People
James Stewart
Acting · follow into films and chains
Biography
James Maitland "Jimmy" Stewart was an American film and stage actor, known for his distinctive voice and his everyman persona. Over the course of his career, he starred in many films widely considered classics and was nominated for five Academy Awards, winning one in competition and receiving one Lifetime Achievement award. He was a major MGM contract star. He also had a noted military career and was a World War II and Vietnam War veteran, who rose to the rank of Brigadier General in the United States Air Force Reserve. Throughout his seven decades in Hollywood, Stewart cultivated a versatile career and recognized screen image in such classics as Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The Philadelphia Story, Harvey, It's a Wonderful Life, Shenandoah, Rear Window, Rope, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo. He is the most represented leading actor on the AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) and AFI's 10 Top 10 lists. He is also the most represented leading actor on the 100 Greatest Movies of All Time list presented by Entertainment Weekly. As of 2007, ten of his films have been inducted into the United States National Film Registry. Stewart left his mark on a wide range of film genres, including westerns, suspense thrillers, family films, biographies and screwball comedies. He worked for a number of renowned directors later in his career, most notably Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford, Billy Wilder, Frank Capra, George Cukor, and Anthony Mann. He won many of the industry's highest honors and earned Lifetime Achievement awards from every major film organization. He died at age 89, leaving behind a legacy of classic performances, and is considered one of the finest actors of the "Golden Age of Hollywood". He was named the third Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute.
Notable films
Where to start
Highlights from credits and KinoChain journeys.
Vertigo
Appears in a KinoChain journey
The Man Who Knew Too Much
Appears in a KinoChain journey
The Shootist
Appears in a KinoChain journey
Rear Window
As L.B. Jefferies
It's a Wonderful Life
As George Bailey
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
As Ransom Stoddard
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
As Jefferson Smith
Rope
As Rupert Cadell
Chains
KinoChain journeys
Public chains that pass through their films — or name them as a bridge.
Second Chances
From Hitchcock to Mann, a journey through films where directors revisit their own earlier work, refining obsession into art.
8 films
The Long Goodbye: Twilight of Heroes and Outlaws
There is a moment in Richard Lester's Robin and Marian (1976) that cuts deeper than any broadsword. Sean Connery, sporting grey in his beard and exhaustion in h...
8 films
The Architecture of Obsession: Cinema of the Fixated Mind
Eight films in which a character's consuming fixation drives the narrative, examined through the directorial techniques that externalise interiority: subjective...
8 films
Topics
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Related people
Collaborators & neighbours
Acted
My Scientology Movie
2016 · Self (archive photo)
Airport '77
1977 · Philip Stevens
The Shootist
1976 · Dr. Hostetler
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
1962 · Ransom Stoddard
Vertigo
1958 · Det. John 'Scottie' Ferguson
The Man Who Knew Too Much
1956 · Ben McKenna
Rear Window
1954 · L.B. Jefferies
Bend of the River
1952 · Glyn McLyntock
Rope
1948 · Rupert Cadell
It's a Wonderful Life
1946 · George Bailey
Pot o' Gold
1941 · James Hamilton 'Jimmy' Haskell
The Philadelphia Story
1940 · Macaulay 'Mike' Connor
The Shop Around the Corner
1940 · Alfred Kralik
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
1939 · Jefferson Smith
Made for Each Other
1939 · John Horace Mason
Rose Marie
1936 · John Flower