Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#14923
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Todd Louiso represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 30 years in, and Todd is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Todd Louiso appears in 13 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Todd. Scent of a Woman is the clearest case: a film rated 7.8 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, drama, romance. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Rodrigo García, Mark Pellington, Josh Gordon and others, Todd Louiso 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.
Scent of a Woman (1992) as Trent Potter · Apollo 13 (1995) as FAO White · Thank You for Smoking (2005) as Ron Goode
Career snapshot
Ranked #14923 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
13
1992–2022
Career length
30 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.8
Scent of a Woman
Average Nutevio score
6.5
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.8
Scent of a Woman
Most frequent director
Rodrigo García
1 film together
Longest collaboration
1×
With Rodrigo García
Most common genre
Comedy
9 titles
Average runtime
1h 54m
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
1990s
6.9 average MV
The 1990s are where the work and the material meet. 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag, Jerry Maguire, The Rock — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
1990s
6.9
Across 5 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
1990s
6.9
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. 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag, Jerry Maguire, The Rock.
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 | 1990s | 2000s | 2010s | 2020s |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drama | 7.43 films | 6.83 films | 6.42 films | 6.21 film |
| Action | 7.21 film | 5.51 film | — | — |
| Thriller | 7.21 film | 5.51 film | — | — |
| Comedy | 6.02 films | 6.54 films | 6.42 films | 6.21 film |
| Crime | 5.01 film | 5.51 film | — | — |
| Romance | 7.01 film | 6.23 films | 6.21 film | — |
| Horror | — | 5.51 film | — | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio · Highest rated performance · Career peak
1992Scent of a Woman
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Trent Potter. 7.8 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
2022Raymond & Ray
The current state of the argument, as Canfield.
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.
13 of 13 films
as Trent Potter
Directed by Martin Brest
as Dick
Directed by Stephen Frears
as FAO White
Directed by Ron Howard
as Marvin Isherwood
Directed by Michael Bay
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
Trent Potter
Scent of a Woman (1992)
Performance score7.6
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Trent Potter gives Todd Louiso a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Dick
High Fidelity (2000)
Performance score7.5
High Fidelity asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Dick is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
FAO White
Apollo 13 (1995)
Performance score7.3
Apollo 13 asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. FAO White is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Ron Goode
Thank You for Smoking (2005)
Performance score7.1
Thank You for Smoking asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Ron Goode 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 Trent Potter
Start here. Scent of a Woman is the clearest statement of what Todd Louiso does — accessible, 156 minutes, and rated 7.8 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Todd 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.
Apollo 13 (1995)
Keeps the drama register of Scent of a Woman but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Rock (1996)
A deliberate change of key after Apollo 13 — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
High Fidelity (2000)
A deliberate change of key after The Rock — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Thank You for Smoking (2005)
Keeps the comedy register of High Fidelity but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Martin Brest
Director
1 film together
Notably Scent of a Woman
Ron Howard
Director
1 film together
Notably Apollo 13
Michael Bay
Director
1 film together
Notably The Rock
Cameron Crowe
Director
1 film together
Notably Jerry Maguire
Tom Schulman
Director
1 film together
Notably 8 Heads in a Duffel Bag
Stephen Frears
Director
1 film together
Notably High Fidelity
Jason Reitman
Director
1 film together
Notably Thank You for Smoking
Todd Phillips
Director
1 film together
Notably School for Scoundrels
David R. Ellis
Director
1 film together
Notably Snakes on a Plane
Melisa Wallack
Director
1 film together
Notably Meet Bill
Josh Gordon
Director
1 film together
Notably The Switch
Mark Pellington
Director
1 film together
Notably The Last Word
Rodrigo García
Director
1 film together
Notably Raymond & Ray
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Martin Brest
Director
1 film together · 7.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Scent of a WomanRon Howard
Director
1 film together · 7.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Apollo 13Jason Reitman
Director
1 film together · 7.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Thank You for SmokingMichael Bay
Director
1 film together · 7.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The RockStephen Frears
Director
1 film together · 7.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
High FidelityCameron Crowe
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Jerry MaguireMark Pellington
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 Last WordRodrigo García
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Raymond & RayJosh Gordon
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The SwitchMelisa Wallack
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Meet BillDavid R. Ellis
Director
1 film together · 5.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Snakes on a PlaneTodd Phillips
Director
1 film together · 5.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
School for ScoundrelsTom Schulman
Director
1 film together · 5.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
8 Heads in a Duffel BagSix 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
Scent of a Woman
as Trent Potter
The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.
Most emotional performance
Apollo 13
as FAO White
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Scent of a Woman
as Trent Potter
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Apollo 13
as FAO White
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Scent of a Woman
as Trent Potter
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. Todd Louiso 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
30 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.
Comedy Legend
Awarded
9 catalogue titles in comedy, 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
Scent of a Woman
as Trent Potter
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
The Rock
as Marvin Isherwood
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
High Fidelity
as Dick
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
8 Heads in a Duffel Bag
as Steve
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
The Rock
as Marvin Isherwood
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
The Rock
as Marvin Isherwood
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
High Fidelity
as Dick
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Meet Bill
as John Jr.
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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Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Matt Damon
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
David Krumholtz
Built a career in the same territory: action and adventure
Cillian Murphy
Built a career in the same territory: drama and history
Morgan Freeman
Built a career in the same territory: action and crime
Robert Downey Jr.
Built a career in the same territory: drama and history
Have your say
Community
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Reference
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