Match the Best Actor Oscar Winners - 1940s Quiz

Answer: James Stewart

With his second nomination in the category, Jimmy Stewart won the Best Actor Oscar for his role as tabloid reporter Macaulay "Mike" Connor in "The Philadelphia Story". He had been nominated the previous year for "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington". In "The Philadelphia Story", Connor had been sent by "Spy" magazine to cover the wedding of a snobby socialite (Katharine Hepburn) which her ex-husband (Cary Grant) wanted to stop.

The other nominees for Best Actor were Charlie Chaplin ("The Great Dictator"), Henry Fonda ("The Grapes of Wrath"), Raymond Massey ("Abe Lincoln in Illinois"), and Laurence Olivier ("Rebecca").

Answer: Gary Cooper

Also winning on his second nomination in the category, Gary Cooper received the Academy Award for Best Actor for his portrayal of WWI hero Alvin York in "Sergeant York". He had previously been nominated for "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town". The biopic "Sergeant York" followed the young farmer from his days as a conscientious objector to an eventual Medal of Honor winner.

The other contenders for the award were Cary Grant ("Penny Serenade"), Walter Huston ("All That Money Can Buy"), Robert Montgomery ("Here Comes Mr. Jordan"), and Orson Welles ("Citizen Kane").

Answer: James Cagney

The first actor to win the Oscar for a musical performance, James Cagney picked up the award for his portrayal of entertainer George M. Cohan in "Yankee Doodle Dandy". He had previously been nominated in the same category for "Angels with Dirty Faces".

The biopic followed Cohan's life from his birth into a vaudeville family to his receipt of the Congressional Gold Medal from President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The other Best Actor nominees were Ronald Colman ("Random Harvest"), Walter Pidgeon ("Mrs. Miniver"), Monty Woolley ("The Pied Piper"), and Gary Cooper ("The Pride of the Yankees").

Although Cooper didn't win this year, he was up on stage as he presented the Oscar to Cagney.

Answer: Paul Lukas

At the first Academy Award ceremony held at Grauman's Chinese Theater, Paul Lukas picked up the Best Actor Oscar for his role as German resistance activist Kurt Muller in "Watch on the Rhine", a role he had originated on Broadway. It was his only Academy Award nomination, and he was the first Hungarian-born actor to win an Oscar.

In the film, Muller, his wife (Bette Davis) and their children were visiting her family in the U.S. unaware that another house-guest was a Nazi conspirator. The other nominees in the category were Humphrey Bogart ("Casablanca"), Gary Cooper ("For Whom the Bell Tolls"), Walter Pidgeon ("Madame Curie"), and Mickey Rooney ("The Human Comedy").

Answer: Bing Crosby

With his first Academy Award nomination, Bing Crosby won the Best Actor Oscar for his role as Father Chuck O'Malley in "Going My Way". In the film, Father O'Malley was a progressive young priest who brought new life to a stuffy parish to the chagrin of the elderly pastor (Barry Fitzgerald).

The other nominees for Best Actor were Charles Boyer ("Gaslight"), Cary Grant ("None but the Lonely Heart"), Alexander Knox ("Wilson"), and Barry Fitzgerald ("Going My Way"). Fitzgerald became the first and apparently only (since the Academy changed the voting rules shortly after his nominations) to be nominated in both the Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor categories for the same role in the same film.

He picked up the latter award.

Answer: Ray Milland

With the only nomination of his career, Ray Milland won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as alcoholic writer Don Birnam in "The Lost Weekend". Although several sources state that Milland didn't give an acceptance speech and merely bowed to the audience, there is video of him accepting the award from Ingrid Bergman, saying "Thank you. Thank you very much indeed, I'm greatly honored". Perhaps because he was facing Bergman at the time he made the comments, it wasn't considered an acceptance speech. "The Lost Weekend" took place over five days in the life of Birnam as his life spun out of control due to his drinking problem.

The other nominees for the award were Gene Kelly ("Anchors Aweigh"), Gregory Peck ("The Keys of the Kingdom"), Cornel Wilde ("A Song to Remember"), and Bing Crosby ("The Bells of St. Mary's"). Crosby became the first performer to be nominated twice for portraying the same character in different films, portraying Father Chuck O'Malley in "The Bells of St. Mary's" and in the prior year's "Going My Way", for which he won the Oscar.

Answer: Fredric March

Fredric March won his second Oscar for Best Actor for his role as former WWII Sergeant Al Stephenson in "The Best Years of Our Lives". He had previously won for "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and been nominated in the same category for "The Royal Family of Broadway" and "A Star is Born". "The Best Years of Our Lives" was a timely film about the difficulty of servicemen returning to civilian life after WWII. Stephenson had served in the Pacific, and although he returned home to a comfortable family life and a steady job as a banker, he struggled with balancing corporate needs with those of his fellow soldiers.

The other contenders for the Best Actor award were Laurence Olivier ("Henry V"), Larry Parks ("The Jolson Story"), Gregory Peck ("The Yearling"), and James Stewart ("It's a Wonderful Life").

Answer: Ronald Colman

At the twentieth Academy Awards ceremony, Ronald Colman picked up the only Oscar of his career for his role as mentally-unstable actor Anthony John in "A Double Life". He had prior nominations, all in the Best Actor category, for "Condemned!", "Bulldog Drummond", and "Random Harvest".

In the film noir "A Double Life", John was an actor who became obsessed with whatever character he was portraying, which led to complications when he portrayed "Othello". The other Best Actor nominees were John Garfield ("Body and Soul"), Gregory Peck ("Gentleman's Agreement"), William Powell ("Life with Father"), and Michael Redgrave ("Mourning Becomes Electra"). James Baskett who portrayed Uncle Remus in Walt Disney's "Song of the South" was not nominated in either the Best or Supporting Actor categories but received an honorary Oscar at the ceremony "for his able and heart-warming characterization of Uncle Remus, friend and story teller to the children of the world".

He was thus the first African-American man to technically win an Oscar for acting, although Sidney Poitier gets the official credit for that achievement since he did so in a competitive category.

Answer: Laurence Olivier

Laurence Olivier received his second Oscar and his first in the Best Actor category for portraying the titular role in "Hamlet". His first Oscar had been an honorary one "for his outstanding achievement as actor, producer and director in bringing 'Henry V' to the screen", although he had also been nominated in the Best Actor category for that role.

He had additional Best Actor nominations for "Wuthering Heights" and "Rebecca". With his win for a film which he directed, Olivier became the first performer to direct himself to an Oscar. Shakespeare's play "Hamlet" had appeared on film several times before Olivier's version, including a five-minute film in 1900 with Sarah Bernhardt portraying the mentally-tortured prince.

The other nominees for Best Actor were Lew Ayres ("Johnny Belinda"), Montgomery Clift ("The Search"), Dan Dailey ("When My Baby Smiles at Me"), and Clifton Webb ("Sitting Pretty").

Answer: Broderick Crawford

With the only Academy Award nomination of his career, Broderick Crawford won the Best Actor Oscar for his portrayal of ruthless politician Willie Stark in "All the King's Men". Based on the novel by Robert Penn Warren (which was inspired by Louisiana Governor Huey Long), Stark started out in politics by campaigning against corruption, but he eventually became more corrupt than the people he had railed against.

The other contenders for the award were Kirk Douglas ("Champion"), Gregory Peck ("Twelve O'Clock High"), Richard Todd ("The Hasty Heart"), and John Wayne ("Sands of Iwo Jima"). Reportedly, Wayne was first offered the role of Willie Stark, but turned it down as he thought the script was unpatriotic.