Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#67207
of 909177 performers
Top 10%
Danny Darst works on quiet performance 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.
Danny Darst appears in 5 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Danny. The Silence of the Lambs is the clearest case: a film rated 9.2 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are quiet performance, transformation, screen presence. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for mystery, drama, thriller. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Jonathan Demme, Robert Altman, Danny Darst 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.
The Silence of the Lambs (1991) as Sgt. Tate · The Silence of the Lambs (1991) as Sgt. Tate · Short Cuts (1993) as Aubrey Bell
Career snapshot
Ranked #67207 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
5
1991–2004
Career length
13 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
9.2
The Silence of the Lambs
Average Nutevio score
7.6
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
8.6
The Silence of the Lambs
Most frequent director
Jonathan Demme
3 films together
Longest collaboration
3×
With Jonathan Demme
Most common genre
Drama
4 titles
Average runtime
2h 15m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
7.4
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
7.1
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
1990s
7.8 average MV
The 1990s are where the work and the material meet. Cookie's Fortune, Short Cuts, The Silence of the Lambs — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
1990s
7.8
Across 4 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
1990s
7.6
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1990s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Cookie's Fortune, Short Cuts, The Silence of the Lambs.
Most productive era
1990s
4 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 | 1990s | 2000s |
|---|---|---|
| Drama | 7.43 films | 6.51 film |
| Thriller | 8.82 films | 6.51 film |
| Comedy | 6.82 films | — |
| Crime | 8.82 films | — |
| Horror | 9.21 film | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio · First Nutevio masterpiece · Highest rated performance · Career peak
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Sgt. Tate. The first film here to clear 9.0 on our scale — a threshold fewer than one film in ten reaches. 9.2 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer. Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
The current state of the argument, as Ellie's Mysterious Aide.
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.
5 of 5 films
as Sgt. Tate
Directed by Jonathan Demme
as Sgt. Tate
Directed by Jonathan Demme
as Aubrey Bell
Directed by Robert Altman
as Ellie's Mysterious Aide
Directed by Jonathan Demme
as Billy Cox
Directed by Robert Altman
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
Showing 4 of 4 titles · 4 total credits · active 1991–2004
The defining work
#1
Sgt. Tate
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Performance score8.8
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Sgt. Tate gives Danny Darst a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Sgt. Tate
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Performance score8.2
The Silence of the Lambs asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Sgt. Tate is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Aubrey Bell
Short Cuts (1993)
Performance score7.1
Short Cuts asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Aubrey Bell is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Ellie's Mysterious Aide
The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
Performance score6.5
The Manchurian Candidate asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Ellie's Mysterious Aide 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 Sgt. Tate
Start here. The Silence of the Lambs is the clearest statement of what Danny Darst does — accessible, 118 minutes, and rated 9.2 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Danny 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.
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Same director as The Silence of the Lambs, different problem to solve. Watching them in order shows how much of the effect was the collaboration.
Short Cuts (1993)
Keeps the drama register of The Silence of the Lambs but asks for a colder reading of it.
Cookie's Fortune (1999)
Same director as Short Cuts, different problem to solve. Watching them in order shows how much of the effect was the collaboration.
The Manchurian Candidate (2004)
Keeps the drama register of Cookie's Fortune but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Jonathan Demme
Director
3 films together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Robert Altman
Director
2 films together
Notably Short Cuts
Jodie Foster
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Anthony Hopkins
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Scott Glenn
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Ted Levine
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Anthony Heald
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Brooke Smith
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Diane Baker
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Kasi Lemmons
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Frankie Faison
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Tracey Walter
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Charles Napier
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Alex Coleman
Actor
1 film together
Notably The Silence of the Lambs
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Jonathan Demme
Director
3 films together · 8.1 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 3 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
The Silence of the LambsRobert Altman
Director
2 films together · 6.8 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Short CutsSix 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
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
The Manchurian Candidate
as Ellie's Mysterious Aide
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
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. Danny Darst has known it for a long time.”
Head to head
Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.
| Nutevio Performer Score | 8.3 | 8.9 |
|---|---|---|
| Career ranking | #134 of 681 | #2 of 681 |
| Awards on file | Unknown | 4 recorded |
| Oscar wins | Unknown | 2 |
| Oscar nominations | Unknown | 6 |
| Average Nutevio score | 9.2 | 9.3 |
| Genres | Thriller, Crime, Horror | Sci-Fi, Adventure, Drama, Thriller |
| Directors | Jonathan Demme | Christopher Nolan |
| Performance DNA | Intensity, Villain presence, Rewatchability | Transformation, Screen presence, Rewatchability |
| Career timeline | 1991–1991 | 2006–2014 |
| Most iconic role | Sgt. Tate — The Silence of the Lambs | Professor Brand — Interstellar |
| Most rewatchable film | The Silence of the Lambs | The Dark Knight |
| Filmography | 1 catalogue film | 4 catalogue films |
Films together
Nothing in common in the library yet.
Shared directors
Nothing in common in the library yet.
Shared collections
Thriller Movies, Crime Movies
Michael Caine edges ahead here — a higher floor across a comparable body of work.
Ours alone
Recognitions handed out by this desk, on criteria no awards body uses.
Drama Legend
Awarded
4 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
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
The Manchurian Candidate
as Ellie's Mysterious Aide
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
The Silence of the Lambs
as Sgt. Tate
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
Across the library
Every Nutevio collection this name turns up in, and how high they rank there.
Collection footprint
Appears in 5 Nutevio collections
Keep reading
genre
Best Psychological Thrillers
Features The Silence of the Lambs at #1
Read the collectiongenre
Best Horror Movies
Features The Silence of the Lambs at #2
Read the collectiongenre
Horror Movies
Features The Silence of the Lambs at #2
Read the collectiongenre
Thriller Movies
Features The Silence of the Lambs at #3
Read the collectiongenre
Crime Movies
Features The Silence of the Lambs
Read the collectionFrom the magazine
If you like this performer
Michael Caine
Built a career in the same territory: drama and thriller
Ted Levine
Works with the same directors — shared collaborators
Morgan Freeman
Built a career in the same territory: crime and drama
Zach Grenier
Built a career in the same territory: crime and mystery
Richmond Arquette
Built a career in the same territory: crime and mystery
Bob Stephenson
Built a career in the same territory: crime and mystery
Have your say
Community
Which Danny Darst performance holds up best?
Our readers argue about this one. Make your case, or read the ranked debate already in progress.
Join the conversation
Reference
Continue exploring
Trending performers
Directors they work with
Collections to read next
