{"id":66771,"date":"2025-08-14T16:22:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-14T16:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/66771\/"},"modified":"2025-08-14T16:22:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-14T16:22:08","slug":"the-greatest-comedy-actor-of-all-time-according-to-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/66771\/","title":{"rendered":"The greatest comedy actor of all time, according to science"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Woman<\/p>\n

(Credits: Far Out \/ Sergi Viladesau \/ Danny Lines)<\/p>\n

Wed 13 August 2025 21:15, UK <\/p>\n

It\u2019s impossible to name one actor as cinema history\u2019s greatest big-screen comedy<\/a> performer because it\u2019s entirely subjective. Some stars make audiences howl in laughter, and leave others stony-faced, and vice versa. Fortunately, science decided to cut out the middleman and come up with an answer.<\/p>\n

Every comedy movie that\u2019s been labelled among the best ever has been watched by at least one person who didn\u2019t see what the fuss was about. At the opposite end of the scale, there are comedies that have been derided as the genre\u2019s lowest points that certain viewers will defend to the death.<\/p>\n

Even when it comes to the folks who\u2019ve spent their entire careers in the industry, the answers offer a wide array of names covering generations. As far as Adam Sandler is concerned<\/a>, Chris Farley is the greatest comedy actor of all time, which Christian Bale agrees with.<\/p>\n

Jeff Bridges thinks Robin Williams is deserving of the crown, which isn\u2019t far-fetched. Eddie Murphy is adamant it belongs to Redd Foxx, Woody Harrelson would fight Jerry Lewis\u2019s corner, Mel Brooks is adamant that Harry Ritz is the funniest man to ever grace the silver screen, while Judi Dench nominated her longtime friend and co-star<\/a> Geoffrey Palmer for the honour.<\/p>\n

The one constant is that they were all known for different types of comedy, ranging from vaudeville and slapstick to stand-up and improvisational riffing. It feels like an impossible question to answer, which is why the boffins at the University of Turin<\/a> devised their own method of naming the cream of the comedic crop.<\/p>\n

Using almost 400,000 onscreen performers and over 47,000 films to collate the findings, each individual is ranked on a gold, silver, or bronze level, based on how well an actor\u2019s movies fared among critics, how much money they earned at the box office, and the positivity of user-generated reviews across the internet.<\/p>\n

With ten gold, four silver, and five bronze medals to his name, science determined that Bill Murray is the greatest comedy actor of all time. Would Bill Murray call Bill Murray the greatest comedy actor of all time? No, he wouldn\u2019t because he said it was Jack Benny<\/a>, although the scientists would evidently disagree.<\/p>\n

Again, not an outlandish candidate, but a potentially polarising one. It can\u2019t be argued that the former Saturday Night Live alum has starred in some of the most beloved, successful, iconic, and influential comedy pictures of the last half-century, but like always, there will always be dissenting voices who\u2019ve never been on board with Murray\u2019s signature, sardonic schtick.<\/p>\n

Not to poke holes in the methodology, but Ben Stiller being ranked second doesn\u2019t quite track. Sure, he\u2019s good in the right projects and has enjoyed a three-decade career across film and television that\u2019s yielded plenty of success, adulation, and awards, but would anyone realistically place him in comedy\u2019s all-time top ten? Probably not, and the runner-up spot feels like a stretch.<\/p>\n

Murray is definitely a lot of people\u2019s favourite comedy actor, though not everyone\u2019s. Still, unless you\u2019re a scientist, it\u2019s best to agree with the eggheads on this one.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: Far Out \/ Sergi Viladesau \/ Danny Lines) Wed 13 August 2025 21:15, UK It\u2019s impossible to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66772,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[14718,2973,96,2839,90,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-66771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-bill-murray","tag-comedy","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66771"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66771\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66772"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}