“Relevant” is subjective, but I think its Danny Devito and there’s no one even close to him.
By relevant I mean, still working in projects everyone is aware of. So its not Shatner. And while Larry Fishburne may have started with Apocalypse Now…he wasn’t a huge part of it. I think Cowboy Carl is really when he showed up on peoples radar.
From Taxi (I don’t count One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest as he wasn’t a headliner) to Sunny in Philadelphia…thats a long ass time.
Al Pacino is still working and has him beat by a little and higher profile.
Wait, Dame Maggie Smith. First big role in the 60s.
She earned her first Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in the film adaptation of Othello (1965) as Desdemona acting alongside Laurence Olivier, Derek Jacobi, and Michael Gambon.
Devito’s a good one, but I’d posit that Clint Eastwood, for one, has been consistently relevant and visible for even longer. He started starring in TV on Rawhide in the late '50s, was a major film acting star from the 1960s through the the 2000s, and is still a significant and relevant film director (and occasional actor) today.
Yeah…a problem with this is im measuring ‘relevance’ by what I know. So I don’t know what Al is doing today nor Maggie. But Im sure they’e doing something high-profile and I just don’t know what its is.
That said, I think TV actors have an edge over movie actors.
Eastwood is a good one. When he directs a film, everyone knows about it.
Julie Andrews, 1964 Mary Poppins. 17 episodes of Bridgerton in 2020 to 2022. So still going.
Clint Eastwood not a bad choice and does goes back further. His acting has been limited over the last 2 decades though.
Steve Martin is currently doing Only Murders in the Building and was well known enough to host SNL a couple years before Taxi was on the air.
Indeed; as I noted, he’s been more focused on directing, including, in recent years, The Mule (2018), Sully (2016), and American Sniper (2014). Still visible and very much in the public eye, IMO, even if he’s not in front of the camera often anymore.
Wait, I think I can win. Rita Moreno who was a supporting character in 1952 in Singing in the Rain and is still working today in fairly big projects on TV and movies. Also an EGOT winner. Though she probably wasn’t really famous until 1961s West Side Story.
Honorable mention and speaking of Mary Poppins, Dick Van Dyke is 97 now and came to fame in 1961 also and only stopped working in 2020.
Moreno is one of the four leads in 80 For Brady (2023) as well. Not Oscar bait, but a movie with some profile.
She did have a fairly substantial role as Tuptim in The King and I (1956), with third billing in the credits. I think she may be the winner.
Good point, I forgot about that. I watch Singing in the Rain yearly and haven’t watched The King and I in decades.
So I think Rita is the one to beat.
They shouldn’t count, but Mel Brooks & Norman Lear are still working and have been since the early 50s. But I don’t think either have been in front of the cameras as actors enough to count.
It is a shame we just lost Angela Lansbury as she goes back to Gaslight in 1944.
I had the advantage of having watched TKaI a year or so ago (and only then realizing that she was in it!)
Yeah, if Christopher Lee hadn’t passed he’d be playing some Marvel villain right now I’m sure. Sneaky ol bastard.
Ironically, I’m listening to the “Symphony Hall” channel on SiriusXM over my Echo (as I often do while working at home), and they’re currently playing Bernstein’s “Prologue” from WSS.
Ian McKellen is a contender. He’s been on stage and in film since 1961.
These Brits skew everything. I imagine asking random passerbys “Who is this and when did you first become aware of them and what project are they on now?”…I’m imagining Americans. “Magneto/Gandalf and…I don’t know” would be the common answer. But Brits would give completely different answers of course.
Which would beat out Ron Howard who started in 1960.
I think Michael Caine has been active and relevant since the 1950s.
I’m a bit confused. You started with “everyone is aware of,” changed the parameter to “what I know,” and then to “Americans.” It’s kinda hard to pinpoint. If it is the 2nd alternative, then only you have the answer.
Certainly acting since the 1950s, though mostly in smaller roles; it looks like his big breakthrough was in Zulu, which was in 1964.