Which earlier actor was cited as the first Oscar winner for a dual role?

Lee Marvin was the earlier actor cited as the first Oscar winner for a dual role. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for portraying both Kid Shelleen and Tim Strawn in the 1965 western comedy Cat Ballou.

Marvin’s Oscar was presented at the 38th Academy Awards in 1966. Cat Ballou, directed by Elliot Silverstein, paired Jane Fonda’s title character with Marvin’s two sharply contrasting roles: Shelleen is a drunken, comic gunslinger, while Strawn is his menacing villainous counterpart. Marvin’s performance made the two-character feat especially memorable because he played both sides of the film’s central conflict.

Michael B. Jordan’s 2026 win for playing twins in Sinners was widely described as the second comparable Oscar victory. The distinction is about one actor receiving a single acting Oscar for multiple roles in the same film, not about winning two Oscars or portraying two versions of the same character. Marvin is sometimes confused with actors such as Nicolas Cage or Peter Sellers, who performed multiple roles but did not win an Oscar for that specific achievement.