst on the other hand claiming that Cooper, Grant etc always got top billing because they were older than their co-stars. If you read carefully over what you have said in your 11.20am post you will realise that you are in fact conceding that status at the time of the production of a movie GENERALLY determines billing which is all I have ever maintained.
3 And whether you Steve Lensman or the Queen of England care about Loy being second billed 81% of the time is irrelevant to our debate which has been about the corollary between billing and status back in the classic era and the importance of the matters to stars BACK THEN.
PS Flynn actually fought hard to not be billed below Ferrer but to no avail so Errol DID care.
HI JOHN
1 Bogie may have been rude but he was flexing his status – ie taking top billing.
2 In the forties if Katie wanted to act with Grant or Tracy and in the 50s with Hope and in the 70s with the Duke she had no choice but to take second billing. My own take on it is that the only people who could invariably demand top billing in a full length role from 1940 to almost the end of the classic era were Crosby, Grant, Tracy, Cooper, Bogie, Crawford and Hope when not in a Road film and from 1948/50 the Duke and Jimmy Stewart. All the rest could only demand top billing, depending on with whom else they were co-starring and when they didn’t appear with any of the aforementioned.
3 By the way talking bout apples and apples Champion The Wonder Horse got top billing in 26 episodes of his own TV show but when he appeared on the big screen with Orvon Grover Autry Orvon got top billing.
PS Have accidentally sent you the same post twice. Maybe Bruce will delete on copy unless he thinks the text was so that the duplicate deserves to be kept.
Bob
Older has nothing to do with it.
By senior I mean you reached that level before the other star has. The military remains the best analogy. If A reaches a given rank before B, A is senior to B. It doesn’t matter if B is a few years older. And of course a higher rank is a higher rank period.
Guys like Gable, Cooper, Grant, Tracy, etc. were the equivalent of five-star generals. And I think others, like Lancaster, recognized that. There was no way of really being bigger and taking second billing to them entailed no loss of status.
“Errol did CARE.”
I don’t dispute that or that most actors care about billing, but Flynn did accept being billed under Ferrer which proves billing wasn’t the top priority for him at that point.
Hey Bob….starting a new comment box….I like all the information you have shared….thanks for the information on Cooper, Bogart, Grant and Gable. You know your billing information. You should check out our updated Diaz page….I think you will like the column I added to that table.