Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#15974
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Peter Maloney represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 47 years in, and Peter is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Peter Maloney appears in 12 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Peter. The Thing Expanded is the clearest case: a film rated 8.5 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 documentary, comedy, fantasy. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Ian Nathan, Alec Baldwin, Darren Aronofsky and others, Peter Maloney 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 Thing Expanded (2026) as Self · The Thing (1982) as Bennings · Requiem for a Dream (2000) as Dr. Pill
Career snapshot
Ranked #15974 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
12
1979–2026
Career length
47 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
8.5
The Thing Expanded
Average Nutevio score
7.0
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
8.5
The Thing Expanded
Most frequent director
Nicholas Hytner
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With Nicholas Hytner
Most common genre
Drama
8 titles
Average runtime
2h 19m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
7.1
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
7.2
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
2020s
8.5 average MV
The 2020s are where the work and the material meet. The Thing Expanded — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2020s
8.5
Across 1 catalogue film in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2020s
8.5
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1970s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. The Amityville Horror, Hair.
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 | 1970s | 1980s | 1990s | 2000s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 7.01 film | — | 6.64 films | 6.83 films | — |
| Thriller | — | 6.81 film | 7.02 films | 6.71 film | — |
| Comedy | 7.01 film | — | — | 5.61 film | — |
| Crime | — | 6.81 film | 6.51 film | 7.42 films | — |
| Romance | — | — | 5.81 film | — | — |
| Horror | 6.41 film | 7.52 films | — | — | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Newspaper Clerk.
Highest rated performance · Career peak · Most recent film
8.5 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 Self.
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 Bennings
Directed by John Carpenter
as Colonel Finck
Directed by Oliver Stone
as Court Clerk (uncredited)
Directed by Miloš Forman
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
Self
The Thing Expanded (2026)
Performance score8.2
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Self gives Peter Maloney a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Bennings
The Thing (1982)
Performance score7.9
The Thing asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Bennings is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Dr. Pill
Requiem for a Dream (2000)
Performance score7.8
Requiem for a Dream asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Dr. Pill is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Colonel Finck
JFK (1991)
Performance score7.3
JFK asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Colonel Finck 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 Self
Start here. The Thing Expanded is the clearest statement of what Peter Maloney does — accessible, 312 minutes, and rated 8.5 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Peter 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.
Hair (1979)
A deliberate change of key after The Thing Expanded — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
The Thing (1982)
A deliberate change of key after Hair — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
JFK (1991)
A deliberate change of key after The Thing — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Requiem for a Dream (2000)
Keeps the drama register of JFK but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Nicholas Hytner
Director
2 films together
Notably The Crucible
Miloš Forman
Director
1 film together
Notably Hair
Stuart Rosenberg
Director
1 film together
Notably The Amityville Horror
John Carpenter
Director
1 film together
Notably The Thing
Michael Mann
Director
1 film together
Notably Manhunter
Oliver Stone
Director
1 film together
Notably JFK
Spike Lee
Director
1 film together
Notably Summer of Sam
Ben Younger
Director
1 film together
Notably Boiler Room
Darren Aronofsky
Director
1 film together
Notably Requiem for a Dream
Alec Baldwin
Director
1 film together
Notably Shortcut to Happiness
Ian Nathan
Director
1 film together
Notably The Thing Expanded
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Nicholas Hytner
Director
2 films together · 6.2 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
The CrucibleIan Nathan
Director
1 film together · 8.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Thing ExpandedJohn Carpenter
Director
1 film together · 8.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The ThingDarren Aronofsky
Director
1 film together · 8.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Requiem for a DreamOliver Stone
Director
1 film together · 7.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
JFKMiloš Forman
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
HairMichael Mann
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
ManhunterBen Younger
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Boiler RoomSpike Lee
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Summer of SamStuart Rosenberg
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Amityville HorrorAlec Baldwin
Director
1 film together · 5.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Shortcut to HappinessSix 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 Thing
as Bennings
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
JFK
as Colonel Finck
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 Thing
as Bennings
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Hair
as Court Clerk (uncredited)
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
The Thing Expanded
as Self
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. Peter Maloney 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
47 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
8 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 Thing
as Bennings
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
The Thing
as Bennings
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Object of My Affection
as Desk Clerk
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
The Thing
as Bennings
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
The Thing Expanded
as Self
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Requiem for a Dream
as Dr. Pill
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Hair
as Court Clerk (uncredited)
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
The Thing
as Bennings
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
If you like this performer
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Have your say
Community
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Reference
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