Match the Best Supporting Actor - 2000s Quiz

Answer: Benicio Del Toro

With his first Academy Award nomination, Benicio Del Toro won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as idealistic Javier Rodriguez in "Traffic". In the film, Rodriguez was a jaded police officer in Mexico who thought he was helping to bring down the drug trade, only to discover he was being used by one of the cartels.

When he offered to help the D.E.A., he didn't ask for cash but for a more noble type of payment. The role of Rodriguez was so integral to the ensemble film that early in the award season, Del Toro competed in the Best Actor category, picking up the Screen Actors Guild award in that category over Russell Crowe ("Gladiator") and Tom Hanks ("Cast Away").

The other nominees for Best Supporting Actor were Jeff Bridges ("The Contender"), Willem Dafoe ("Shadow of the Vampire"), Albert Finney ("Erin Brockovich"), and Joaquin Phoenix ("Gladiator"). With his nomination, Joaquin Phoenix joined his brother River in being the first pair of brothers to receive acting nominations; River Phoenix had been nominated in the same category in 1989 for "Running on Empty".

Answer: Jim Broadbent

Another first time Academy Award winner, Jim Broadbent picked up the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of John Bayley in "Iris". It was his first Academy Award nomination. The biographical drama told the story of the relationship between author Dame Iris Murdoch (Judi Dench/Kate Winslet) and her meek and devoted husband Bayley (Broadbent/Hugh Bonneville).

The film contrasted their early years of opposites attracting with their later years as the formerly vibrant Murdoch suffered from Alzheimer's and Bayley struggled as her frustrated caretaker.

The other contenders in the category were Ethan Hawke ("Training Day"), Ben Kingsley ("Sexy Beast"), Ian McKellen ("The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring"), and Jon Voight ("Ali").

Answer: Chris Cooper

At the 75th Academy Awards ceremony, Chris Cooper won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his portrayal of self-important orchid hunter John Laroche in "Adaptation". It was his first Academy Award nomination. Mixing fact and fiction, the quirky "Adaptation" told the story of screenwriter Charlie Kaufman (Nicolas Cage) who was hired to write a screenplay for the best-selling novel "The Orchid Thief" by author Susan Orlean (Meryl Streep).

The book however lacked a narrative so Kaufman and his fictional twin brother (also Cage) followed Orlean to her tryst with Laroche in Florida in the hopes of getting material for the script.

As film critic Roger Ebert pointed out: "The real Orlean and Laroche must have signed waivers abandoning every possible legal recourse; they were very good sports." The other Best Supporting Actor nominees were Ed Harris ("The Hours"), Paul Newman ("Road to Perdition"), John C. Reilly ("Chicago"), and Christopher Walken ("Catch Me If You Can").

Answer: Tim Robbins

With his second Academy Award nomination, Tim Robbins won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role as the emotionally damaged Dave Boyle in "Mystic River". He had previously been nominated in the Best Director category for the film "Dead Man Walking" in 1996. "Mystic River" told the story of three childhood friends, Dave, Jimmy, and Sean (Robbins, Sean Penn, and Kevin Bacon), whose lives were affected when Dave was abducted by pedophiles.

As adults, police detective Sean had to investigate the murder of Jimmy's teenage daughter, a crime for which Dave became a suspect. Sean Penn won the Best Actor Oscar for his role as Jimmy; it was the first time since "Ben Hur" in 1960 that a film garnered both the Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor awards. Robbins took a moment during his acceptance speech to state that he played "a victim of abuse and violence, and if you are out there and are a person that has had that tragedy befall you, there is no shame and no weakness in seeking help and counseling.

It is sometimes the strongest thing that you can do to stop the cycle of violence." The other contenders in the Best Supporting Actor category were Alec Baldwin ('The Cooler"), Benicio Del Toro ("21 Grams"), Djimon Hounsou ("In America"), and Ken Watanabe ("The Last Samurai").

Answer: Morgan Freeman

With his fourth Academy Award nomination, Morgan Freeman picked up the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role as former boxer Eddie "Scrap" Dupris in "Million Dollar Baby". He had previously been nominated in the same category for "Street Smart" in 1988 and in the Best Actor category for "Driving Miss Daisy" in 1990 and "The Shawshank Redemption" in 1995.

In "Million Dollar Baby", gym employee Scrap agreed to help coach a talented female boxer (Oscar winner Hilary Swank) after his curmudgeonly boss Dunn (Clint Eastwood) turned her down. Dunn later had a change of heart and turned her into a champion before a disaster forced him to make a difficult decision.

The other nominees in the category were Alan Alda ("The Aviator"), Thomas Haden Church ("Sideways"), Jamie Foxx ("Collateral"), and Clive Owen ("Closer"). Jamie Foxx was also nominated in the Best Actor category (which he won for "Ray"), making him only the second actor to receive nominations in both categories in the same year for different films; Al Pacino was the first in 1993 for "Scent of a Woman" and "Glengarry Glen Ross".

Answer: George Clooney

George Clooney had three Academy Award nominations in 2006, and he won the Oscar in the Best Supporting Actor category for his role as CIA agent Bob Barnes in "Syriana". He was also nominated in the Best Director and Best Original Screenplay categories for "Good Night, and Good Luck", and he was the first person to receive nominations in the directing and acting categories in the same year for different films.

When he picked up his award, Clooney joked, "Alright, so I'm not winning director". Written by Stephen Gaghan who also wrote the screenplay for "Traffic", "Syriana" had a similar structure with multiple plot lines and an ensemble cast, but this time the topic was oil, not drugs.

In the film, Barnes was a CIA field agent assigned with taking out illegal arms dealers, but when he got in the way of an oil deal, he found himself to be a target.

The other nominees for Best Supporting Actor were Matt Dillon ("Crash"), Paul Giamatti ("Cinderella Man"), Jake Gyllenhaal ("Brokeback Mountain"), and William Hurt ("A History of Violence").

Answer: Alan Arkin

The third time was a charm for Alan Arkin who won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as cantankerous grandpa Edwin Hoover in "Little Miss Sunshine". He had previously been nominated in the Best Actor category for "The Russians are Coming, the Russians are Coming" in 1967 and for "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" in 1969. "Little Miss Sunshine" was the name of a child pageant in which gawky young Olive (Abigail Breslin) wanted to compete, and the film followed her dysfunctional family as they traveled in a van from New Mexico to Southern California for the competition.

As the self-absorbed family dealt with their own issues, Olive was coached for the competition by the drug-addled Hoover, something that became shockingly apparent during the talent competition.

The other contenders for the award were Jackie Earle Haley ("Little Children"), Djimon Hounsou ("Blood Diamond"), Eddie Murphy ("Dreamgirls"), and Mark Wahlberg ("The Departed").

Answer: Javier Bardem

At the 80th Academy Award ceremony, Javier Bardem won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role as stoic hitman Anton Chigurh in "No Country for Old Men". He had previously been nominated in the Best Actor category for "Before Night Falls" in 2001. Bardem also became the first actor to win the "Big Five" acting awards (Academy Award, BAFTA, Golden Globe, Screen Actors Guild, and Critics' Choice) in the Supporting Actor category, and he was also the first Spanish actor to win an acting Academy Award.

In "No Country for Old Men", a hunter named Moss (Josh Brolin) stole millions after stumbling on a drug deal gone bad, and Chigurh was hired to recoup the cash, gruesomely killing anyone who got in his way. Tommy Lee Jones portrayed the sheriff who was working the case while he tried to protect Moss.

The other Best Supporting Actor nominees were Casey Affleck ("The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford"), Philip Seymour Hoffman ("Charlie Wilson's War"), Hal Holbrook ("Into the Wild"), and Tom Wilkinson ("Michael Clayton").

At the age of 82, Holbrook was the oldest actor nominated for an acting Academy Award at that point in time.

Answer: Heath Ledger

With his second Academy Award nomination, Health Ledger was awarded the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as the psychopathic Joker in "The Dark Knight". Ledger had passed away in January 2008, and became the second actor to receive a posthumous Oscar; Peter Finch was the first in 1977. Ledger had a previous Academy Award nomination in the Best Actor category for "Brokeback Mountain" in 2006.

He also won the Big Five acting awards (Oscar, BAFTA, Golden Globe, SAG, and Critics' Choice) for his performance as The Joker. "The Dark Knight" was the second film in Christopher Nolan's "Batman" trilogy featuring Christian Bale as Batman.

In the film, the mysterious Joker used a group of misfits to wreak havoc on the city of Gotham and international crime syndicates.

The other Best Supporting Actor nominees were Josh Brolin ("Milk"), Robert Downey, Jr. ("Tropic Thunder"), Philip Seymour Hoffman ("Doubt"), and Michael Shannon ("Revolutionary Road").

Answer: Christoph Waltz

Christoph Waltz joined Javier Bardem and Heath Ledger in winning the Big Five acting awards (Oscar, BAFTA, Golden Globe, SAG, and Critics' Choice) when he picked up the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his role as the menacing Colonel Hans Landa in "Inglourious Basterds".

It was his first Academy Award nomination, and he was the first performer to win an acting Oscar for a Quentin Tarantino film. Tarantino had originally wanted Leonardo DiCaprio to portray Landa but then decided that a native German speaker would work better in the film. "Inglourious Basterds" presented an alternate history of a plot to assassinate Nazi leadership during WWII.

The opportunistic Landa was tasked with hunting down Jews in France, but when he discovered the Allied plan, he decided to look out for himself.

The other contenders for the Best Supporting Actor award were Matt Damon ("Invictus"), Woody Harrelson ("The Messenger"), Christopher Plummer ("The Last Station"), and Stanley Tucci ("The Lovely Bones").