American actor Walter Brennan is the first actor in the history of cinema to win three Oscars. A performance that he accomplished in just 5 years, and which led to a change in the Academy’s regulations.
He is known in particular for his unforgettable interpretation of old Stumpy, the endearing guard of the Rio Bravo prison alongside John Wayne and Dean Martin in the Howard Hawks classic.
This eternal “grandpa of westerns”, very popular within the Hollywood industry, and whose jovial face lit up dozens of films in the 30s, 40s and 50s, can also boast of having accomplished an unusual feat in the history of cinema, as recently recalled an article from Collider.
A first in Oscar history
Walter Brennan is in fact the first actor of all time to have won 3 Oscars (for best supporting role), and this in the space of only 5 years!
In 1937, he obtained his first statuette for his role in Howard Hawks’ The Vandal, in which he played the character of Swan Bostrom. The Best Supporting Actor category had just been created, and he was therefore the first winner.
Two years later, in 1939, he won a second Oscar for David Butler’s film Kentucky, in which he played the heroine’s uncle. And in 1941, it was for his performance in The Rider of the Desert by William Wyler that Walter Brennan received a third award.
Warner Bros. Walter Brennan in “Rio Bravo”
The most Oscar-winning stars
The first Hollywood actor to win three Oscars, Brennan is still the only one to have accomplished this feat in such a short time, and exclusively in the Best Supporting Actor category. Later, other stars will also manage to multiply the rewards for their various performances.
In the entire history of the ceremony, Katharine Hepburn holds the absolute record with 4 Oscars for best actress. Frances McDormand, Ingrid Bergman, Meryl Streep, Daniel Day-Lewis and Jack Nicholson have all, like Walter Brennan, won three Oscars each.
Modification of the regulations
However, this veritable raid of prizes won by Walter Brennan at the end of the 1930s led to a change in the official regulations of the Academy. Indeed, according to the site Cinema Sight (quoted in the Collider article), it would seem that the actor obtained these awards thanks to the help of the union of extras who, at the time, were also authorized to vote to award Oscars.
Following Brennan’s third award, the rule would have been modified, henceforth preventing extras from contributing to the vote.
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