Performer
A performer whose catalogue work here is strong, with the fuller case still to be made.
Nutevio rank
#69
of 909177 performers
Top 1%
Paul Rudd represents the rare performer whose career became more ambitious with every decade — 31 years in, and Paul is still choosing the harder script.
The essay
Our editors on the work, the patterns and the reason this body of work holds together.
Paul Rudd appears in 67 films in the Nutevio catalogue, and none of them would work the same way without Paul. Avengers: Endgame 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, 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, music, drama. It is a style built on what is withheld as much as what is played.
Working with John Carney, Lawrence Kasdan, David Wain and others, Paul Rudd 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.
Avengers: Endgame (2019) as Scott Lang / Ant-Man · Chadwick Boseman: A Tribute for a King (2020) as Self - Actor, "Avengers: Endgame" · Marty, Life Is Short (2026) as Self (archive footage)
Career snapshot
Ranked #69 of 909177 performers tracked in the Nutevio library.
Films in Nutevio
67
1995–2026
Career length
31 yrs
Measured across our catalogue
Academy Awards
—
Unknown
Oscar nominations
—
Unknown
Highest Nutevio score
8.5
Avengers: Endgame
Average Nutevio score
6.3
Across catalogue work
Highest IMDb rating
8.2
Avengers: Endgame
Most frequent director
David Wain
6 films together
Longest collaboration
6×
With David Wain
Most common genre
Comedy
45 titles
Average runtime
1h 41m
Across catalogue work
Golden Globe wins
—
Unknown
Nutevio metric
Ten weighted categories, applied identically to everyone we cover.
Nutevio Performer Score
7.0
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
6.5 average MV
The 1990s are where the work and the material meet. The Cider House Rules, The Object of My Affection, Romeo + Juliet — the run our editors reach for first when the argument is about range rather than fame.
Highest average Nutevio score
1990s
6.5
Across 5 catalogue films in this decade, our scores never drop below the level a career is judged on.
Highest average IMDb rating
1990s
6.4
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. The Cider House Rules, The Object of My Affection, Romeo + Juliet.
Most productive era
2010s
23 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 | 6.63 films | 6.24 films | 6.38 films | 6.73 films |
| Action | — | 5.81 film | 7.35 films | 6.63 films |
| Thriller | — | — | 5.92 films | — |
| Comedy | 7.31 film | 6.117 films | 5.915 films | 6.612 films |
| Crime | — | 5.81 film | — | 6.91 film |
| Romance | 6.73 films | 6.27 films | 5.53 films | — |
| Horror | 5.21 film | — | — | 6.12 films |
Chronology
Firsts and peaks
The turning points, in the order they happened.
First film in Nutevio
1995Clueless
Where our catalogue meets this career, as Josh.
Highest rated performance · Career peak
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.
Most recent film
The current state of the argument, as Scott Lang / Ant-Man.
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.
67 of 67 films
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Directed by Anthony Russo
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Directed by Peyton Reed
as Self (archive footage)
Directed by Lawrence Kasdan
as Self - Actor, "Avengers: Endgame"
Directed by Unknown
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
Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Avengers: Endgame (2019)
Performance score8.2
The performance the rest of the career is read through. Scott Lang / Ant-Man gives Paul Rudd a structure to work against, and the film hands over its centre of gravity without hesitation.
View movie#2
Ben Benjamin
The Fundamentals of Caring (2016)
Performance score7.9
The Fundamentals of Caring asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Ben Benjamin is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#3
Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Ant-Man (2015)
Performance score7.9
Ant-Man asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Scott Lang / Ant-Man is played without a single line of pleading for the audience's sympathy — which is exactly why it lands.
View movie#4
Self (archive footage)
Marty, Life Is Short (2026)
Performance score7.8
Marty, Life Is Short asks for something the previous films did not, and gets it. Self (archive footage) 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 Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Start here. Avengers: Endgame is the clearest statement of what Paul Rudd does — accessible, 181 minutes, and rated 8.5 by our editors. No context required.
Our editors order this path by accessibility first and chronology second. You meet Paul 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.
Ant-Man (2015)
Keeps the action register of Avengers: Endgame but asks for a colder reading of it.
The Fundamentals of Caring (2016)
A deliberate change of key after Ant-Man — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Chadwick Boseman: A Tribute for a King (2020)
A deliberate change of key after The Fundamentals of Caring — same instrument, unfamiliar tuning, and the reason range gets mentioned.
Marty, Life Is Short (2026)
Keeps the documentary register of Chadwick Boseman: A Tribute for a King but asks for a colder reading of it.
Company kept
The directors and performers this career keeps returning to.
David Wain
Director
6 films together
Notably Role Models
Judd Apatow
Director
3 films together
Notably The 40 Year Old Virgin
Adam McKay
Director
3 films together
Notably Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
Peyton Reed
Director
3 films together
Notably Ant-Man
Anthony Russo
Director
3 films together
Notably Avengers: Endgame
Amy Heckerling
Director
2 films together
Notably Clueless
Jesse Peretz
Director
2 films together
Notably Our Idiot Brother
Joe Chappelle
Director
1 film together
Notably Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers
Baz Luhrmann
Director
1 film together
Notably Romeo + Juliet
Nicholas Hytner
Director
1 film together
Notably The Object of My Affection
Lasse Hallström
Director
1 film together
Notably The Cider House Rules
Neil LaBute
Director
1 film together
Notably The Shape of Things
Shawn Levy
Director
1 film together
Notably Night at the Museum
Robert Ben Garant
Director
1 film together
Notably Reno 911!: Miami
Jake Kasdan
Director
1 film together
Notably Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
Jeff Lowell
Director
1 film together
Notably Over Her Dead Body
Nicholas Stoller
Director
1 film together
Notably Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Harold Ramis
Director
1 film together
Notably Year One
John Hamburg
Director
1 film together
Notably I Love You, Man
Rob Letterman
Director
1 film together
Notably Monsters vs Aliens
James L. Brooks
Director
1 film together
Notably How Do You Know
Jay Roach
Director
1 film together
Notably Dinner for Schmucks
Stephen Chbosky
Director
1 film together
Notably The Perks of Being a Wallflower
David Gordon Green
Director
1 film together
Notably Prince Avalanche
Paul Weitz
Director
1 film together
Notably Admission
Evan Goldberg
Director
1 film together
Notably This Is the End
Mark Osborne
Director
1 film together
Notably The Little Prince
Rob Burnett
Director
1 film together
Notably The Fundamentals of Caring
Conrad Vernon
Director
1 film together
Notably Sausage Party
Alethea Jones
Director
1 film together
Notably Fun Mom Dinner
Andrew Fleming
Director
1 film together
Notably Ideal Home
Ben Lewin
Director
1 film together
Notably The Catcher Was a Spy
Duncan Jones
Director
1 film together
Notably Mute
Scott Aukerman
Director
1 film together
Notably Between Two Ferns: The Movie
Andrew Fried
Director
1 film together
Notably We Are Freestyle Love Supreme
Morgan Sackett
Director
1 film together
Notably A Parks and Recreation Special
Jason Reitman
Director
1 film together
Notably Ghostbusters: Afterlife
Loren Bouchard
Director
1 film together
Notably The Bob's Burgers Movie
Akiva Schaffer
Director
1 film together
Notably Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers
Brad Baruh
Director
1 film together
Notably Marvel Studios Assembled: The Making of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
Jeff Rowe
Director
1 film together
Notably Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem
Andrew DeYoung
Director
1 film together
Notably Friendship
Tom Gormican
Director
1 film together
Notably Anaconda
Lawrence Kasdan
Director
1 film together
Notably Marty, Life Is Short
John Carney
Director
1 film together
Notably Power Ballad
Behind the camera
Who casts this performer, how often, and what the pairing produces.
David Wain
Director
6 films together · 5.6 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 6 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Role ModelsAnthony Russo
Director
3 films together · 7.6 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 3 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Avengers: EndgamePeyton Reed
Director
3 films together · 6.8 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 3 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Ant-ManAdam McKay
Director
3 films together · 6.3 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 3 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Anchorman: The Legend of Ron BurgundyJudd Apatow
Director
3 films together · 6.2 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 3 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
The 40 Year Old VirginAmy Heckerling
Director
2 films together · 6.6 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
CluelessJesse Peretz
Director
2 films together · 5.7 avg MV
A working relationship rather than a booking — 2 films, and the register shifts each time.
Best film together
Our Idiot BrotherLawrence Kasdan
Director
1 film together · 8.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Marty, Life Is ShortStephen Chbosky
Director
1 film together · 7.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Perks of Being a WallflowerMorgan Sackett
Director
1 film together · 7.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
A Parks and Recreation SpecialMark Osborne
Director
1 film together · 7.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Little PrinceAndrew Fried
Director
1 film together · 7.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
We Are Freestyle Love SupremeJason Reitman
Director
1 film together · 7.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Ghostbusters: AfterlifeRob Burnett
Director
1 film together · 7.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Fundamentals of CaringJeff Rowe
Director
1 film together · 7.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant MayhemLasse Hallström
Director
1 film together · 7.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Cider House RulesAkiva Schaffer
Director
1 film together · 7.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Chip 'n Dale: Rescue RangersJohn Carney
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Power BalladLoren Bouchard
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Bob's Burgers MovieBaz Luhrmann
Director
1 film together · 6.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Romeo + JulietShawn Levy
Director
1 film together · 6.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Night at the MuseumJohn Hamburg
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
I Love You, ManJake Kasdan
Director
1 film together · 6.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox StoryRob Letterman
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Monsters vs AliensNicholas Stoller
Director
1 film together · 6.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Forgetting Sarah MarshallAndrew DeYoung
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
FriendshipAndrew Fleming
Director
1 film together · 6.4 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Ideal HomeBrad Baruh
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Ben Lewin
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 Catcher Was a SpyEvan Goldberg
Director
1 film together · 6.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
This Is the EndNeil LaBute
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 Shape of ThingsDavid Gordon Green
Director
1 film together · 6.1 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Prince AvalancheScott Aukerman
Director
1 film together · 5.9 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Between Two Ferns: The MovieTom Gormican
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
AnacondaConrad Vernon
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Sausage PartyRobert Ben Garant
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Reno 911!: MiamiNicholas Hytner
Director
1 film together · 5.8 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
The Object of My AffectionAlethea Jones
Director
1 film together · 5.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Fun Mom DinnerJay Roach
Director
1 film together · 5.7 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Dinner for SchmucksDuncan Jones
Director
1 film together · 5.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
MutePaul Weitz
Director
1 film together · 5.6 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
AdmissionJeff Lowell
Director
1 film together · 5.5 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Over Her Dead BodyJames L. Brooks
Director
1 film together · 5.3 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
How Do You KnowJoe Chappelle
Director
1 film together · 5.2 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Halloween: The Curse of Michael MyersHarold Ramis
Director
1 film together · 5.0 avg MV
One film, but the kind that reorganises how a performer is cast afterwards.
Best film together
Year OneSix 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
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
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 Little Prince
as Mr. Prince (voice)
Grief played at conversational volume. The film never asks the audience to cry; the performance simply makes it difficult not to.
Most influential performance
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
You can hear this reading in other actors' auditions a decade later — the surest measure of influence there is.
Best ensemble performance
Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
as John Lennon (uncredited)
Work that makes everyone else in the frame better without ever pulling the camera towards itself.
Career defining performance
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
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. Paul Rudd 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.
Comedy Legend
Awarded
45 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
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
The last five minutes reorganise everything before them, and hold up when you already know what's coming.
Best opening
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
A first sequence that states the rules of the film without explaining a single one of them.
Most emotional
The Little Prince
as Mr. Prince (voice)
The film where the technique steps aside and lets the feeling arrive undefended.
Best twist
The Bob's Burgers Movie
as Jericho (voice)
A reversal earned by information the film gave you and trusted you to misread.
Best visual achievement
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Images that would survive with the sound switched off.
Best action sequence
Avengers: Endgame
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
Geography, stakes and consequence held in the same frame — spectacle you can follow.
Best dialogue
Power Ballad
as Rick Power
Lines written to be spoken, staged so the pauses do half the work.
Most underrated film
Avengers: Doomsday
as Scott Lang / Ant-Man
The public vote sits below ours on this one, and the direction is the reason for the gap.
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Have your say
Community
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Reference
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