Danny DeVito Movies

Want to know the best Danny DeVito movies?  How about the worst Danny DeVito movies?  Curious about Danny DeVito box office grosses or which Danny DeVito movie picked up the most Oscar® nominations? Need to know which Danny DeVito movie got the best reviews from critics and audiences? Well you have come to the right place.

Danny DeVito (1944-) is an Oscar®-nominated American producer and director.  He gained prominence for his portrayal of the taxi dispatcher Louie De Palma in the television series Taxi (1978–1983), which won him a Golden Globe® and an Emmy®.   After leaving Taxi he became a very popular movie star.  His IMDb page shows 130 acting and 23 directing credits since 1970.

In the table below, Ultimate Movie Rankings ranks 65 of his movies in 6 different sortable columns.  Television roles, cameos, shorts and straight to DVD movies were not included in the rankings on the table, but have a spot near the bottom of the page.   This page comes from a request by bob cox.

Danny DeVito and Arnold in 1988’s Twins

Danny DeVito Movies Ranked In Chronological Order With Ultimate Movie Rankings Score (1 to 5 UMR Tickets) *Best combo of box office, reviews and awards.

Danny DeVito Movies Can Be Ranked 6 Ways In This Table

The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the movies anyway you want.

  • Sort Danny DeVito movies by movie title and movie trailers.
  • Sort Danny DeVito movies by co-stars of his movies.
  • Sort Danny DeVito movies by adjusted domestic box office grosses using current movie ticket cost  (in millions)
  • Sort Danny DeVito movies by yearly domestic box office rank
  • Sort Danny DeVito movies how they were received by critics and audiences.  60% rating or higher should indicate a good movie.
  • Sort by how many Oscar® nominations each Danny DeVito movie received and how many Oscar® wins each Danny DeVito movie won.
  • Sort Danny DeVito movies by Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score.  UMR Score puts box office, reviews and awards into a mathematical equation and gives each movie a score.

Stats and Possibly Interesting Things From The Above Danny DeVito Table

1.  16 Danny DeVito movies crossed the magical $100 million mark.  That is a percentage of 24.14% of his movies listed.  His top box office hit is  One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975).

2.  An average Danny DeVito movie grosses $73.80 million in adjusted box office gross.

3.  Using RottenTomatoes.com’s 60% fresh meter.  25 Danny DeVito movies are rated as good movies…or 39.43% of his movies.  His highest rated movie is L.A. Confidential (1997).  His lowest rated movie is Look Who’s Talking Now  (1993) .

4.  8 Danny DeVito movies received at least one Oscar® nomination in any category…..or 12.50% of his movies.

5.  3 Danny DeVito movies won at least one Oscar® in any category…..or 4.68% of his movies.

6.  A “good movie” Ultimate Movie Rankings (UMR) Score is 60.00.  22 Danny DeVito movies scored higher that average….or 34.37% of his movies.  One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) got the highest UMR Score…. while Look Who’s Talking Now  (1993) . got the lowest UMR Score.

Danny DeVito in 1995’s Get Shorty

Possibly Interesting Facts About Danny DeVito

1.  Daniel Michael DeVito, Jr. was born in Neptune Township, New Jersey in 1944.

2.  Danny DeVito trained and graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1966.  In his early theater days, he performed with the Colonnades Theater Lab, at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, and, along with his future wife, Rhea Perlman.

3.  Danny DeVito’s first credited role was playing “Thug” in 1970’s Dreams of Glass.

4. Danny  DeVito played Martini in the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, reprising his role from the 1971 off-Broadway play of the same title.

5.  Danny DeVito has frequently starred in movies with Jack Nicholson:   Goin’ South (1978), One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975), Terms of Endearment (1983), Hoffa (1992), and Mars Attacks! (1996). They have also both played Batman villains: The Joker in Batman (1989) and The Penguin in Batman Returns (1992).

6. Danny DeVito’s first connection with Michael Douglas happened when he starred in a New York stage production of “Down the Morning Line” in 1969, directed by Douglas and written by Martin Sheen.   During these early acting years, DeVito lived with Douglas.  Douglas and DeVito would make 5 movies together:  1975’s One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, 1984’s Romancing The Stone, 1985’s The Jewel of the Nile, 1989’s War of the Roses and 2009’s Solitary Man.

7. Danny DeVito has been married to actress Rhea Perlman since 1982…..they have three children together.

8.  Danny DeVito has 41 producing credits.  The highlights would be 1994’s Pulp Fiction, 1995’s Get Shorty and 2000’s Erin Brockovich.

9.  Get Shorty Trivia.  According to Elmore Leonard, Danny DeVito’s character Martin Weir, is based on Leonard’s own dealings with Dustin Hoffman.

10. Check out Danny DeVito’s career compared to current and classic actors.  Most 100 Million Dollar Movies of All-Time.

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16 thoughts on “Danny DeVito Movies”

  1. I have always found Danny an endearing and entertaining actor to watch but in my opinion he deserves this new page if only for the fact that he carved out a great career [as well illustrated above] despite physical limitations that probably would have prevented most other performers from achieving success in the movies. Legend has it that the ultimate King of Hollywood in the 1930s/1940s was first turned down by the studios because “his ears are too big”. I wonder what the studio executive who came to that conclusion would have said had Danny appeared before him for audition!

    Although the film has lowly critical ratings ranging from 47% in the table above to 61% on IMDB my own favourite DeVito performance was his virtual one-man tour de force as Larry the Liquidator in 1991’s Other People’s Money. That was no mean achievement when the cast included many other fine performers including especially the great Gregory Peck. Indeed when Greg’s in a movie in even the most routine of roles it is unusual for one of his fellow actors to impress me in the way that Danny did in that flick, the most notable other examples that I can immediately recall are Widmark in 1948’s Yellow Sky and Chuck Heston in 1958’s The Big Country.

    Reports suggest that Jimmy Stewart turned down the Peter Finch role in the 1976 Network because Stewart didn’t like the bad language in the script [and Golden Holden later sheepishly virtually apologised for appearing in that movie]. I think I may have mentioned before that what struck me personally about Other People’s Money was how it demonstrated the split between Old and New Hollywood regarding the use of swear words on the screen. Whilst Danny, Penelope Ann Miller and more modern players swore like troopers, as the saying goes, throughout the film Greg and Piper Laurie representing Old Hollywood stayed away from the four-letter words and the nearest they got to strong language if my memory is correct was Greg’s mild suggestion to Piper about the annoying and unsavoury asset-stripper Larry the Liquidator “Let’s kick the little SOB’s a** all the way back to where he came from!”

    The strong links between Danny and Jack Nicholson had not previously registered with me. Possibly Interesting Facts coverage also mentions DeVito’s close relationship with Michael Douglas and in an TV interview that the latter gave which I saw he was heartwarming in his praise of and respect for Danny. Indeed although my own preoccupation has largely been with Other People’s Money’s part in DeVito’s careers it is possibly for the Douglas/Turner films that other cinema goers will most cherish Danny. Certainly I’m sure that Mike would agree with my opinion that Danny richly deserves his page on this site [for those of us who follow this site the equivalent of a performer getting a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, !!]

    Reply

    1. Hey Bob
      1. Enjoyed your thoughts on Mr. Danny Devito.
      2. You are so correct…..his rise to stardom is pretty amazing….and probable even amazes him.
      3. Not thinking the “studio braintrusts” would have even given him an audition if he was just starting out in the “Golden Age of Hollywood”.
      4. Other People’s Money got some pretty rough reviews….but I found that movie interesting…and any movie that has Mr. Peck is worth checking out.
      5. I think Stewart would have been outstanding in Network…but unlike Jack Lemmon in Glengary Glenn Ross….he was able to stay away from the money and the bad language. Not that I am fussing about Lemmon….love him in that role….and it should have gotten an Oscar nomination at the minimum.
      6. Danny has forged some awesome friendships over the years….gotta be rough having Michael and Jack as friends…lol.
      7. Glad you liked this UMR selection….thanks for sharing your movie thoughts….they are always appreciated.

      Reply

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