Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#2875
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Yul Vazquez represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 31 years in, and Yul is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Yul Vazquez appears in 27 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Yul. American Gangster is the clearest case: a film rated 7.6 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, science fiction. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Andy Garcia, Paul Greengrass, Nash Edgerton and others, Yul Vazquez 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.
American Gangster (2007) as Alfonso Abruzzo · Captain Phillips (2013) as Captain Frank Castellano · Imposters (2026) as Chief Ezra Reid
Career snapshot
Ranked #2875 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
27
1995–2026
Career length
31 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
7.6
American Gangster
Average Nutevio score
6.1
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.6
American Gangster
Most frequent director
Paul Greengrass
2 films together
Longest collaboration
2×
With Paul Greengrass
Most common genre
Drama
16 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
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
6.5
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
6.5 average MV
The 2000s are where the work and the material meet. Che: Part Two, Che: Part One, American Gangster — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
2000s
6.5
Across 8 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
2000s
6.5
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. Nick of Time.
Most productive era
2010s
13 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 | — | 7.04 films | 6.39 films | 4.83 films |
| Action | 6.21 film | 6.81 film | 6.44 films | 4.81 film |
| Thriller | 6.21 film | 6.82 films | 6.55 films | 6.43 films |
| Comedy | — | 5.93 films | 6.16 films | 0.01 film |
| Crime | 6.21 film | 6.84 films | 6.27 films | 7.01 film |
| Romance | — | 5.31 film | 5.71 film | — |
| Horror | — | — | — | 7.41 film |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
1995Nick of Time
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Gustino (Guest Services).
Highest rated performance
7.6 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer.
Career peak
2026Imposters
Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
2026Diamond
The current state of the argument.
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.
27 of 27 films
as Chief Martinez
Directed by Paul Greengrass
as Captain Frank Castellano
Directed by Paul Greengrass
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
Chief Ezra Reid
Imposters (2026)
Performance score7.7
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Chief Ezra Reid gives Yul Vazquez a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Chief Martinez
The Lost Bus (2025)
Performance score7.4
The Lost Bus asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Chief Martinez is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Alfonso Abruzzo
American Gangster (2007)
Performance score7.4
American Gangster asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Alfonso Abruzzo is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Captain Frank Castellano
Captain Phillips (2013)
Performance score7.3
Captain Phillips asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Captain Frank Castellano 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 Chief Ezra Reid
Start here. Imposters is the clearest statement of what Yul Vazquez does — accessible, 102 minutes, and rated 7.4 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Yul 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.
Traffic (2000)
Same director as Imposters, different problem to solve. Watching them in order shows how much of the effect was the collaboration.
American Gangster (2007)
Keeps the crime register of Traffic but asks for a colder reading of it.
Captain Phillips (2013)
Keeps the drama register of American Gangster but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Lost Bus (2025)
Same director as Captain Phillips, different problem to solve. Watching them in order shows how much of the effect was the collaboration.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Paul Greengrass
Director
2 films together
Notably Captain Phillips
John Badham
Director
1 film together
Notably Nick of Time
Nick Gomez
Director
1 film together
Notably Drowning Mona
Michael Bay
Director
1 film together
Notably Bad Boys II
Steven Spielberg
Director
1 film together
Notably War of the Worlds
Jesse Peretz
Director
1 film together
Notably The Ex
Ridley Scott
Director
1 film together
Notably American Gangster
Joe Carnahan
Director
1 film together
Notably The A-Team
Paul Weitz
Director
1 film together
Notably Little Fockers
Tom McCarthy
Director
1 film together
Notably The Cobbler
Michael Cuesta
Director
1 film together
Notably Kill the Messenger
Jeff Wadlow
Director
1 film together
Notably True Memoirs of an International Assassin
Richard Linklater
Director
1 film together
Notably Last Flag Flying
Nash Edgerton
Director
1 film together
Notably Gringo
Andy Garcia
Director
1 film together
Notably Diamond
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Paul Greengrass
Director
2 films together · 7.3 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Captain PhillipsRidley Scott
Director
1 film together · 7.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
American GangsterAndy Garcia
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
DiamondMichael Bay
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Bad Boys IIRichard Linklater
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Last Flag FlyingMichael Cuesta
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Kill the MessengerSteven Spielberg
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
War of the WorldsJoe Carnahan
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 A-TeamJohn Badham
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Nick of TimeNash Edgerton
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
GringoTom McCarthy
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The CobblerJeff Wadlow
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
True Memoirs of an International AssassinPaul Weitz
Director
1 film together · 5.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Little FockersNick Gomez
Director
1 film together · 5.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Drowning MonaJesse Peretz
Director
1 film together · 5.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The ExSix 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
Captain Phillips
as Captain Frank Castellano
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 Lost Bus
as Chief Martinez
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
American Gangster
as Alfonso Abruzzo
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
The Infiltrator
as Javier Ospina
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Imposters
as Chief Ezra Reid
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. Yul Vazquez 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
31 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
16 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
Diamond
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Captain Phillips
as Captain Frank Castellano
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Ex
as Paco
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Diamond
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Captain Phillips
as Captain Frank Castellano
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Bad Boys II
as Detective Mateo Reyes
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Traffic
as Tigrillo / Obregón Assassin
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Bad Boys II
as Detective Mateo Reyes
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
If you like this performer
Matt Damon
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Michael Caine
Built a career in the same territory: adventure and drama
Harry Dean Stanton
Works with the same directors — Ridley Scott
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
Have your say
Community
Which Yul Vazquez performance holds up best?
Our readers argue about this one. Make your case, or read the ranked debate already in progress.
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Reference
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