10 Steve Buscemi Performances That Are Rightly Considered Masterpieces

Warning! Spoilers ahead for everything from Con Air to The Death of Stalin, from Boardwalk Empire to The Sopranos, and more.

Steve Buscemi is a living legend. He’s been a Hollywood mainstay for over 40 years, and an instantly recognizable face for more than 30. Below are the best of the best of Buscemi’s most memorable performances, from key cameos in classic movies to starring roles on generational TV shows.

Buscemi is best known for his work with the Coen brothers, his role in Quentin Tarantino’s directorial debut, and his tenure on two of the best television shows of the 21st century, one as the main character. Buscemi has incredible range as a performer; he can do comedy, he can do drama, and he can blend the two into a cocktail that makes him one of the stand-out actors of his generation.

With just a few lines of dialogue, or a certain look on his face, Steve Buscemi can deliver a gamechanging performance. From big roles to small, this list celebrates the best of that ability.

10

30 Rock

Lenny Wosniak; Episodes: “The Collection,” “The Natural Order,” “Mamma Mia,” “Season 4,” “The Tuxedo Begins,” “Game Over”

Steve Buscemi’s turn on 30 Rock as Lenny Wosniak, an incompetent and just plain weird private detective, was already memorable before he went “undercover” as a high school student in “The Tuxedo Begins.” But the sight of Buscemi in a backward red cap, wearing a t-shirt that says “Music Band,” with a skateboard slung over his shoulder, has become an immortal meme in the nearly fifteen years since the episode came out.

“How do you do fellow kids?” is now shorthand for anyone who feels old and out of touch. This scene was the peak of Buscemi’s recurring 30 Rock bit, where Lenny Wosniak seemed to think he was a master of disguise. And to be fair, in the absurdist world of the sitcom, he might actually have been. Notoriously, Lenny tried and failed to seduce Kenneth Parcell in his “Charlene La Rue” alter ego.

His recurring role as Lenny is Steve Buscemi at peak silliness. He fit seamlessly into the madcap atmosphere of 30 Rock and seemed to love every second of it.

9

Monsters, Inc.

& Monsters University, Voice Of Randall Boggs

Buscemi has an iconic look, and an equally iconic voice. Over the years, he’s parlayed that into his share of voice-acting roles, including Wayne in the Hotel Transylvania franchise, and in 2024, Starscream in Transformers One. For his best voice work, though, we have to go back to his first animated feature: Monsters, Inc. Buscemi is essential to the movie as antagonist Randall Boggs.

As Boggs in Monsters, Inc., Buscemi pitch-perfectly blended his comedic sensibilities with his ability to exude charisma tinged with a little bit of menace. It’s a testament to how his distinct voice serves him as a character actor in his on-screen roles.

And Buscemi further tested his range with the 2013 prequel Monsters University, in which Randall Boggs played an even bigger role. First as Mike’s friend and roommate, before ditching him for his frat bros and taking on his more familiar, antagonistic tone.

8

Con Air

Garland “The Marietta Mangler” Green

Steve Buscemi is considered one of the best character actors of the past 35 years. But what does that mean, exactly? Often, it means doing a lot with a little, taking what could be a small role and turning it into something big. Con Air is a spectacular example of Buscemi doing exactly that.

His character, a riff on Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs, could have been a throwaway gag, or a glorified cameo, but Buscemi turned Garland “The Marietta Mangler” Green into one of the Nic Cage action bonanza’s most beloved characters. The clash between Green’s relaxed, friendly demeanor and the casual way he talks about his gruesome crimes is mostly played for laughs, but it also builds to Con Air’s most legitimately tense scene.

That is, Green’s tea party scene in the abandoned swimming pool with an adolescent girl. Everything viewers have been told about the character suggests a horrible outcome, and it’s a huge moment of relief when it’s revealed Green left her unharmed. Buscemi’s acting in that scene is illuminating, showcasing how deeply he can sink into the most disturbed and idiosyncratic characters.

7

Billy Madison

Danny McGrath

Here’s another iconic example of Steve Buscemi doing a lot with a little. Buscemi cameos in most of Adam Sandler’s ’90s/early ’00s hits, including The Wedding Singer, Big Daddy and Mr. Deeds. His screen time in Billy Madison is just as limited, but he turns in an amazing performance, and actually saves the day in the movie’s climax.

Buscemi gets one of Billy Madison’s biggest laughs in his first scene, when Billy calls his former classmate to apologize for bullying him in school. Buscemi’s character, Danny McGrath, meekly accepts the apology, as the camera pulls back to show him crossing “Billy Madison” off the “People To Kill” list on his wall.

Later, it’s Danny, armed with a sniper rifle, who prevents a tragedy by (non-fatally) shooting Bradley Whitford’s character when he pulls out a gun at the end of the film’s deliriously funny “Academic Decathlon” scene. With little more than a big smile and a friendly wave, Buscemi delivered one of his finest moments, perfectly setting up Sandler’s punchline: “Man, I’m glad I called that guy.”

6

The Death of Stalin

Nikita Khrushchev

Armando Iannucci’s diabolical satire The Death of Stalin features an ensemble cast as the members of the Soviet Union’s ruling Central Committee as they jockey for position and scramble for survival in the immediate wake of Stalin dying. Steve Buscemi plays a crucial role, Nikita Khrushchev, who ultimately came out on top as Stalin’s successor.

Buscemi’s performance as Khrushchev hits all his sweet spots: sniveling, sneering, snide, sarcastic, and even a little bit scary. “I will bury you in history,” Khrushchev rants at an already dead adversary late in the film. It’s an echo of a quote from the real-life historical Soviet leader, but The Death of Stalin puts it in a harrowing new context at a point in the movie where it abandons all pretext of comedy and becomes nightmarishly tense.

The Death of Stalin is one of Steve Buscemi’s best leading performances. It’s the opposite of his career-defining supporting roles. As Khrushchev, Buscemi commands the viewer’s attention in every scene he’s in, proving he’s earned leading-man status.

5

Boardwalk Empire

Enoch “Nucky” Thompson; Lead Role, 56 Episodes

If The Death of Stalin is a reminder that Steve Buscemi is a star, Boardwalk Empire was the proof. With Boardwalk, HBO made Buscemi the centerpiece of its big crime series, following The Sopranos. Based on a real historical Prohibition-era figure, Buscemi’s Nucky Thompson was the next gen Tony Soprano, but he was necessarily a very different type of criminal, played by a very different performer.

The early seasons of Boardwalk Empire taught Nucky the hard way that he couldn’t be “half a gangster,” while later seasons had him ascendant, but constantly beleaguered by challenges his throne as the king of Atlantic City’s criminal underworld. In both phases of the series, Buscemi’s performance throughout Boardwalk is nothing short of stellar.

Buscemi has more than just a highly recognizable face; he’s a seriously emotive actor, and even when he underplays it, there is a wide range of responses he can evoke with just a wince, the narrowing of his eyes, the clenching of his jaw. Boardwalk Empire is one of the best examples of that, and given its five-year TV run, certainly the most comprehensive.

4

Reservoir Dogs

Mr. Pink

By the time he was cast in Reservoir Dogs, Steve Buscemi was a working actor going back to the mid-1980s, and he’d already been discovered by the Coen Brothers, who put him in Miller’s Crossing in 1990 and in ’91’s Barton Fink. That’s worth noting, because the Coens account for two of the final three entries on this list. Yet Dogs is rightly considered a pivotal step forward in Buscemi’s career.

It’s no surprise Buscemi was a natural fit for Quentin Tarantino’s writing; what is surprising is that, aside from his Pulp Fiction cameo, the two never worked together again. Still, Tarantino’s debut film was a phenomenon upon its release in 1992, and it helped make Steve Buscemi a household name, thanks to a performance that defines the idea of a “supporting” role.

Mr. Pink makes a strong impression early on, and is maybe the only member of the heist crew left standing when the dust settles, but he’s in and out of the movie between those beats. When he’s on screen though, Buscemi is electric as Pink. For an actor who often plays uncool, or straight up deranged characters, Buscemi radiates off-the-charts levels of cool in Reservoir Dogs.

3

The Big Lebowski

Donny

The ’90s were a prolific period for Joel and Ethan Coen, and Steve Buscemi was part of that boom period. Buscemi appeared in five Coen films in eight years, in roles of varying sizes, culminating in The Big Lebowski. Donny is both a straight man and a punching bag for John Goodman’s over-the-top character, Walter. Buscemi turns in a solid supporting performance, one that gave the actor a chance to play something he rarely has in his career: a gentle soul.

Donny doesn’t have much to do in Lebowski, and some viewers have even questioned whether he exists at all, but in the end, he provides the movie with an emotional climax that wouldn’t have been possible otherwise. The stakes and drama of Lebowski are, for the most part, frivolous and fantastical, but the tragedy at the end is very real.

That’s a neat writing trick by the Coens, but it required a performer who could make the audience love Donny through just a handful of lines and his expressive face. He’s the literal human heart of The Big Lebowski, and once he’s gone, the movie is over.

2

Fargo

Carl Showalter

Two years before Lebowski, Steve Buscemi co-starred in the Coens’ masterpiece of Midwestern crime, Fargo. Buscemi plays Carl, one of two thugs (alongside Peter Stormare) hired by William H. Macy’s character Jerry Lundegaard to kidnap his own wife. As Fargo fans know, the ransom plot quickly goes horribly wrong for everyone involved.

An early act of oppositional defiance by Carl is what sets off the film’s increasingly graphic chain of violence, which brings Frances McDormand’s police character into the fold, as she investigates their crimes. Buscemi is both weaselly and sinister as Carl in Fargo; he’s a ruthless killer but also a bumbling schmuck.

Carl takes as much suffering as he dishes out in Fargo, and part of the glory of the movie is watching Buscemi as he literally and figuratively goes to pieces. It’s hard to argue against Fargo as the defining cinematic performance of Steve Buscemi’s career, but overall, there is one role that eclipses it.

1

The Sopranos

Tony Blundetto; Main Cast Season 5, Cameo Season 6

Steve Buscemi played a huge role in Sopranos history both behind and in front of the camera. Buscemi directed four Sopranos episodes, starting with Season 3’s “Pine Barrens,” which is held up as one of the show’s fan-favorite episodes to this day. And in Season 5, he stepped in to play a huge character in the show’s lore: “the other Tony.”

That is, Tony Blundetto, Tony Soprano’s cousin. Season 5 elaborated on the backstory of James Gandolfini’s character by revealing that he narrowly avoided being caught, along with Blundetto, pulling off a truck heist. Tony B. went to prison for nearly twenty years, while Tony S. became a made guy and rose up the ranks of the DiMeo crime family. This tale of two divergent paths was the set-up for one of The Sopranos’ most dramatic pay-offs.

Tony Blundetto’s downfall was a masterclass from Steve Buscemi. He played the character as sympathetic and affable at first, before the siren song of criminal life pulled him back in, and he proved to be a wildcard. The tragic ending to the “two Tonys” storyline changed Tony Soprano permanently, putting him into position for The Sopranos‘ endgame in its final season.

Release Date

March 7, 2004

Network

HBO

Episodes

13