Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#20045
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Jay Patterson represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 32 years in, and Jay is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Jay Patterson appears in 12 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Jay. City of Angels is the clearest case: a film rated 6.9 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 comedy, fantasy, family. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Barry Sonnenfeld, Seth MacFarlane, Steven Zaillian and others, Jay Patterson 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.
City of Angels (1998) as Air Traffic Controller · Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) as Charles Pennington · Places in the Heart (1984) as W.E. Simmons
Career snapshot
Ranked #20045 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
12
1984–2016
Career length
32 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
6.9
City of Angels
Average Nutevio score
6.4
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.2
Places in the Heart
Most frequent director
Seth MacFarlane
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With Seth MacFarlane
Most common genre
Drama
6 titles
Average runtime
1h 46m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
6.9
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
6.6
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
1980s
6.8 average MV
The 1980s are where the work and the material meet. Places in the Heart — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
1980s
6.8
Across 1 catalogue film in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
1980s
7.2
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1980s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Places in the Heart.
Most productive era
1990s
5 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 | 1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.81 film | 6.63 films | 6.22 films | — |
| Action | — | 6.42 films | — | — |
| Thriller | — | 6.11 film | 6.11 film | — |
| Comedy | — | 6.81 film | 6.71 film | 6.33 films |
| Crime | — | 6.22 films | — | — |
| Romance | — | 6.62 films | 6.71 film | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
Where our catalogue meets this career, as W.E. Simmons.
Highest rated performance
1998City of Angels
6.9 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer.
Career peak
2008My Sassy Girl
Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
2016Nine Lives
The current state of the argument, as Benson.
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 Roger Bellow
Directed by Unknown
as Air Traffic Controller
Directed by Brad Silberling
as Charles Pennington
Directed by Steve Barron
as Benson
Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld
From the library
Every movie and TV credit stored for this name in the Nutevio catalogue — filter by media, role or sort by rating.
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The defining work
#1
Roger Bellow
My Sassy Girl (2008)
Performance score6.9
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Roger Bellow gives Jay Patterson a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Air Traffic Controller
City of Angels (1998)
Performance score6.8
City of Angels asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Air Traffic Controller is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Charles Pennington
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)
Performance score6.7
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Charles Pennington is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
W.E. Simmons
Places in the Heart (1984)
Performance score6.7
Places in the Heart asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. W.E. Simmons 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 Roger Bellow
Start here. My Sassy Girl is the clearest statement of what Jay Patterson does — accessible, 96 minutes, and rated 6.7 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Jay 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.
Places in the Heart (1984)
A deliberate change of key after My Sassy Girl — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)
A deliberate change of key after Places in the Heart — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
City of Angels (1998)
A deliberate change of key after Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Nine Lives (2016)
Keeps the fantasy register of City of Angels but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Steven Zaillian
Director
2 films together
Notably A Civil Action
Seth MacFarlane
Director
2 films together
Notably Ted 2
Robert Benton
Director
1 film together
Notably Places in the Heart
Steve Barron
Director
1 film together
Notably Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Peter Medak
Director
1 film together
Notably Romeo Is Bleeding
Brad Silberling
Director
1 film together
Notably City of Angels
Mikael Salomon
Director
1 film together
Notably Hard Rain
Barry Sonnenfeld
Director
1 film together
Notably Nine Lives
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Seth MacFarlane
Director
2 films together · 6.3 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Ted 2Steven Zaillian
Director
2 films together · 6.3 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
A Civil ActionBrad Silberling
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
City of AngelsSteve Barron
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Teenage Mutant Ninja TurtlesRobert Benton
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Places in the HeartPeter Medak
Director
1 film together · 6.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Romeo Is BleedingBarry Sonnenfeld
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Nine LivesMikael Salomon
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Hard RainSix 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
City of Angels
as Air Traffic Controller
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
City of Angels
as Air Traffic Controller
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Places in the Heart
as W.E. Simmons
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
A Civil Action
as Geologist
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
My Sassy Girl
as Roger Bellow
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. Jay Patterson 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.
Career Achievement
Awarded
32 years of relevant work — not merely a long career, but a long career of choices.
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
City of Angels
as Air Traffic Controller
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Hard Rain
as Mr Wellman
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
City of Angels
as Air Traffic Controller
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Hard Rain
as Mr Wellman
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
as Charles Pennington
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
as Charles Pennington
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Romeo Is Bleeding
as Mona's Lawyer (uncredited)
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
All the King's Men
as Senator
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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