Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#14326
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Ken Lerner 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.
Ken Lerner appears in 8 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Ken. Undisputed II: Last Man Standing is the clearest case: a film rated 7.4 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 action, crime, drama. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Isaac Florentine, Dennis Dugan, Penelope Spheeris and others, Ken Lerner 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.
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing (2006) as Phil · The Running Man (1987) as Agent · The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989) as Ray
Career snapshot
Ranked #14326 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
8
1987–2006
Career length
19 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.4
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
Average Nutevio score
6.4
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.4
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
Most frequent director
Isaac Florentine
1 film together
Longest collaboration
1×
With Isaac Florentine
Most common genre
Action
5 titles
Average runtime
1h 41m
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
6.4
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
2000s
6.7 average MV
The 2000s are where the work and the material meet. Undisputed II: Last Man Standing, National Security — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2000s
6.7
Across 2 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2000s
6.7
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. The Fabulous Baker Boys, Maniac Cop, The Running Man.
Most productive era
1980s
3 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.51 film | — | 7.41 film |
| Action | 6.42 films | 6.01 film | 6.72 films |
| Thriller | 6.61 film | 6.22 films | 7.41 film |
| Comedy | 6.51 film | 6.21 film | 6.01 film |
| Crime | 6.21 film | 6.01 film | 6.72 films |
| Romance | 6.51 film | 6.21 film | — |
| Horror | 6.21 film | — | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
1987The Running Man
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Agent.
Highest rated performance · Career peak · Most recent film
2006Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
7.4 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 Phil.
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.
8 of 8 films
as Phil
Directed by Isaac Florentine
as Agent
Directed by Paul Michael Glaser
as Hank's Lawyer
Directed by Dennis Dugan
as Dean Barlow
Directed by Penelope Spheeris
as Roger Graham
Directed by Jonathan Kaplan
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
Phil
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing (2006)
Performance score7.5
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Phil gives Ken Lerner a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Agent
The Running Man (1987)
Performance score6.6
The Running Man asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Agent is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Hank's Lawyer
National Security (2003)
Performance score6.5
National Security asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Hank's Lawyer is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Dean Barlow
Senseless (1998)
Performance score6.5
Senseless asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Dean Barlow 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 Phil
Start here. Undisputed II: Last Man Standing is the clearest statement of what Ken Lerner does — accessible, 93 minutes, and rated 7.4 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Ken 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 Running Man (1987)
Keeps the action register of Undisputed II: Last Man Standing but asks for a colder reading of it.
Unlawful Entry (1992)
Keeps the thriller register of The Running Man but asks for a colder reading of it.
Senseless (1998)
A deliberate change of key after Unlawful Entry — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
National Security (2003)
Keeps the comedy register of Senseless but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Paul Michael Glaser
Director
1 film together
Notably The Running Man
William Lustig
Director
1 film together
Notably Maniac Cop
Steve Kloves
Director
1 film together
Notably The Fabulous Baker Boys
Irvin Kershner
Director
1 film together
Notably RoboCop 2
Jonathan Kaplan
Director
1 film together
Notably Unlawful Entry
Penelope Spheeris
Director
1 film together
Notably Senseless
Dennis Dugan
Director
1 film together
Notably National Security
Isaac Florentine
Director
1 film together
Notably Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Isaac Florentine
Director
1 film together · 7.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Undisputed II: Last Man StandingPaul Michael Glaser
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Running ManSteve Kloves
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 Fabulous Baker BoysJonathan Kaplan
Director
1 film together · 6.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Unlawful EntryPenelope Spheeris
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
SenselessWilliam Lustig
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Maniac CopDennis Dugan
Director
1 film together · 6.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
National SecurityIrvin Kershner
Director
1 film together · 6.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
RoboCop 2Six 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
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
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 Fabulous Baker Boys
as Ray
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Maniac Cop
as Mayor Jerry Killium (uncredited)
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
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. Ken Lerner 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.
Action Legend
Awarded
5 catalogue titles in action, 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
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Fabulous Baker Boys
as Ray
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Unlawful Entry
as Roger Graham
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing
as Phil
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
The Fabulous Baker Boys
as Ray
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Maniac Cop
as Mayor Jerry Killium (uncredited)
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Zach Grenier
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Richmond Arquette
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Have your say
Community
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Reference
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