After a year unlike any in the history of cinema, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced plans to hold The 93rd Oscar ceremony on the late date of April 25, 2021. Although Tinsel Town's grandest annual event is still a few months away, the buzz is starting to build for the top-contending movies, performances, and technical achievements of 2020.
As the limelight turns to the category of Best Leading Actor, the eventual winner in 2021 may have a difficult time joining the youngest winners in the near-century-long history of the honor.
Charles Laughton - The Private Life Of Henry VIII (1932)
With 34 years and 258 days under his belt, the great Charles Laughton won the very first Oscar nomination of his career for playing the title role in The Private Life of Henry VIII.
Directed by Alexander Korda, the film traces the romantic dalliances of Henry VIII, one of the most notorious bachelors in history. As Henry divorces Catherine of Aragon, the King goes on to marry five more times with unsuccessful results. The film begins with the death of his second wife, Anne Boleyn, and ends with his sixth wedding to Catherine Parr.
Clark Gable - It Happened One Night (1934)
Frank Capra's It Happened One Night was the first film in Academy history to win the Big 5: Best Picture, Director, Screenplay, Lead Actor, and Lead Actress. At 34 years and 26 days, Clark Gable won the sole Oscar of his career.
The screwball road-movie rom-com centers on the mismatched couple Peter (Gable), a rebellious reporter, and Ellie (Claudette Colbert), a temperamental heiress who struggle to find their way to New York together after being stranded at a bus stop. At odds with each other the entire way, Peter and Ellie can't resist their romantic feelings for each other.
Eddie Redmayne - The Theory Of Everything (2014)
Following his riveting turn as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything, Eddie Redmayne became the eighth-youngest Best Leading Actor in Oscar history. Redmayne won the award at 33 years and 47 days old.
Redmayne beat out Michael Keaton's leading turn in Birdman for a contentious victory. Rather than a cradle-to-grave biopic, the film focuses on Hawking's time in 1960s Cambridge, where he developed his understanding of quantum physics while falling in love with his wife, Jane Wilde (Felicity Jones).
Daniel Day-Lewis - My Left Foot (1988)
With three Best Leading Male Oscars to his name, Daniel Day-Lewis is considered by many to be the finest male actor who ever lived. His first Academy Award came following his turn as Christy Brown in My Left Foot, a story about a man who overcomes his crippling cerebral palsy.
Based on Brown's true memoir, the film chronicles Brown's dogged determination to teach himself how to write and paint with his left foot, the only appendage he can control. Day-Lewis was 32 years and 331 days old at the time.
James Stewart - The Philadelphia Story (1940)
Besting Daniel Day-Lewis by 48 days for the sixth-youngest Best Male Lead of all time is James Stewart. At 32 years and 283 days young, Stewart won the sole Oscar of his career for his work in The Philadelphia Story.
After winning the Oscar in 1941, Stewart went off to fight in WWII for five years before returning to the big screen with the holiday classic It's A Wonderful Life, for which he earned another Oscar nomination.
Nicolas Cage - Leaving Las Vegas (1995)
Nicolas Cage was 32 years and 78 days old when he won his Academy Award for playing Ben Sanderson, a withering alcoholic who finds a late reason to live when meeting Sera (Elisabeth Shue), a hooker with a heart of gold in Sin City.
The heartbreaking character piece marks the first of two Oscar nods for Cage, who was also nominated for Adaptation in 2002. Leaving Las Vegas also earned Oscar nominations for Best Leading Actress (Shue), Best Director (Mike Figgis), and Best Adapted Screenplay.
Maximillian Schell - Judgment At Nuremberg (1961)
Despite the A-list ensemble surrounding him, it was Maximillian Schell who walked away with the gold statuette following the release of Judgment at Nuremberg. Schell was 31 years and 122 days old at the time.
Directed by Stanley Kramer, the epic three-hour courtroom drama finds a quartet of Nazi soldiers tried for war crimes in an American court in 1948 Germany. Schell plays Hans Rolfe, the lead defense attorney for the Nazis on trial.
Marlon Brando - On The Waterfront (1954)
Marlon Brando was four days shy of his 31st birthday when earning an Oscar for one of the greatest screen performances of all time, Terry Malloy in On The Waterfront. The film won 8 Oscars total, including Best Picture and Best Director for Elia Kazan.
The 30-year-old Brando redefined screen acting with his vulnerable turn as Terry, a once-promising boxer living in the shadow of his rich criminal brother, Charley (Rod Steiger). As the dock worker pines for one final shot at redemption, he stands up to his dirty union employers once and for all.
Richard Dreyfuss - The Goodbye Girl (1977)
Richard Dreyfuss spent 30 years and 156 days on Earth before he was honored with the Best Leading Actor Oscar for his performance in the feel-good dramedy The Goodbye Girl.
Written by playwright Neil Simon and directed by Herbert Ross, the film focuses on Paula (Marsha Mason), a single mother and aspiring dancer struggling to raise her 10-year-old daughter Lucy (Quinn Cummings) after divorcing her husband. Along comes Elliot (Dreyfuss), a kindhearted Broadway actor who begins to care for Paula and Quinn in equal measure.
Adrien Brody is still the only male in cinematic history to win Best Lead Actor under the age of 30. At 29 years and 343 days young, Brody bore the distinction by three weeks.
Currently rated #35 in IMDB'S Top 250, Roman Polanski's The Pianist follows Wladyslaw Szpilman (Brody), a Polish virtuoso piano player struggling to survive the Jewish Holocaust in Warsaw during WWII. Brody's soulful and precocious turn is perhaps only eclipsed by his iconic acceptance speech.