Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#21773
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Darin Cooper 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.
Darin Cooper appears in 6 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Darin. Radio Sky is the clearest case: a film rated 9.0 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.
The recognisable elements are versatility, transformation, quiet performance. Watch two of these films back to back and the method separates from the material — the same instrument, tuned differently for drama, action, western. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Jesse V. Johnson, James Mangold, Craig William Macneill and others, Darin Cooper 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.
Radio Sky (2026) as James Newman · Ford v Ferrari (2019) as Reporter - Sam · Gone Girl (2014) as Mustached Man
Career snapshot
Ranked #21773 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
6
2014–2026
Career length
12 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
9.0
Radio Sky
Average Nutevio score
7.5
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
9.0
Radio Sky
Most frequent director
Jesse V. Johnson
1 film together
Longest collaboration
1×
With Jesse V. Johnson
Most common genre
Drama
4 titles
Average runtime
1h 55m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
7.3
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
6.9
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
2020s
8.3 average MV
The 2020s are where the work and the material meet. Radio Sky, Thieves Highway — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2020s
8.3
Across 2 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2020s
8.3
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. Ford v Ferrari, Lizzie, Keeping Up with the Joneses.
Most productive era
2010s
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 | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|
| Drama | 7.53 films | 9.01 film |
| Action | 7.12 films | 7.51 film |
| Thriller | 7.22 films | 7.51 film |
| Comedy | 6.11 film | — |
| Crime | 6.21 film | 7.51 film |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
2014Gone Girl
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Mustached Man.
First Nutevio masterpiece · Highest rated performance · Career peak · Most recent film
2026Radio Sky
The first film here to clear 9.0 on our scale — a threshold fewer than one film in ten reaches. 9.0 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. The current state of the argument, as James Newman.
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.
6 of 6 films
as Reporter - Sam
Directed by James Mangold
as Mustached Man
Directed by David Fincher
as Mack Warner
Directed by Jesse V. Johnson
as Jury Foreman
Directed by Craig William Macneill
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
James Newman
Radio Sky (2026)
Performance score8.9
The performance the rest of the career is read through. James Newman gives Darin Cooper a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Reporter - Sam
Ford v Ferrari (2019)
Performance score7.8
Ford v Ferrari asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Reporter - Sam is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Mustached Man
Gone Girl (2014)
Performance score7.8
Gone Girl asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Mustached Man is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Mack Warner
Thieves Highway (2025)
Performance score7.3
Thieves Highway asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Mack Warner 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 James Newman
Start here. Radio Sky is the clearest statement of what Darin Cooper does — accessible, 92 minutes, and rated 9.0 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Darin 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.
Gone Girl (2014)
Keeps the drama register of Radio Sky but asks for a colder reading of it.
Lizzie (2018)
Keeps the drama register of Gone Girl but asks for a colder reading of it.
Ford v Ferrari (2019)
Keeps the drama register of Lizzie but asks for a colder reading of it.
Thieves Highway (2025)
Keeps the action register of Ford v Ferrari but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
David Fincher
Director
1 film together
Notably Gone Girl
Greg Mottola
Director
1 film together
Notably Keeping Up with the Joneses
Craig William Macneill
Director
1 film together
Notably Lizzie
James Mangold
Director
1 film together
Notably Ford v Ferrari
Jesse V. Johnson
Director
1 film together
Notably Thieves Highway
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
James Mangold
Director
1 film together · 8.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Ford v FerrariDavid Fincher
Director
1 film together · 8.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Gone GirlJesse V. Johnson
Director
1 film together · 7.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Thieves HighwayCraig William Macneill
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
LizzieGreg Mottola
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Keeping Up with the JonesesSix 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
Radio Sky
as James Newman
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Radio Sky
as James Newman
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Radio Sky
as James Newman
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Ford v Ferrari
as Reporter - Sam
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Radio Sky
as James Newman
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. Darin Cooper 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
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
Radio Sky
as James Newman
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Gone Girl
as Mustached Man
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
Radio Sky
as James Newman
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Gone Girl
as Mustached Man
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Ford v Ferrari
as Reporter - Sam
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Thieves Highway
as Mack Warner
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Ford v Ferrari
as Reporter - Sam
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Gone Girl
as Mustached Man
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Have your say
Community
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Reference
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