The 20 Best Film and TV Performances of 2024 (So Far)

Now that we at IndieWire have landed on the best movies and TV shows of the year so far, let’s dive into the best performances on either screen in 2024 up until now.

We’re now in the thick of Emmys season ahead of the September 15 awards, which actually makes this year’s the second Emmys ceremony to go down in 2024, as the strikes pushed 2023’s event to this past January. All of this is to say we haven’t stopped talking about glorious TV performances in 2024, and our picks for the last six months range from streaming titles from celebrated filmmakers (like “Expats” on Prime Video from director Lulu Wang and co-starring Sarayu Blue alongside Nicole Kidman) and indie screen favorites (Paul Dano in “Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” also from Prime Video) to breakouts on cable (including “The Sympathizer,” directed by Park Chan-wook and starring Hoa Xuande) that stunned and surprised us. And some streaming staples, like Hannah Einbinder’s spiky comedy writer in Max’s “Hacks,” outdid even their own performance from past seasons.

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As the way we consume movies and TV is all a jumble now, we decided to combine our list of the top TV turns with those in film. And who says the best movie performances have to come at the end of the year as Oscar contenders finally bow from the wings? The internet slobbered over Josh O’Connor’s turn as a chaotic tennis player in “Challengers,” but the performance itself brought the actor to a whole new level after superb work in another movie this year, “La Chimera.” Léa Seydoux played three versions of the same woman tortured by ill-fated romance and artificial intelligence across over a century in “The Beast.” And Nell Tiger Free wowed in the horror franchise reboot “The First Omen,” a movie way better than it needed to be.

Below, IndieWire picks the 20 best performances across TV and film so far in 2024. And while you’re here, check out our lists of the best TV shows and best movies of 2024 so far.

David Ehrlich, Kate Erbland, Marcus Jones, Proma Khosla, Mark Peikert, Sarah Shachat, Erin Strecker, and Christian Zilko contributed to this list.

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