Steven Spielberg names the most inventive actor he ever worked with: “Just brilliant”
Steven Spielberg has worked with some of the greatest actors of all time, building an unforgettable legacy through his life-affirming and immersive collaborations with the likes of Tom Hanks, Harrison Ford, Ralph Fiennes and Meryl Streep.
Widely considered one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, Spielberg has created films that touch audiences of all ages – appealing to the wonder and curiosity of children and to the inner child within all adults, something that is even explicitly explored in films like Hook and ET The Extra-Terrestrial.
Because of this, he has earned the right to work with his pick of the bunch, keeping a watchful eye on any emerging talent in Hollywood and carefully selecting new teams for each project. However, in all his years of innovation and risk-taking in the business, he has named one actor who matches this quality in their craft.
The director has been able to pull many challenging performances out of his actors over the years, notoriously working with a huge ensemble cast for the likes of Saving Private Ryan and putting them through a gruelling boot camp to prepare for the film’s battle sequences. His projects aren’t for the faint-hearted, with legendary stories about the production of Jaws that led to a miserable crew and team of actors who were constantly at each other’s throats.
Given his high standards and meticulous approach to filmmaking, praise from Spielberg is an honour and something that the director was quick to award to Leonardo DiCaprio.
DiCaprio has collaborated with many great directors over the years but has only worked with Spielberg on one film. Catch Me If You Can, released in 2002, follows a young criminal called Frank who tries to evade capture by an FBI agent, leading to one long game of cat and mouse. Considering that it was DiCaprio’s first collaboration with the director, he made quite the impression, with Spielberg saying he is “quite the fan of Leo’s” and that “Leo is a very inventive actor and has a lot of ideas, but he’s also his own best critic. There were times I’d accept a certain take, and Leo would say, ‘No, no. I think there’s something I haven’t found yet. Let me do it again.’ And he would invariably come up with something that was just brilliant”.
This careful and analytical approach to his craft is what leads to such considered and ferocious performances, with the actor stepping into a new world for each role and becoming immersed in the reality of his character. Even when starting out in the industry at such a young age, he already showed a deep understanding and appreciation for the medium, being a cinephile and intense film-watcher as a teenager, which he used to inform his work.
There have been rumours that the pair will work together one more time, with details about a fabled biopic on Ulysses S Grant in which DiCaprio will star. However, these discussions have been circulating for many years, and Spielberg is now in pre-production for a film that will be released during the summer of 2026. The film is called The Dish, with plot details being kept under lock and key but described as a UFO story.
