Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#9351
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Daniel Zovatto works on versatility rather than volume, and the catalogue keeps proving that the quieter choice was the correct one.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Daniel Zovatto appears in 12 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Daniel. Lady Bird is the clearest case: a film rated 7.3 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, quiet performance, transformation. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for action, history, drama. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Catherine Hardwicke, Derrick Borte, Anna Kendrick and others, Daniel Zovatto helped set a standard other performers now audition against. Awards bodies have been slower than the work, which is usually the sign of a career built on choices rather than campaigns.
Lady Bird (2017) as Jonah Ruiz · Don't Breathe (2016) as Money · The Pope's Exorcist (2023) as Father Esquibel
Career snapshot
Ranked #9351 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
12
2014–2027
Career length
13 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.3
Lady Bird
Average Nutevio score
5.3
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.3
Lady Bird
Most frequent director
Catherine Hardwicke
1 film together
Longest collaboration
1×
With Catherine Hardwicke
Most common genre
Drama
6 titles
Average runtime
1h 32m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
6.8
out of 10
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio metric
Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.
Nutevio Influence Score
6.2
out of 10
A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.
How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.
What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.
Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.
Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.
Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.
Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.
Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.
The reading other performers now have to answer.
Actor DNA
A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.
The shape of a career
Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.
Peak years
Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.
Best decade
2010s
6.5 average MV
The 2010s are where the work and the material meet. Heavy, Lady Bird, Newness — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2010s
6.5
Across 6 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2010s
6.4
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
2010s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Heavy, Lady Bird, Newness.
Most productive era
2010s
6 films
The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.
Range, mapped
Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.
| Genre | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.53 films | 4.03 films |
| Action | — | 3.32 films |
| Thriller | 6.32 films | 6.63 films |
| Comedy | 6.72 films | — |
| Crime | 6.32 films | 6.02 films |
| Romance | 5.93 films | 5.51 film |
| Horror | 6.92 films | 6.91 film |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
2014Laggies
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Junior.
Highest rated performance
2017Lady Bird
7.3 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer.
Career peak
Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
2027The Last Druid
The current state of the argument.
Our order
Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.
Every title
Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.
12 of 12 films
as Jonah Ruiz
Directed by Greta Gerwig
as Greg Hannigan
Directed by David Robert Mitchell
as Money
Directed by Fede Álvarez
as Rodney Alcala
Directed by Anna Kendrick
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
Loading credits…
The defining work
#1
Father Esquibel
The Pope's Exorcist (2023)
Performance score7.3
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Father Esquibel gives Daniel Zovatto a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Jonah Ruiz
Lady Bird (2017)
Performance score7.2
Lady Bird asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Jonah Ruiz is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Greg Hannigan
It Follows (2015)
Performance score7.2
It Follows asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Greg Hannigan is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Money
Don't Breathe (2016)
Performance score7.1
Don't Breathe asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Money is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movieStart here
A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.
Best entry point
as Father Esquibel
Start here. The Pope's Exorcist is the clearest statement of what Daniel Zovatto does — accessible, 103 minutes, and rated 6.9 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Daniel at the most legible performance, then move forward in time so each film reads as a response to the one before it rather than a repetition of it.
It Follows (2015)
Keeps the horror register of The Pope's Exorcist but asks for a colder reading of it.
Don't Breathe (2016)
Keeps the horror register of It Follows but asks for a colder reading of it.
Lady Bird (2017)
A deliberate change of key after Don't Breathe — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Woman of the Hour (2024)
Keeps the drama register of Lady Bird but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Lynn Shelton
Director
1 film together
Notably Laggies
David Robert Mitchell
Director
1 film together
Notably It Follows
Fede Álvarez
Director
1 film together
Notably Don't Breathe
Greta Gerwig
Director
1 film together
Notably Lady Bird
Cameron Van Hoy
Director
1 film together
Notably Flinch
Anna Kendrick
Director
1 film together
Notably Woman of the Hour
Derrick Borte
Director
1 film together
Notably The Get Out
Catherine Hardwicke
Director
1 film together
Notably Street Smart
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Greta Gerwig
Director
1 film together · 7.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Lady BirdFede Álvarez
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Don't BreatheDavid Robert Mitchell
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
It FollowsDerrick Borte
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Get OutAnna Kendrick
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Woman of the HourLynn Shelton
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
LaggiesCameron Van Hoy
Director
1 film together · 5.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
FlinchCatherine Hardwicke
Director
1 film together · 0.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Street SmartSix degrees
Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.
Categories of our own
Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.
Most rewatchable
Lady Bird
as Jonah Ruiz
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Newness
as Oren
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Lady Bird
as Jonah Ruiz
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Lady Bird
as Jonah Ruiz
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
The Pope's Exorcist
as Father Esquibel
If the career had to be argued in a single scene, our editors would pick one from this film and rest the case.
In their films' words
“You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Daniel Zovatto has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Modern Classic Performer
Awarded
Defining performances delivered inside the last twenty-five years, in films already being taught rather than merely remembered.
Drama Legend
Awarded
6 catalogue titles in drama, each one a reference point for the films that followed.
Our desk
Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.
Best ending
It Follows
as Greg Hannigan
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Don't Breathe
as Money
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Newness
as Oren
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
It Follows
as Greg Hannigan
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
The Get Out
as Rodriguez
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
The Get Out
as Rodriguez
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Laggies
as Junior
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
It Follows
as Greg Hannigan
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Reference
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