Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#24100
of 909177 performers
Top 5%
Kevin Corcoran 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.
Kevin Corcoran appears in 6 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Kevin. Swiss Family Robinson is the clearest case: a film rated 6.7 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, music. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with Jack Donohue, Ken Annakin, David Swift and others, Kevin Corcoran 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.
Swiss Family Robinson (1960) as Francis · Pollyanna (1960) as Jimmy Bean · Old Yeller (1957) as Arliss Coates
Career snapshot
Ranked #24100 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
6
1954–1961
Career length
7 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
6.7
Swiss Family Robinson
Average Nutevio score
6.5
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
7.0
The Glenn Miller Story
Most frequent director
Jack Donohue
1 film together
Longest collaboration
1×
With Jack Donohue
Most common genre
Family
5 titles
Average runtime
1h 52m
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
6.3
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
1950s
6.6 average MV
The 1950s are where the work and the material meet. The Shaggy Dog, Old Yeller, The Glenn Miller Story — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
1950s
6.6
Across 3 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
1950s
6.7
The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.
Most awarded era
1950s
0 Academy Awards
Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. The Shaggy Dog, Old Yeller, The Glenn Miller Story.
Most productive era
1950s
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 | 1950s | 1960s |
|---|---|---|
| Drama | 6.72 films | 6.71 film |
| Comedy | 6.31 film | 6.42 films |
| Romance | 6.71 film | — |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio · Highest rated performance
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited). 6.7 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer.
Career peak
1957Old Yeller
Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.
Most recent film
1961Babes in Toyland
The current state of the argument, as Boy Blue.
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.
6 of 6 films
as Arliss Coates
Directed by Robert Stevenson
as Jimmy Bean
Directed by David Swift
as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
Directed by Anthony Mann
as Boy Blue
Directed by Jack Donohue
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
Arliss Coates
Old Yeller (1957)
Performance score6.9
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Arliss Coates gives Kevin Corcoran a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Francis
Swiss Family Robinson (1960)
Performance score6.6
Swiss Family Robinson asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Francis is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Jimmy Bean
Pollyanna (1960)
Performance score6.6
Pollyanna asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Jimmy Bean is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
The Glenn Miller Story (1954)
Performance score6.6
The Glenn Miller Story asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited) 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 Arliss Coates
Start here. Old Yeller is the clearest statement of what Kevin Corcoran does — accessible, 84 minutes, and rated 6.7 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Kevin 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 Glenn Miller Story (1954)
Keeps the drama register of Old Yeller but asks for a colder reading of it.
Swiss Family Robinson (1960)
A deliberate change of key after The Glenn Miller Story — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Pollyanna (1960)
Keeps the family register of Swiss Family Robinson but asks for a colder reading of it.
Babes in Toyland (1961)
Keeps the comedy register of Pollyanna but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
Anthony Mann
Director
1 film together
Notably The Glenn Miller Story
Robert Stevenson
Director
1 film together
Notably Old Yeller
Charles Barton
Director
1 film together
Notably The Shaggy Dog
David Swift
Director
1 film together
Notably Pollyanna
Ken Annakin
Director
1 film together
Notably Swiss Family Robinson
Jack Donohue
Director
1 film together
Notably Babes in Toyland
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
Ken Annakin
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Swiss Family RobinsonDavid Swift
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
PollyannaRobert Stevenson
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Old YellerAnthony Mann
Director
1 film together · 6.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Glenn Miller StoryCharles Barton
Director
1 film together · 6.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Shaggy DogJack Donohue
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Babes in ToylandSix 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
Swiss Family Robinson
as Francis
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 Glenn Miller Story
as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
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 Glenn Miller Story
as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
The Glenn Miller Story
as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Old Yeller
as Arliss Coates
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. Kevin Corcoran 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.
Family Legend
Awarded
5 catalogue titles in family, 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 Glenn Miller Story
as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Pollyanna
as Jimmy Bean
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Glenn Miller Story
as Steve Miller - Age 4 (uncredited)
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
Babes in Toyland
as Boy Blue
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Old Yeller
as Arliss Coates
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Old Yeller
as Arliss Coates
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Old Yeller
as Arliss Coates
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Babes in Toyland
as Boy Blue
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Reference
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