9 Actors Who Haven't Topped Their Breakout Performance

8. Christoph Waltz As Col. Hans Landa - Inglorious Basterds

Completely unknown to US audiences until Quentin Tarantino cast him as Col. Hans Landa in Inglorious Basterds, Christoph Waltz is now an established Hollywood actor. His breakout role here deservedly won him acting awards at Cannes, BAFTA, the Golden Globes, and, finally, the Oscars, with Waltz picking up the Best Supporting Actor statuette. Always an effective presence, Waltz rarely changes his style, seemingly playing variations on the role which made him famous. While this is no issue - many great actors in history have done the same thing - it remains that Waltz has never quite hit the heights of Landa, the lip-smacking villain at the heart of Tarantino's spectacular war mashup (and he certainly hasn't bettered his acting in that film's opening scene, one of the greatest ever shot). He won another Oscar in a Tarantino picture, collecting another Supporting Actor win for his turn in Django Unchained. That performance, though good, is pretty much the lesser yin to Landa's superior yang, with Waltz playing an assassin with a heart as opposed to a Nazi assassin with none. Elsewhere, he's the best thing about Roman Polanski's misjudged Carnage, but underwhelming in his latest role as Spectre's Oberhauser. Never anything less than watchable, Waltz is a fine actor, capable of sumptuous delivery and immaculate timing. It just happens that he'll probably never better his breakthrough role, his turn in Inglorious Basterds ranking as one of the greatest film breakouts ever.