10 Actors Who Tried Like Hell To Win An Oscar (But Failed)

We can already see a bit of a pattern emerging here: actors achieve massive mainstream success, then crave awards recognition. This was certainly the case with Sharon Stone, who - having spent most of the 1980s in the B-list, or lower - finally broke big in the 1990s with Basic Instinct.

After taking on a number of roles that cashed in on her newfound sex symbol status, Stone decided she wanted to move up in the world - and what better way than teaming up with the Goodfellas dream team of Martin Scorcese, Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, for their next crime epic?

Stone was cast as Ginger McKenna, wife of De Niro's mobster Ace Rothstein, whose duplicitous ways and increasing alcoholism play a significant role in her husband's fall from grace.

It's a showy part which Stone makes the most of - and, perhaps surprisingly, she wound up garnering Casino its sole Academy Award nomination at the 1996 ceremony, with Scorcese, De Niro and Pesci overlooked.

She went home empty-handed, however. Susan Sarandon took home the gold for Dead Man Walking, and Stone has never been nominated again in the years since.