Catherine Curtin

Performer

Catherine Curtin

A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.

Born
14 July 1970
Age
56
Nationality
American
Active
2008–present
Performances
20
In Nutevio
2008–present
Known for
Plucked
Performer Score
6.8
  • Horror Icon
  • Cult Favourite
  • Modern Classic
View filmography

Nutevio rank

#2254

of 909177 performers

Top 1%

Catherine Curtin works on versatility rather than volume, and the catalogue keeps proving that the quieter choice was the correct one.
Ranked #2254 of 909177 performers in the Nutevio catalogue. Recalculated automatically as titles and credits are imported.

The essay

Reading Catherine Curtin

Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.

Why this performer matters

Catherine Curtin appears in 20 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Catherine. Chemical Hearts is the clearest case: a film rated 7.1 by our editors, where the performance carries weight the script only implies.

Signature style

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 comedy, drama, thriller. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.

Legacy

Working with Jason Reitman, Josh Ruben, Alice Wu and others, Catherine Curtin 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.

Best known for

Chemical Hearts (2020) as Sarah Sawyer · The Half of It (2020) as Colleen Munsky · Revolutionary Road (2008) as Woman in Audience

Career snapshot

The career at a glance

Ranked #2254 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.

  • Films in Nutevio

    20

    2008–2026

  • Career length

    18 yrs

    Measured across our catalogue

  • Academy Awards

    Unknown

  • Oscar nominations

    Unknown

  • Highest Nutevio score

    7.1

    Chemical Hearts

  • Average Nutevio score

    4.5

    Across catalogue work

  • Highest IMDb rating

    7.3

    Chemical Hearts

  • Most frequent director

    Jason Reitman

    1 film together

  • Longest collaboration

    With Jason Reitman

  • Most common genre

    Drama

    14 titles

  • Average runtime

    1h 27m

    Across catalogue work

  • Golden Globe wins

    Unknown

Nutevio metric

Performer Score

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.

  • Performance quality6.4
  • Consistency6.4
  • Emotional range6.4
  • Character transformation6.4
  • Cultural impact6.4
  • Iconic roles6.4
  • Career longevity8.3
  • Influence6.4
  • Awards recognition6.6
  • Rewatch value6.4

Nutevio metric

Influence Score

Cultural impact and legacy, measured separately from craft — how far the work travelled once it left the cinema.

Nutevio Influence Score

6.2

out of 10

A quieter influence — felt inside the films rather than across the industry.

  • Cultural impact5.5

    How far the work travelled past the people who saw it first.

  • Legacy5.5

    What survives once the release-week conversation has burned off.

  • Industry recognition6.6

    Institutional acknowledgement, weighted but never decisive.

  • Career longevity7.9

    Years of chosen, relevant work rather than years merely employed.

  • Awards6.4

    Statuettes, read as evidence rather than verdict.

  • Iconic performances6.8

    Roles named without needing the film named alongside them.

  • Influence on filmmakers5.5

    Directors who wrote parts because this performer existed.

  • Influence on other actors5.5

    The reading other performers now have to answer.

Actor DNA

How they work on screen

A fingerprint derived from the roles themselves — register, range and the kind of film they carry.

  • Versatility99
  • Quiet performance94
  • Transformation79
  • Drama56
  • Screen presence48
  • Emotional range47
  • Charisma47
  • Rewatchability46
  • Intensity28
  • Comedy26
  • Villain presence26
  • Action12
  • Physical performance8

The shape of a career

Career evolution

Every performance plotted in time. Hover a point to read the title behind it.

67891020082011201220192019201920192020202020202020202020212021202220242024202520252026
  • Nutevio
  • Performance score
  • IMDb

Peak years

Best era

Where the scores, the awards and the sheer volume of work agree with each other.

Best decade

2000s

7.0 average MV

The 2000s are where the work and the material meet. Revolutionary Road — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.

Highest average Nutevio score

2000s

7.0

Across 1 catalogue film in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.

Highest average IMDb rating

2000s

7.0

The public agrees most strongly about this stretch — useful context, and occasionally a decade behind our own reading.

Most awarded era

2000s

0 Academy Awards

Statuettes for the films themselves, which is the honest way to read an ensemble career. Revolutionary Road.

Most productive era

2020s

13 films

The busiest stretch of the catalogue — volume that reads as appetite rather than availability.

Range, mapped

Career heatmap

Genres down the side, decades across the top. Warmer cells mean stronger titles.

The career concentrates in drama during the 2020s, and the scores hold there.
Genre2000s2010s2020s
Drama
7.01 film
4.94 films
5.09 films
Action
6.41 film
Thriller
6.41 film
6.02 films
Comedy
4.57 films
Crime
6.71 film
6.11 film
Romance
7.01 film
6.73 films
Horror
3.12 films

Chronology

Career timeline

Firsts and peaks

Career milestones

The turning points, in the order they happened.

  1. First film in Nutevio

    2008Revolutionary Road

    Where our catalogue meets this career, as Woman in Audience.

  2. Highest rated performance

    2020Chemical Hearts

    7.1 on the Nutevio scale, the top of the catalogue for this performer.

  3. Career peak

    2020The Half of It

    Weighing billing against the film's own quality, this is the point where everything aligned at once.

  4. Most recent film

    2026Plucked

    The current state of the argument, as Maggie.

Our order

Performances ranked

Every performance in the catalogue, ordered by Nutevio Score.

1
Official poster for Chemical Hearts (2020)

Chemical Hearts

2020 · Romance

1h 33m

7.3IMDb
2
Official poster for The Half of It (2020)

The Half of It

2020 · Romance

1h 44m

7.1IMDb
3
Official poster for Revolutionary Road (2008)

Revolutionary Road

2008 · Romance

1h 59m

7.0IMDb
4
Official poster for Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

2011 · Drama

2h 9m

7.0IMDb
5
Official poster for Bad Education (2019)

Bad Education

2019 · Crime

1h 49m

6.7IMDb
6
Official poster for Saturday Night (2024)

Saturday Night

2024 · Comedy

1h 49m

6.7IMDb
7
Official poster for Worth (2021)

Worth

2021 · Drama

1h 58m

6.7IMDb
8
Official poster for The Bourne Legacy (2012)

The Bourne Legacy

2012 · Action

2h 15m

6.3IMDb
9
Official poster for Werewolves Within (2021)

Werewolves Within

2021 · Comedy

1h 36m

6.0IMDb
10
Official poster for Lie Hard (2022)

Lie Hard

2022 · Comedy

5.2IMDb
11
Official poster for Pretty Thing (2025)

Pretty Thing

2025 · Drama

1h 36m

5.5IMDb
12
Official poster for Inside the Rain (2020)

Inside the Rain

2020 · Romance

1h 35m

5.0IMDb
13
Official poster for What Breaks the Ice (2020)

What Breaks the Ice

2020 · Mystery

1h 44m

5.1IMDb
14
Official poster for Blush (2019)

Blush

2019 · Drama

1h 41m

4.9IMDb
15
Official poster for Plucked (2026)

Plucked

2026 · Comedy

2h 0m

16
Official poster for Long Pork (2025)

Long Pork

2025 · Horror

0h 13m

17
Official poster for Yaniv (2024)

Yaniv

2024 · Comedy

1h 25m

18
Official poster for Hung Up (2020)

Hung Up

2020

0h 13m

19
Official poster for Mad? (2019)

Mad?

2019 · Drama

1h 14m

20
Official poster for Hooked (2019)

Hooked

2019

0h 32m

Every title

Filmography

Filter by genre or decade, and compare any two titles side by side.

Genre
Decade
Sort

20 of 20 films

Official poster for The Half of It (2020)

as Colleen Munsky

Directed by Alice Wu

IMDb7.1Rotten Tomatoes70%Metacritic651h 44mRomance · Comedy · Drama
View movie
Official poster for Chemical Hearts (2020)

as Sarah Sawyer

Directed by Unknown

IMDb7.3Rotten Tomatoes71%Metacritic661h 33mRomance · Drama
View movie
Official poster for Revolutionary Road (2008)

as Woman in Audience

Directed by Sam Mendes

IMDb7.0Rotten Tomatoes70%Metacritic641h 59mRomance · Drama
View movie
Official poster for Saturday Night (2024)

as Joan Carbunkle

Directed by Jason Reitman

IMDb6.7Rotten Tomatoes66%Metacritic611h 49mComedy · Drama
View movie

From the library

Complete credits

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

Signature performances

Official poster for The Half of It (2020)

#1

Colleen Munsky

The Half of It (2020)

Performance score7.1

The performance the rest of the career is read through. Colleen Munsky gives Catherine Curtin a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.

View movie
Official poster for Chemical Hearts (2020)

#2

Sarah Sawyer

Chemical Hearts (2020)

Performance score7.0

Chemical Hearts asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Sarah Sawyer is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.

View movie
Official poster for Revolutionary Road (2008)

#3

Woman in Audience

Revolutionary Road (2008)

Performance score6.9

Revolutionary Road asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Woman in Audience is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.

View movie
Official poster for Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

#4

Leigh-Anne Black

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

Performance score6.8

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Leigh-Anne Black is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.

View movie

Start here

The movie journey

A guided path through the work, ordered so each film explains the next.

Official poster for The Half of It (2020)

Best entry point

The Half of It

as Colleen Munsky

Start here. The Half of It is the clearest statement of what Catherine Curtin does — accessible, 104 minutes, and rated 7.0 by our editors. No context required.

Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Catherine 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.

  1. Official poster for Revolutionary Road (2008)

    Revolutionary Road (2008)

    Keeps the romance register of The Half of It but asks for a colder reading of it.

  2. Official poster for Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

    Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

    Keeps the drama register of Revolutionary Road but asks for a colder reading of it.

  3. Official poster for Chemical Hearts (2020)

    Chemical Hearts (2020)

    Keeps the drama register of Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close but asks for a colder reading of it.

  4. Official poster for Saturday Night (2024)

    Saturday Night (2024)

    Keeps the drama register of Chemical Hearts but asks for a colder reading of it.

Company kept

Frequent collaborators

The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.

Behind the camera

Director network

Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.

Six degrees

Connected through cinema

Follow the thread outward — director, film, co-star, and the film after that.

Categories of our own

Most rewatchable, most emotional, most influential

Six editorial categories we apply to every performer we cover.

Most rewatchable

Official poster for Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

as Leigh-Anne Black

The one that survives a fourth viewing. Nothing in the performance depends on surprise, which is why it keeps paying out.

Most emotional performance

Official poster for Chemical Hearts (2020)

Chemical Hearts

as Sarah Sawyer

Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.

Most influential performance

Official poster for Revolutionary Road (2008)

Revolutionary Road

as Woman in Audience

You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.

Best ensemble performance

Official poster for The Bourne Legacy (2012)

The Bourne Legacy

as C-Team

Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.

Career defining performance

Official poster for The Half of It (2020)

The Half of It

as Colleen Munsky

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

Lines that stay

You can build a whole film around a performer who knows when not to speak. Catherine Curtin has known it for a long time.

Nutevio Editors · On The Half of It

Head to head

Compare performers

Put two careers on the same scale and see where the argument actually sits.

Ours alone

Nutevio Honors

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.

Drama Legend

Awarded

14 catalogue titles in drama, each one a reference point for the films that followed.

Our desk

Editor's picks

Best ending, best opening, best twist and the rest — categories we apply to everyone we cover.

Best ending

Official poster for Chemical Hearts (2020)

Chemical Hearts

as Sarah Sawyer

The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.

Best opening

Official poster for The Bourne Legacy (2012)

The Bourne Legacy

as C-Team

A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.

Most emotional

Official poster for Worth (2021)

Worth

as Joan

The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.

Best twist

Official poster for What Breaks the Ice (2020)

What Breaks the Ice

as Elaine

A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.

Best visual achievement

Official poster for The Bourne Legacy (2012)

The Bourne Legacy

as C-Team

Images that would survive with the sound switched off.

Best action sequence

Official poster for The Bourne Legacy (2012)

The Bourne Legacy

as C-Team

Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.

Best dialogue

Official poster for The Half of It (2020)

The Half of It

as Colleen Munsky

Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.

Most underrated film

Official poster for Blush (2019)

Blush

as Gail

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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Community

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Reference

Quick facts

Born
14 July 1970
New York City, New York, USA
Age
56
Nationality
American
Years active
2008–present
Known for
Plucked
Genres
Comedy, Drama, Thriller
IMDb
nm0193160
Nutevio rank
#2254
of 909177 performers tracked

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