MOVIES

Willem Dafoe is getting a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Willem Dafoe may or may not win a Golden Globe Award this weekend, but he definitely has an honor coming his way.

The Hollywood Walk of Fame announced Tuesday that Dafoe — an Appleton native who studied theater at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and cut his acting teeth with Milwaukee's Theatre X — will receive his own star on the Walk of Fame Jan. 8.

"The Last of Us" star Pedro Pascal and Patricia Arquette, who co-starred with and directed Dafoe in the 2023 movie "Gonzo Girl," will be on hand for the ceremony, according to the Walk of Fame.

The star ceremony caps another busy year for Dafoe.

Dafoe is nominated for a Golden Globe for best supporting actor for "Poor Things," one of 2023's buzziest awards-season contenders; his competition includes another Wisconsin native, Kenosha's Mark Ruffalo, who's also nominated for that movie. (The Golden Globes air on CBS at 7 p.m. Central time Jan. 7, the night before the Walk of Fame ceremony.)

Dafoe's nomination is his fourth Golden Globe nomination overall; he's also been nominated for four Academy Awards over his long career.

Wisconsin natives Mark Ruffalo, left, and Willem Dafoe act up on the red carpet before a screening of their movie "Poor Things" in London in December. Both actors are nominated for best supporting actor in a movie at the 2024 Golden Globe Awards.

"Poor Things" followed a slew of other screen appearances for Dafoe during 2023, from voicing a key character in the animated fantasy "The Boy and the Heron"; to a watch-closely-or-you'll-miss-it cameo in Wes Anderson's "Asteroid City"; to playing a master thief trapped in a high-tech apartment in "Inside," a psychological thriller in which he's effectively by himself (and on camera) for the entire movie.

Among the more than half-dozen projects Dafoe has in the works are "Beetlejuice 2," in which he plays a former action-movie star turned cop in the afterlife; and "Nosferatu," the remake being told by modern horror master Robert Eggers ("The Lighthouse"). (Fun fact: Dafoe, who plays a vampire hunter in Eggers' movie, earned an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Max Schreck, the German actor who played Dracula and who may or may not have been a vampire himself, in "Shadow of the Vampire," the 2000 drama about the making of the original "Nosferatu.")