20 Best Actor/Director Collaborations

1. Elia Kazan/Marlon Brando-All of the actors of today look up to DeNiro, Hoffman, Hackman, Duvall and Pacino and those actors all idolized Brando. Brando learned his craft at the actor’s studio which was co-founded by Kazan and it was Kazan who discovered Brando on stage and fought for him to be cast into Streetcar Named Desire, which along with On the Waterfront became two of the best performances ever captured onscreen. With so many aspiring actors cutting their teeth on screenplays from the Kazan/Brando collaborations, it’s hard to argue any other way.

2. John Ford/John Wayne-It’s not just remarkable how much Ford and Wayne contributed to the Western, but how much they grew with the Western and evolved with the genre. Normally, with a genre, you have one director who accomplishes something big, and then the genre moves in a different direction as another filmmaker comes. Ford and Wayne didn’t just create the preeminent Westerns of their day, but they evolved along with the genre. There’s significant difference in John Wayne’s stock character between Stagecoach and The Searcher with a lot of variation in between. They also ventured outside the Western for the Irish period piece, Quiet Man, which one John Ford an Oscar. Of their 22 films together, other highlights include She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, How the West Was Won, Rio Grande and Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.

3. Frank Capra/Jimmy Stewart-Frank Capra was the 1930’s version of Spielberg and Scorsesee rolled into one. He was the most respected, revered and…