
Age: 70
male
William James "Willem" Dafoe (born July 22, 1955) is an American actor. Known for his prolific career portraying diverse roles in both mainstream and arthouse films, he is the recipient of various accolades, including the Volpi Cup for Best Actor as well as nominations for four Academy Awards, a BAFTA Award, four Golden Globe Awards, four Critics' Choice Movie Awards, and five Screen Actors Guild Awards. He has frequently collaborated with filmmakers Paul Schrader, Abel Ferrara, Lars von Trier, Julian Schnabel, Wes Anderson, and Robert Eggers. Dafoe was a founding member of experimental theatre company The Wooster Group. He made his film debut with an uncredited role in Heaven's Gate (1980). Dafoe's early career includes credits for The Loveless (1982), Streets of Fire (1984), and To Live and Die in L.A. (1985). He earned his first Academy Award nomination for the war drama Platoon (1986), followed by nominations for his roles in Shadow of the Vampire (2000), The Florida Project (2017), and the Vincent van Gogh biopic At Eternity's Gate (2018). He also gained acclaim and wide recognition for his roles as Jesus Christ in The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) and as the supervillain Norman Osborn in the superhero film Spider-Man (2002), a role he reprised in its sequels Spider-Man 2 (2004) and Spider-Man 3 (2007), and the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021). His other film appearance include roles in Mississippi Burning (1988), Born on the Fourth of July (1989), Wild at Heart (1990), Light Sleeper (1992), Body of Evidence (1993), Clear and Present Danger (1994), The English Patient (1996), Affliction (1997), New Rose Hotel(1998), Existenz (1999), The Boondock Saints (1999), American Psycho (2000), Auto Focus (2002), Finding Nemo (2003), The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004), Inside Man (2006), Mr. Bean's Holiday (2007), Antichrist (2009), Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009), Nymphomaniac (2013), The Fault in Our Stars (2014), John Wick (2014), The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), Aquaman (2018), The Lighthouse (2019), Nightmare Alley (2021), Poor Things (2023), and Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024).

Willem Dafoe

Albert Higgins
for Albert Higgins in F. Gary Gray's Kane & Lynch
Suggested by michaelcosby

Convicted traitor and death row inmate Marcus Kane is being transported to San Quentin when his prison bus is violently ambushed by a black armored truck. He wakes up in a mysterious interrogation room face-to-face with his former best friend and betrayer, Sean Cosgrove, who Kane believed was dead. Cosgrove reveals that he now leads a covert mercenary team called "The Seven" and has kidnapped Kane's wife Megan and teenage daughter Eliza, locking them in an air-tight cell with only 96 hours of oxygen. To save them, Kane must retrieve a stolen microchip known as "The Skeleton Key"—a device containing nuclear launch codes—and deliver it to Cosgrove. To do so, he is forced to partner with Lester Lynch, a schizophrenic former government asset and accused murderer who suffers from violent psychotic episodes and hears voices commanding him to kill. Kane and Lynch embark on a brutal, globe-spanning mission from Tokyo's Yakuza underworld to the frozen coast of Alaska, forming a fragile and reluctant alliance. In Tokyo, with help from a grizzled CIA contact named Higgins, they infiltrate the fortress-like tower of Japanese kingpin Retomoto, retrieve the microchip, and escape in a helicopter as the building explodes behind them. But when Kane delivers the chip to Cosgrove, the villain double-crosses him, murders Megan mid-phone call, and takes Lynch hostage. Kane survives a point-blank shooting, rescues Eliza, and teams up with an eccentric, foul-mouthed CIA agent named Carmikael—whose kneecap Kane once shot out—to track Cosgrove to an Alaskan cargo dock. In a bloody, explosive showdown on a burning barge and collapsing ice, Kane and Lynch finally kill Cosgrove and destroy the microchip. Lynch disappears into the wilderness, finally at peace with his demons, while Kane surrenders to the FBI, now reconciled with his daughter Eliza, who visits him in prison and begins to call him "Dad."