It can be a long road to Oscar victory — some of the best have never stood victorious on that stage regardless of acclaim and despite, in some cases, numerous nominations.
However, there are some who end up Oscar champs after a long wait. Some, like Henry Fonda and John Wayne, only had two acting nominations in decades-long careers and after starring in dozens of films that are now classics.
Some, like Al Pacino and Paul Newman, spent two decades piling up nominations, with each of these men having six prior acting nominations leading up to the ceremonies in which they won. Geraldine Page won on her eighth try, after receiving a nomination in every decade from the 1950s to the 1980s. She and Lee Grant were both unfortunate victims of the Hollywood blacklist in the 1950s, after promising Oscar-nominated film debuts; however, both of these ladies made spectacular comebacks, eventually earning well-deserved statues.
In the nearly 100 years of Academy Award ceremonies, 23 performers have won at least 15 years after their first failed nomination. Tour our photo gallery with the actresses and actors whose long waits came to happy endings.
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Alan Arkin (40 Years)
Image Credit: Rob Latour/Variety Arkin received his initial Best Actor nomination in 1967, for his first major film role in Norman Jewison’s “The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming,” for his comedic portrayal of Russian Lieutenant Rozanov. He received a second failed bid two years later for “The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter.” But 40 years after his first nomination, he was a surprise win for Best Supporting Actor, for “Little Miss Sunshine” in 2007. He received a second supporting nod in 2013 for “Argo.”
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Jeff Bridges (38 Years)
Image Credit: Jamie McCarthy/Getty Images He comes from acting royalty, so it’s no surprise that Bridges has been acting since he was a toddler, often alongside his father Lloyd. Bridges earned his first Oscar nomination in 1972, for Best Supporting Actor for “The Last Picture Show,” which was his first major film. Over the next three decades he received two more supporting bids and one lead, until he finally claimed victory on his fifth bid in 2010, winning for Best Actor for his role as faded country music star Otis Blake in “Crazy Heart.” With his supporting bid in 1972 at the age of 22, he was one of the youngest people ever nominated up to that time; his win 38 years later at the age of 60 makes him the eighth-oldest Best Actor champ. And he hasn’t slowed down, earning two more acting bids in the decade since.
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Michael Caine (20 Years)
Image Credit: Joe Kohen/Variety One of the most beloved British actors, Caine’s diverse film catalogue has led to six acting nominations and two wins. He rose to international fame and received his first Best Actor nomination in 1967, for his role as the womanizing “Alfie.” He’d receive two more failed bids for lead before securing a win for Best Supporting Actor for Woody Allen’s “Hannah and Her Sisters” in 1987, two decades after his first nomination. Another 13 years later, he won again in supporting, for “The Cider House Rules,” and received another bid in 2003 for “The Quiet American.”
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Ronald Colman (18 Years)
Image Credit: The Print Collector/Heritage Images/Newscom/The Mega Agency Known for his cultured voice and suave personality, Colman was one of the most popular British actors of the Golden Age, and received three Best Actor nominations during his career. At the third Academy Awards, Colman was nominated for both “Bulldog Drummond” and “Condemned!” His second bid came 13 years later, for “Random Harvest,” but his win occurred nearly two decades after his first nomination. In 1948, Colman won for “A Double Life,” in which he plays an actor playing Othello whose boundaries between the play and real life begin to blur, with tragic consequences.
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Laura Dern (28 Years)
Image Credit: Rob Latour/Variety The daughter of Oscar nominees Bruce Dern and Diane Ladd, it’s not surprising that Dern has had an impressive career and three nominations herself. When she was just 25 years-old, she received her first bid, for Best Actress for “Rambling Rose” in 1992; with Ladd’s nomination in supporting for the same film, they became the only mother/daughter pair to garner acting nominations for the same film. In 2015, she earned a Best Supporting Actress bid for “Wild,” but she had to wait a few more years for a win. In 2020, 28 years after her initial bid, she became a Best Supporting Actress champ, for “Marriage Story.”
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Leonardo DiCaprio (22 Years)
Image Credit: Kathy Hutchins / Hutchins Photo/Newscom/The Mega Agency DiCaprio earned his first Academy Award nomination when he was only 19-years-old, for his portrayal of the intellectually disabled Arnie in “What’s Eating Gilbert Grape” in 1994, becoming one of the youngest nominees of all time in that category. He was soon one of the most sought-after actors, and achieved his first Best Actor nomination in 2005, for “The Aviator.” On his fifth acting nomination, 22 years after the first, he finally claimed victory with his Best Actor win for “The Revenant” in 2016; he received another bid in 2020, for “Once Upon a Time in . . . Hollywood.”
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Henry Fonda (41 Years)
Image Credit: Harry Langdon/Getty Images A Hollywood legend who starred in classics like “Jesse James” (1939), “Young Mr. Lincoln” (1939), “Mister Roberts” (1955) and “12 Angry Men” (1957), Fonda was only nominated twice for competitive acting Oscars. He earned his first bid in 1941 for his iconic role as Tom Joad in “Grapes of Wrath,” but lost to his good friend James Stewart (“The Philadelphia Story”) – who actually voted for Fonda. In 1958, Fonda was nominated (with Reginald Rose) as a producer for “12 Angry Men,” but failed to earn an acting bid. In 1981, he was bestowed an Honorary Award, but finally won his competitive Oscar 41 years after his first nomination, for his final film, “On Golden Pond,” in 1982, just a few months before his death. Remarkably, this was his first film with fellow Golden Age star Katharine Hepburn, who won her record-setting fourth Best Actress Oscar.
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Morgan Freeman ( 17 years)
Image Credit: Kathy Hutchins / Hutchins Photo/Newscom/The Mega Agency Freeman had been acting for more than two decades when he had his breakthrough film role in “Street Smart,” earning a Best Supporting Actor nomination in 1988. In the 1990s, he received two bids in lead, for “Driving Miss Daisy” in 1990 and “The Shawshank Redemption” in 1995; however, he waited another decade for a win. In 2005, 17 years after his first supporting nomination, he won in that category for Clint Eastwood’s “Million Dollar Baby.” In 2010, he received another Best Actor nod, for “Invictus.”
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John Gielgud (17 Years)
Image Credit: Fairchild Archive/Penske Media One of the most respected British actors of all time, Gielgud spent most of his early years on stage, and made most of his films after the age of 60. He was 60 years-old when he received his first of two Best Supporting Actor nominations, for his role as King Louis VII of France in “Becket” in 1965. He won 17 years later for a much different role, as the droll valet Hobson in the comedy “Arthur” in 1982. He had already won three Tonys and a Grammy; with his Emmy win in 1991, he became the fourth person to complete the competitive EGOT.
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Lee Grant (24 Years)
Image Credit: WWD Grant had a promising career, earning her first of four Best Supporting Actress nominations in 1952, for her film debut as a shoplifter in “Detective Story.” Shortly after, she fell victim to the Hollywood blacklist and found very little work for more than a decade. When she was finally removed from the blacklist, she got an Emmy-winning role on “Peyton Place.” Her film career was revived in the 1970s, during which time she received her other three nominations, winning in 1976 for “Shampoo” – 24 years after her spectacular debut. In 1986, she directed the Oscar-winning documentary “Down and Out in America,” making her the only Oscar-winning performer to direct an Oscar-winning documentary.
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Wendy Hiller (20 Years)
Image Credit: Sasha/Hulton Archive/Getty Images One of the most esteemed British actresses of her generation, Dame Hiller preferred the stage and was a favorite of George Bernard Shaw, who cast her as Eliza Doolittle in the 1936 stage version of “Pygmalion.” She starred in the film version at Shaw’s request, earning a Best Actress nomination in 1939. It would be another 20 years before she received another bid, this time winning for Best Supporting Actress for “Separate Tables” in 1959. Her last nomination was in 1967, for “A Man for All Seasons.”
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Shirley MacLaine (25 Years)
Image Credit: Fairchild Archive/Penske Media It didn’t take long for MacLaine’s star to rise in the 1950s, and she earned her first Best Actress nomination early in her career, in 1959 for “Some Came Running.” Two more bids would follow in the 1960s, and another in the 1970s, before she would finally win in 1984 on her fifth acting nomination, for her role as the difficult but loving mother in James L. Brooks’s “Terms of Endearment.”
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Julianne Moore (17 Years)
Image Credit: YLJ/PKI/Newscom/The Mega Agency Moore had already appeared in some acclaimed films when she achieved her first nomination in 1998, for her portrayal of porn actress Amber Waves in Paul Thomas Anderson’s “Boogie Nights.” She received her first lead bid in 2000, for “The End of the Affair,” and three years later, became one of a dozen performers to receive two acting nominations in a single year, in supporting for “The Hours” and in lead for “Far from Heaven.” It was 12 years before she got another bid – but she’d claim victory 17 years after her initial nomination. In 2015, she won for her moving performance of a woman stricken with early onset Alzheimer’s disease in “Still Alice.”
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Paul Newman (28 Years)
Image Credit: Studio, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons It’s hard to believe that Newman did NOT win an Oscar for “Hud” (1964), “Cool Hand Luke” (1968) or “Absence of Malice” (1982), but it seemed there was always a Sidney Poitier, Rod Steiger or Henry Fonda edging him out. He earned his first Best Actor bid in 1959, for “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” and accumulated six more over the next quarter century. In 1986, he was bestowed an Honorary Oscar, but his competitive win finally came the next year, 28 years after his first time on the ballot. In 1987, he became the fourth of six performers to receive a second Oscar nomination for playing the same character, when he earned a bid for playing his 1962-nominated “The Hustler” role Eddie Felson in “The Color of Money.” He’s the only of the six performers to win on the second try; the only other to win at all was Bing Crosby, who won on his first try for playing Father O’Malley in “Going My Way” in 1945.
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Al Pacino (20 Years)
Image Credit: Michael Buckner/VAR For a time, it looked like Pacino would become one of the great actors nominated many times over, but without a win. His first Supporting Actor bid came in 1973, for playing Michael Corleone in “The Godfather,” and like Newman, he received a second bid in 1975 for playing the same character, in “The Godfather Part II”. He earned an acting nomination every year from 1973 to 1976, and two more in 1980 and 1991, making six failed bids. However, in 1993, after 20 years of waiting, he became the sixth of 12 people nominated for two acting awards in the same year, in supporting for “Glengarry Glen Ross” and in lead for “Scent of a Woman,” finally earning a Best Actor statue for the latter. His losing streak was over, but he didn’t make another appearance as a nominee for 27 years, earning another supporting bid for “The Irishman” in 2020.
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Geraldine Page (32 Years)
Image Credit: WWD One of America’s great actresses of stage and screen, Page garnered her first nomination in 1954, for Best Supporting Actress for her first major film, playing against John Wayne in “Hondo.” Unfortunately, she was blacklisted in Hollywood during the HUAC years; however, she had a successful career on Broadway, and made a comeback on film with back-to-back lead nominations for “Summer and Smoke” in 1962 and “Sweet Bird of Youth” in 1963. She earned a least one nomination in every decade from the 1950s to the 1980s, and finally won Best Actress in 1986 on her eighth acting nomination, for “The Trip to Bountiful.”
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Jack Palance (39 Years)
Image Credit: Newscom/The Mega Agency Known for playing villains, Palance garnered three supporting nominations throughout his career. He earned back-to-back nominations in 1953 and 1954, the first for “Sudden Fear,” in which he plays Joan Crawford’s duplicitous husband; the second, for playing a ruthless gunslinger in the classic “Shane.” It was almost four decades before his name appeared again on the ballot, for his role as grizzled cowboy Curly in “City Slickers” in 1992. After four decades in the business, and 39 years after his first nomination, Palace claimed a statue at the age of 73, memorably doing one-arm push-ups during his speech.
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Gregory Peck (17 Years)
Image Credit: AMPAS / YouTube A popular leading man during Hollywood’s classic age, Peck earned five Best Actor nominations, four of which occurred between 1946 and 1950. In 1946, he achieved the first bid for “The Keys of the Kingdom;” the subsequent nominations are from films all now considered classics: “The Yearling” in 1947, “Gentleman’s Agreement” in 1948 and “Twelve O’Clock High” in 1950. None of these netted him a win, and it was another 13 years before he was on the ballot again, but this time it was for a role for which he is best remembered, and is one of the most beloved in the history of cinema. In 1963, he won for his role as Atticus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird.” This was his last nomination, although he did win the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award in 1968.
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Joaquin Phoenix (19 Years)
Image Credit: Michael Buckner for Variety Phoenix had already been in the business for almost two decades when his career really took off, with his portrayal of Roman Emperor Commodus in Ridley Scott’s “Gladiator,” for which he received his first Oscar nomination in 2001, for Best Supporting Actor. His brother River had received a supporting nod in 1989, making these two the only pair of brothers nominated for acting Oscars. Phoenix became a sought-after leading man, and earned two Best Actor bids over the next decade. However, it took 19 years after his first time on the ballot to accomplish a win, finally claiming a Best Actor statue in 2020 for “Joker.”
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Brad Pitt (24 Years)
Image Credit: Chelsea Lauren/Variety Pitt has a long history with the Academy, earning recognition both for acting and for producing. In 1996, he garnered a Best Supporting Actor bid for his memorable role as a mental patient in the sci fi film “12 Monkeys.” Despite several acclaimed performances, it was 13 years before he received his next nomination, this time in lead, for “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” in 2009; over the next 11 years, he earned one more acting nomination and three Best Picture nominations, winning that award in 2014 for “12 Years a Slave.” But it wasn’t until 2020, 19 years after his first Best Supporting Actor bid, that he finally won his acting award, in that category, for Quentin Taratino’s “Once Upon a Time in. . .Hollywood.”
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Will Smith (20 Years)
Image Credit: Michael Buckner/Variety He’s come a long way from “Fresh Prince,” with three Best Actor nominations under his belt. He earned his first bid in 2002 for his portrayal of Muhammad Ali in “Ali,” and garnered a second in 2007 for “The Pursuit of Happyness.” But it took 20 years to get him on stage, when he finally won in 2022 for his portrayal of Serena and Venus Williams’s father in “King Richard.”
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Maureen Stapleton (24 Years)
Image Credit: WWD Stapleton earned her first of four Best Supporting Actress nominations in 1959 for her film debut in “Lonelyhearts.” Her next two came in 1971, for “Airport” (which she lost to costar Helen Hayes) and in 1979, for “Interiors.” In 1981, she completed the Triple Crown of Acting with her win for “Reds,” adding an Oscar statue to her competitive Tony and Emmy awards.
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John Wayne (20 Years)
Image Credit: WWD One of the biggest stars of the Golden Age of Hollywood, Wayne is primarily remembered for his war films and westerns, so it’s not surprising that his two acting nominations came from those genres. His first bid for Best Actor came in 1950, for the WWII film “Sands of Iwo Jima.” In 1960, he produced, directed and starred as Davy Crockett in “The Alamo,” which earned him a Best Picture bid only. However, after 40 years in the business and over 20 years after his only other acting nomination, Wayne finally stood victorious on the Oscar stage in 1970, for his legendary role of Rooster Cogburn in “True Grit.”
