Film & Television
Test your knowledge of Best Actress Academy Award Winners with a free trivia word search from thewordfind.com. Read each clue, work out the answer, then find it hidden in the letter grid — every puzzle is freshly generated, so no two plays are ever quite the same. Don't know an answer? Tap the hint button in-game to reveal the first letter, or just scan the grid — every answer is hiding in there somewhere. Between the clues and the full answer key below, this topic doubles as a quick study guide — good for a trivia night, a classroom quiz, or just picking up something new about Best Actress Academy Award Winners along the way.
Play This Puzzle →A few sample clues
This South African-born actress transformed her look to play a real-life serial killer in 'Monster' (2003).
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This British actress won her first Best Actress Oscar for 'Women in Love' (1970).
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This British actress won Best Actress for playing a reigning monarch coping with a national tragedy in 'The Queen' (2006).
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She won Best Actress for playing country singer Loretta Lynn in 'Coal Miner's Daughter' (1980).
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She won her first Best Actress Oscar for playing a self-destructive actress in 'Dangerous' (1935).
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All 81 questions in this topic, with answers — use it to study, or just browse. Every actual play of the puzzle only pulls a random handful of these into one game, so knowing them all here won't spoil which ones show up or where they're hidden in the grid. Play it here.
She won Best Actress for playing a resilient wife on the British home front in 'Mrs. Miniver' (1942).
GARSONShe won her first Best Actress Oscar as an aspiring actress in the musical 'La La Land' (2016).
STONEShe won Best Actress for playing a strong-willed housekeeper in 'Hud' (1963).
NEALShe won Best Actress for playing a woman who takes in a homeless teen who becomes a football star in 'The Blind Side' (2009).
BULLOCKThis British actress won Best Actress for playing an ambitious, amoral model in 'Darling' (1965).
CHRISTIEBest known for dancing with Fred Astaire, she won Best Actress for the dramatic role 'Kitty Foyle' (1940).
ROGERSShe won Best Actress on her fifth nomination, playing a death-row inmate in 'I Want to Live!' (1958).
HAYWARDShe won Best Actress for playing a wronged wife in 'The Divorcee' (1930).
SHEARERShe won Best Actress for playing a troubled Montana rancher's wife in 'Blue Sky' (1994).
LANGEThis Canadian-American comedienne won Best Actress in her sixties for 'Min and Bill' (1930).
DRESSLERShe won Best Actress for playing an obsessive ballerina unraveling under pressure in 'Black Swan' (2010).
PORTMANShe won Best Actress for playing an aging Judy Garland on a London concert tour in 'Judy' (2019).
ZELLWEGERThis British actress won Best Actress for playing a lawyer investigating her husband's affair in 'Howards End' (1992).
THOMPSONThis Italian actress won Best Actress for 'The Rose Tattoo' (1955), the first win for a non-English performance.
MAGNANIThis Australian actress won Best Actress playing a disgraced New York socialite in 'Blue Jasmine' (2013).
BLANCHETTShe won Best Actress hitchhiking across America in the screwball comedy 'It Happened One Night' (1934).
COLBERTShe won Best Actress in her film debut as a magical nanny in 'Mary Poppins' (1964).
ANDREWSShe won Best Actress for playing a ruthless television executive in 'Network' (1976).
DUNAWAYThis Italian star became the first to win Best Actress for a foreign-language performance, in 'Two Women' (1961).
LORENShe won Best Actress for playing a ditzy-seeming but sharp former showgirl in 'Born Yesterday' (1950).
HOLLIDAYShe won Best Actress playing Scarlett O'Hara in 'Gone with the Wind' (1939).
LEIGHThis one-named singer-actress won Best Actress for playing a widowed bookkeeper who falls for her fiance's brother in 'Moonstruck' (1987).
CHERShe won her first Best Actress Oscar for a Polish immigrant haunted by a wartime decision in 'Sophie's Choice' (1982).
STREEPShe won Best Actress playing an exotic dancer who impulsively marries a Russian oligarch's son in 'Anora' (2024).
MADISONShe won Best Actress for playing a mute Scottish pianist in 19th-century New Zealand in 'The Piano' (1993).
HUNTERShe won Best Actress for playing a Berlin cabaret singer in 'Cabaret' (1972).
MINNELLI'Roman Holiday' (1953) brought this actress, whose first name is _ _ _ _ _ _, her only competitive Best Actress Oscar.
AUDREYShe won Best Actress for playing a deaf and mute woman in 'Johnny Belinda' (1948), without speaking a single line.
WYMANShe won Best Actress for playing a French peasant girl who sees visions of the Virgin Mary in 'The Song of Bernadette' (1943).
JONESShe won the first-ever Best Actress Oscar in 1929 for a trio of silent-era roles including 'Seventh Heaven.'
GAYNORShe won her first Best Actress Oscar playing a pregnant Minnesota police chief in 'Fargo' (1996).
MCDORMANDThis Australian actress won Best Actress wearing a prosthetic nose to play Virginia Woolf in 'The Hours' (2002).
KIDMANShe won her first Best Actress Oscar for raising a child alone in 'To Each His Own' (1946).
HAVILLANDShe won Best Actress playing Helen Keller's teacher in 'The Miracle Worker' (1962).
BANCROFTThis Irish actress won Best Actress playing Agnes, Shakespeare's wife, in 'Hamnet' (2025).
BUCKLEYThis actress holds the record for most Best Actress wins, four in total, the first for 'Morning Glory' (1933).
HEPBURNThis French actress won Best Actress for 'Room at the Top' (1959).
SIGNORETShe won Best Actress playing a former Nazi camp guard hiding a secret in 'The Reader' (2008).
WINSLETThis Malaysian actress won Best Actress playing a laundromat owner navigating the multiverse in 'Everything Everywhere All at Once' (2022).
YEOHShe won Best Actress for playing an unconventional Edinburgh schoolteacher in 'The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie' (1969).
SMITHShe won Best Actress in her film debut, reprising a stage role, in 'Come Back, Little Sheba' (1952).
BOOTHShe won Best Actress as a frumpy political wife in 'The Country Girl' (1954), before becoming a real-life princess.
KELLYThis Austrian-born actress won Best Actress in back-to-back years, 1936 and 1937, a first in Oscar history.
RAINERThis British actress won Best Actress playing Queen Anne in 'The Favourite' (2018).
COLMANShe won Best Actress for playing a Swedish immigrant housemaid who runs for Congress in 'The Farmer's Daughter' (1947).
YOUNGShe won Best Actress for playing a fiercely protective mother in 'Terms of Endearment' (1983).
MACLAINEShe won Best Actress playing an obsessive fan who holds an author captive in 'Misery' (1990).
BATESThis Swedish star won Best Actress for being psychologically tormented by her husband in 'Gaslight' (1944).
BERGMANShe won Best Actress for 'The Sin of Madelon Claudet' (1932), playing a mother who sacrifices everything for her son.
HAYESShe won Best Actress for playing a waitress romanced by an obsessive-compulsive writer in 'As Good as It Gets' (1997).
HUNTShe won Best Actress playing televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker in 'The Eyes of Tammy Faye' (2021).
CHASTAINShe won her first Best Actress Oscar playing a union organizer in a Southern textile mill in 'Norma Rae' (1979).
FIELDShe became the first Black woman to win Best Actress, for 'Monster's Ball' (2001).
BERRYShe won her first Best Actress Oscar playing a call girl in the thriller 'Klute' (1971).
FONDAShe won Best Actress for playing a wife who suspects her husband of murder in Hitchcock's 'Suspicion' (1941).
FONTAINEThis French actress won Best Actress for portraying singer Édith Piaf in 'La Vie en Rose' (2007).
COTILLARDShe won Best Actress on her eighth nomination, for playing an elderly widow revisiting her hometown in 'The Trip to Bountiful' (1985).
PAGEShe won Best Actress for the title role of a neurotic New Yorker in 'Annie Hall' (1977).
KEATONShe won her first Best Actress Oscar for 'BUtterfield 8' (1960), a role she reportedly disliked.
TAYLORShe won her first Best Actress Oscar playing a transgender man in the drama 'Boys Don't Cry' (1999).
SWANKShe shared the Best Actress prize in a rare tie, for playing entertainer Fanny Brice in 'Funny Girl' (1968).
STREISANDShe won Best Actress for portraying a woman with three distinct personalities in 'The Three Faces of Eve' (1957).
WOODWARDShe won Best Actress at age 22, playing a young widow in a dance competition, in 'Silver Linings Playbook' (2012).
LAWRENCEShe won Best Actress on her fifth nomination, playing a nun ministering to a death-row inmate in 'Dead Man Walking' (1995).
SARANDONPlaying June Carter Cash in 'Walk the Line' (2005) won this actress, whose first name is _ _ _ _ _, a Best Actress Oscar.
REESEShe won Best Actress playing a widow chasing a singing career in 'Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore' (1974).
BURSTYNShe won Best Actress for playing a self-made restaurant tycoon and devoted mother in 'Mildred Pierce' (1945).
CRAWFORDHollywood's 'America's Sweetheart' won Best Actress for 'Coquette' (1929), her first talking picture.
PICKFORDShe won Best Actress in her film debut, the youngest winner at the time, for the deaf drama 'Children of a Lesser God' (1986).
MATLINAt 80, she became the oldest Best Actress winner for playing an elderly Southern woman in 'Driving Miss Daisy' (1989).
TANDYShe won Best Actress playing a fictionalized muse to a struggling playwright in 'Shakespeare in Love' (1998).
PALTROWShe won Best Actress for playing a chillingly controlling psychiatric ward nurse in 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest' (1975).
FLETCHERShe won Best Actress for playing a linguistics professor diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's in 'Still Alice' (2014).
MOOREShe won her first Best Actress Oscar playing a rape survivor seeking justice in 'The Accused' (1988).
FOSTERShe won Best Actress playing a real-life legal researcher who took on a power company in 'Erin Brockovich' (2000).
ROBERTSShe won Best Actress for playing a mother raising her son in captivity in 'Room' (2015).
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