The biggest films all-time with Wisconsinites in prominent roles

Kate Hudson may not be a native Milwaukeean, though she plays a real-life one well enough in “Song Sung Blue” that she’s been nominated for Best Actress in the 98th Academy Awards, taking place March 15.

The movie comes a couple of years after actors Willem Dafoe and Mark Ruffalo, both Wisconsin natives, appeared in the Yorgos Lanthimos-directed “Poor Things,” a 2023 absurdist Frankenstein riff starring Emma Stone that was nominated for Best Picture. Ruffalo, for the fourth time in his career, was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for his performance, while Stone wound up winning Best Actress.

Dafoe, an Appleton native, has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and four Oscar nominations, including for his role in 1986 Best Picture winner “Platoon.” Ruffalo, a native of Kenosha, has cultivated celebrity playing Hulk in Marvel’s Avengers movies. But he’s also been nominated three times for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar, and he just appeared in a critically acclaimed HBO miniseries “Task.”

Figuring in Oscar success and simply a place in the zeitgeist, take a look at some of the most notable films with a prominent Wisconsinite acting performance.

15. ‘Airplane!’

We’re already cheating because Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who has a memorable supporting role as pilot Roger Murdock, had long ago left the Milwaukee Bucks for the Los Angeles Lakers when he appeared in the film, which came out in 1980. But the goofball comedy also had a major Wisconsin presence behind the overall production, with Shorewood natives David Zucker, Jerry Zucker and Jim Abrahams creating the film (as well as the “Naked Gun” movies).

14. ‘Judgment at Nuremburg’

Not to be confused with the 2025 film “Nuremburg,” this 1961 courtroom drama features Spencer Tracy among a cast of familiar names (Burt Lancaster, Marlene Dietrich, Judy Garland, William Shatner and Academy Award winner Maximilian Schell, to name a few). Tracy, who was born in Milwaukee and attended Ripon College, plays the chief judge in a three-judge panel assessing the crimes of German officials standing trial for crimes against humanity during the Nazi regime. Tracy was nominated for Best Actor but lost out to Schell for the honor, and the film was nominated for Best Picture in the year West Side Story won the prize. In all, Nuremburg reeled in 11 nominations and two Oscar wins, and the film has endured as a gripping portrayal of the Holocaust’s after-effects.

13. ‘RoboCop’

The 1987 science-fiction action film certainly wasn’t an Oscar darling, but the dystopian blockbuster has endured in the zeitgeist and spawned several sequels and video games. The titular character is played by Peter Weller, born in Stevens Point. New Lisbon-born Kurtwood Smith (better known, perhaps, as Red Forman in “That 70s Show”) plays crime lord Clarence Boddicker.

12. ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’

The 1988 film directed by Martin Scorsese and written by Paul Schrader starred Dafoe as Jesus of Nazareth. Though the film wasn’t nominated for Best Picture, it generated ample controversy, and Scorsese was nominated for Best Director.

11. ‘Spotlight’

The 2015 movie starred Ruffalo as investigative journalist Michael Rezendes, one of several Boston Globe reporters at work uncovering widespread child sex abuse in the Catholic church. The film won Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay at the Oscars, and Ruffalo was nominated for Best Supporting Actor.

10. ‘Young Frankenstein’

Here’s a second Frankenstein reference, coming for an actual retelling of “Frankenstein” that was up for (but lost) Best Picture. The 1974 Mel Brooks horror parody stars Milwaukee-born Gene Wilder as Dr. Frederick Frankenstein, and Wilder also co-wrote the Oscar-nominated screenplay. It often appears on lists of the greatest comedy films of all time, including No. 13 on the American Film Institute’s list of the 100 funniest American movies.

9. ‘Cocoon’

The 1985 science-fiction drama directed by Ron Howard stars Don Ameche, born in Kenosha and an alumnus of Marquette University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Ameche plays Arthur Selwyn, a retirement home resident who discovers ancient aliens inside of cocoons have been deposited in a neighboring swimming pool, allowing members of the home to feel healthy and rejuvenated. Ameche, a cousin of Wisconsin football great Alan Ameche, won Best Supporting Actor at the Oscars for his portrayal, and the film was a box-office hit.

8. ‘The Best Years of Our Lives’

The 1946 Best Picture winner stars Fredric March, a Racine native and UW alum, as Al Stephenson, one of three military servicemen readjusting to life after serving in World War II. March won Best Actor for the portrayal, and the movie cleaned up at the Oscars ceremony, winning all but one of the categories in which it was nominated. The movie has been reserved in the National Film Registry in the Library of Congress.

March also won a Best Actor Oscar for the 1932 movie “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” sharing the award with Wallace Beery thanks to a voting tie.

7. ‘Sunset Boulevard’

The iconic 1950 film directed by Billy Wilder includes actress Nancy Olson, a Milwaukee native who was nominated for an Oscar for her supporting role as Betty Schaefer, a script writer working to resuscitate the career of a film star played by Gloria Swanson. In 2007, it appeared at No. 16 on the American Film Institute’s list of the 100 best American films.

6. ‘Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory’

The dark fantasy/comedy/musical was back in the news when the re-imagined prequel “Wonka” arrived in 2023, starring current Oscar Best Actor nominee Timothée Chalamet. In the 1971 film, Wilder plays the iconic titular role, a reclusive chocolate-maker who is, for the first time, inviting five lucky children inside his factory to explore its various mysteries.

5. ‘The Goonies’

The 1985 coming-of-age adventure comedy features an unforgettable supporting performance by John Matuszak, an Oak Creek native whose previous claim to fame was becoming the No. 1 overall selection in the 1973 NFL Draft by the Houston Oilers. The two-time Super Bowl champion defensive end played Sloth, a physically deformed but childlike behemoth befriended by the characters.

4. ‘Platoon’

The 1986 Vietnam war drama was nominated for seven Academy Awards and won four of them, though neither was for Best Supporting Actor despite two nominations for Dafoe and Tom Berenger. The Best Picture winner made the American Film Institute’s list of 100 best American movies and produced a number of unforgettable scenes, including Dafoe’s death sequence.

3. ‘Tommy Boy’

The 1995 buddy comedy starring Madison comedian Chris Farley became a centerpiece of ’90s comedy movies, with Farley playing an emotionally stunted man trying to find a place working for his father’s auto-parts manufacturer.

2. ‘Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner’

This 1967 romantic comedy stars Spencer Tracy in his final role, as well as Sidney Poitier and Katharine Hepburn, in a film nominated for Best Picture and nine other Academy Awards – with wins for Hepburn and the screenplay by William Rose. Tracy, who was sick during filming, died less than three weeks after production was complete, six months before the movie hit theaters. He was posthumously nominated for Best Actor. The film courted controversy for its portrayal of an interracial marriage, arriving shortly after such marriage laws were struck down by the Supreme Court. Tracy played Hepburn’s father, Matt Drayton, coming to terms with the nature of his daughter’s new partnership.

Tracy, by the way, won his two awards for Best Actor in 1937 (“Captains Courageous”) and 1938 (“Boys Town”).

1. ‘Citizen Kane’

On the short list of the greatest films ever made, the audacious 1941 drama features director, co-writer and star Orson Welles, a Kenosha native. Structured as a biopic of the fictional Charles Foster Kane, a character based on real-life moguls of the moment (notably William Randolph Hearst), the film was initially a box-office failure but became a critical darling, credited with innovations on its narrative structure, cinematography and other technical aspects of film.

One more to note: Marvel movies

We mentioned Ruffalo’s role of Hulk in the Avengers franchise; that puts him in two of the seven highest-grossing films of all time (“Avengers: Endgame” is No. 2 and “Avengers: Infinity War” is No. 7), plus two more in the top 20.

Another to note: ‘A Woman Under the Influence’

Starring Cambria-born Gena Rowlands in a performance that earned her one of two Oscar nominations for Best Actress, the film follows an emotionally taxed housewife spiraling and struggling to connect with her blue-collar husband. It’s perhaps the most notable work by director John Cassavetes, Rowlands’ real-life husband.

Others of note: “Inherit the Wind” (with both Tracy and March), “Boogie Nights” (with Milwaukee native Heather Graham), “Mississippi Burning” (with Dafoe).

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: The biggest films all-time with Wisconsinites in prominent roles

Reporting by JR Radcliffe, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

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