Best Actor Award
Prix d'interprétation masculine  (French)
The 2021 recipient: Caleb Landry Jones
Awarded for	Best Performance by an Actor
Country	France
Presented by	Cannes Film Festival
First awarded	1946
Currently held by	Caleb Landry Jones Nitram (2021)
Website	www.festival-cannes.com/en/

The Best Actor Award (French: Prix d'interprétation masculine) is an award presented at the Cannes Film Festival. It is given to an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance and chosen by the jury from the films in official competition slate at the festival. As of the 2021 festival, Caleb Landry Jones is the most recent winner in this category for his work on Nitram.

History

The award was first presented in 1946. The prize was not awarded in 1947, 1953, 1954, 1956 and 1960. Additionally, the festival was not held at all in 1948, 1950 and 2020; while in 1968 no awards were given as the festival was called off mid-way due to the May 1968 events in France. On four occasions, the jury has awarded multiple men (more than 2) the prize from one film. The four films were A Big Family in 1955, Compulsion in 1959, Long Day's Journey into Night in 1962, and Days of Glory in 2006. Dean Stockwell, Jack Lemmon, and Marcello Mastroianni has won the most awards in this category, each winning twice. The award can be for lead or supporting roles with the exception of the period from 1979 to 1981, and in 1991, when the festival used to award a separate "Best Supporting Actor" prize. The jury also on occasion cites actors with a special citation that is separate from the main award.

Winners

Table key

#	Indicates Ex-aequo winners
	Indicates the Best Supporting Actor winner

Year	Actor	Role	Film	Original title	Ref.
1940s
1946	Ray Milland	Don Birnam	The Lost Weekend		[1]
1947	No award given that year
1948	Festival not held, no awards given that year
1949	Edward G. Robinson	Gino Monetti	House of Strangers		[2]
1950s
1950	Festival not held, no awards given that year
1951	Michael Redgrave	Andrew Crocker-Harris	The Browning Version		[3]
1952	Marlon Brando	Emiliano Zapata	Viva Zapata!		[4]
1953	No award given that year
1954	No award given that year
1955	Spencer Tracy [A][B]	John J. Macreedy	Bad Day at Black Rock		[5]
	Sergei Lukyanov [A][B]	Matvei Zhurbin	A Big Family	Больша́я семья́
	Boris Andreyev [A][B]	Ilya Matveyevich Zhurbin
	Aleksey Batalov [A][B]	Aleksei Zhurbin
	Sergei Kurilov [A][B]	Viktor Zhurbin
	Vadim Medvedev [A][B]	Anton Zhurbin
	Boris Bityukov [A][B]	Kostya Zhurbin
	Nikolai Gritsenko [A][B]	Club Manager
	Pavel Kadochnikov [A][B]	Skobolev
	Boris Kokovkin [A][B]	Shipyard Director
	Nikolay Sergeev [A][B]	Basmanov
1956	No award given that year
1957	John Kitzmiller	Sgt. Jim	Valley of Peace		[6]
1958	Paul Newman	Ben Quick	The Long, Hot Summer		[7] [8]
1959	Bradford Dillman #	Artie Strauss	Compulsion		[9]
	Dean Stockwell #	Judd Steiner
	Orson Welles #	Jonathan Wilk
1960s
1960	No award given that year
1961	Anthony Perkins	Philip Van Der Besh	Goodbye Again		[10]
1962	Murray Melvin [C]	Geoffrey Inghman	A Taste of Honey		[11] [12]
	Ralph Richardson [C]	James Tyrone Sr.	Long Day's Journey into Night
	Jason Robards [C]	James Tyrone Jr.
	Dean Stockwell [C]	Edmund Tyrone
1963	Richard Harris	Frank Machin	This Sporting Life		[13]
1964	Antal Páger #	Vajkay Ákos	Drama of the Lark	Pacsirta	[14]
	Saro Urzì #	Don Vincenzo Ascalone	Seduced and Abandoned	Sedotta e abbandonata
1965	Terence Stamp	Freddie Clegg	The Collector		[15]
1966	Per Oscarsson	Pontus	Hunger	Sult	[16]
1967	Oded Kotler	Eli	Three Days and a Child	שלושה ימים וילד	[17]
1968	Festival interrupted, no awards given that year because of the May 68 events in France
1969	Jean-Louis Trintignant	The Examining Magistrate	Z		[18]
1970s
1970	Marcello Mastroianni	Oreste Nardi	The Pizza Triangle	Dramma della gelosia (tutti i particolari in cronaca)	[19]
1971	Riccardo Cucciolla	Nicola Sacco	Sacco & Vanzetti	Sacco e Vanzetti	[20]
1972	Jean Yanne	Jean	We Won't Grow Old Together	Nous ne vieillirons pas ensemble	[21]
1973	Giancarlo Giannini	Antonio Soffiantini	Love and Anarchy	Film d'amore e d'anarchia, ovvero: stamattina alle 10, in via dei Fiori, nella nota casa di tolleranza...	[22]
1974	Jack Nicholson	Billy L. Buddusky	The Last Detail		[23]
1975	Vittorio Gassman	Fausto Consolo	Scent of a Woman	Profumo di donna	[24]
1976	José Luis Gómez	Pascual Duarte	Pascual Duarte		[25]
1977	Fernando Rey	Luis	Elisa, vida mía		[26]
1978	Jon Voight	Luke Martin	Coming Home		[27]
1979	Jack Lemmon	Jack Godell	The China Syndrome		[28] [29]
	Stefano Madia	Marco Millozza	Dear Father	Caro papà
1980s
1980	Michel Piccoli	Mauro Ponticelli	A Leap in the Dark	Salto nel vuoto	[30] [31]
	Jack Thompson	Major J.F. Thomas	Breaker Morant
1981	Ugo Tognazzi	Primo Spaggiari	Tragedy of a Ridiculous Man	La tragedia di un uomo ridicolo	[32] [33]
	Ian Holm	Sam Mussabini	Chariots of Fire
1982	Jack Lemmon	Edmund Horman	Missing		[34]
1983	Gian Maria Volonté	Bernard Fontana	The Death of Mario Ricci	La mort de Mario Ricci	[35]
1984	Alfredo Landa #	Paco el Bajo	The Holy Innocents	Los santos inocentes	[36]
	Francisco Rabal #	Azarías
1985	William Hurt	Luis Molina	Kiss of the Spider Woman		[37]
1986	Michel Blanc #	Antoine	Tenue de soirée		[38]
	Bob Hoskins #	George	Mona Lisa
1987	Marcello Mastroianni	Romano	Dark Eyes	Oci ciornie	[39]
1988	Forest Whitaker	Charlie "Bird" Parker	Bird		[40]
1989	James Spader	Graham Dalton	Sex, Lies, and Videotape		[41]
1990s
1990	Gérard Depardieu	Cyrano de Bergerac	Cyrano de Bergerac		[42]
1991	John Turturro	Barton Fink	Barton Fink		[43]
	Samuel L. Jackson	Gator Purify	Jungle Fever
1992	Tim Robbins	Griffin Mill	The Player		[44]
1993	David Thewlis	Johnny	Naked		[45]
1994	Ge You	Xu Fugui	To Live	活着	[46]
1995	Jonathan Pryce	Lytton Strachey	Carrington		[47]
1996	Daniel Auteuil #	Harry	The Eighth Day	Le huitième jour	[48]
	Pascal Duquenne #	Georges
1997	Sean Penn	Eddie Quinn	She's So Lovely		[49]
1998	Peter Mullan	Joe Kavanagh	My Name Is Joe		[50]
1999	Emmanuel Schotté	Pharaon de Winter	Humanité	L'humanité	[51]
2000s
2000	Tony Leung Chiu-wai	Chow Mo-wan	In the Mood for Love	花樣年華	[52]
2001	Benoît Magimel	Walter Klemmer	The Piano Teacher	La Pianiste	[53]
2002	Olivier Gourmet	Olivier	The Son	Le Fils	[54]
2003	Muzaffer Özdemir #	Mahmut	Uzak		[55]
	Mehmet Emin Toprak #	Yusuf
2004	Yūya Yagira	Akira Fukushima	Nobody Knows	誰も知らない	[56]
2005	Tommy Lee Jones	Pete Perkins	The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada		[57]
2006	Roschdy Zem #	Messaoud Souni	Days of Glory	Indigènes	[58]
	Bernard Blancan #	Sergent Roger Martinez
	/ Jamel Debbouze #	Saïd Otmari
	Samy Naceri #	Yassir
	/ Sami Bouajila #	Abdelkader
2007	Konstantin Lavronenko	Alex	The Banishment	Изгнание	[59]
2008	/ Benicio del Toro	Ernesto "Che" Guevara	Che		[60]
2009	Christoph Waltz	Col. Hans Landa	Inglourious Basterds		[61]
2010s
2010	Javier Bardem #	Uxbal	Biutiful		[62]
	Elio Germano #	Claudio	La nostra vita
2011	Jean Dujardin	George Valentin	The Artist		[63]
2012	Mads Mikkelsen	Lucas	The Hunt	Jagten	[64]
2013	Bruce Dern	Woody Grant	Nebraska		[65]
2014	Timothy Spall	J. M. W. Turner	Mr. Turner		[66]
2015	Vincent Lindon	Thierry Taugourdeau	The Measure of a Man	La Loi du marché	[67]
2016	Shahab Hosseini	Emad	The Salesman	فروشنده	[68]
2017	Joaquin Phoenix	Joe	You Were Never Really Here		[69]
2018	Marcello Fonte	Marcello	Dogman		[70]
2019	Antonio Banderas	Salvador Mallo	Pain and Glory	Dolor y gloria	[71]
2020s
2020	Festival not held, no awards given that year due to the COVID-19 pandemic
2021	Caleb Landry Jones	Martin Bryant	Nitram		[72]

Multiple winners

The following individuals received two Best Actor awards:

Wins	Actor	Nationality
2	Jack Lemmon	United States
	Marcello Mastroianni	Italy
	Dean Stockwell	United States