Winning an Academy Award does not increase the lifespan for the winning actors and actresses. That is the result of a study this author did of all the Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress Academy Award Winners.
In fact, actors and actresses who have won the Academy Award tended to end up living shorter lifespans than average men and women do in the United States. That is certainly not true for all of the Oscar winners but it is true for all of the Academy Award winners on average.
One would think the opposite is true as winning an Academy Award brings great rewards to a man or woman including above average wealth and studies have shown that wealthier people tend to live longer than poorer people. But none of that has helped Academy Award winners to live longer lives than regular men and women in the United States.
Winning Academy Award Does Not Increase Lifespan of Winner
- Average lifespan of a man in the United States is 76.9 years
- Average lifespan of Academy Award winning actors is 74.87 years
Men who have won the Best Actor or Best Supporting Actor Academy Award and passed away lived, on average, over two years less than the average man does in the United States. Overall, there are 86 men who won the Best Actor or Best Supporting Actor award and passed away. Those 86 men lived, on average, to the age of 74.87. The average male in the United States lives to 76.9 years or over two years longer than the Academy Award winners.
- Average lifespan of a woman in the United States is 81.6 years
- Average lifespan of Academy Award winning Actresses is 78.48 years
Women who won the Best Actress or Best Supporting Actress and passed away lived, on average, over three years less than the average woman does in the United States. Overall, there are 62 women who won the Best Actress or Best Supporting Actress award and passed away. Those 62 women lived, on average, to the age of 78.48. The average female in the United States lives to 81.6 years or over three years longer than the Academy Award winners.
A few notes. Life expectancy for both men and women in the United States have risen over the years and many of the Academy Award winners in the study died when lifespans were somewhat shorter. But survivor-ship bias is in full effect here as all the men and women Academy Award winners lived well into adulthood while some male and female babies, infants and children do not reach adulthood but are included in the average age lifespans for men and women.
For all the men and women in the study I rounded off their ages. If a winner was 80 years and 180 days old I counted his or her age as 80. If a winner was 80 years and 185 days old I counted his or her age as 81.
No matter how many times a man or woman won an Academy Award they were only counted once in the study. Katherine Hepburn won four Best Actress Academy Awards but she was only counted once in the study. Jack Lemmon won an Oscar for both Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor but he was only counted once.
The oldest male Oscar winner is George Burns who lived to 100, while the oldest woman Oscar winner is Luise Rainer who lived to 105. The youngest male Oscar winner in the study is Heath Ledger who died at age 29, while the youngest female Oscar winner is Judy Holliday who died at age 44.
The results of the study are pretty clear. Both male and female Oscar winners have, on average, lived shorter lifespans than average men and women in the United States.
Interestingly, men who won the Best Director Academy Award have, on average, lived longer lifespans than the average male in the United States. (Only one woman has won the award and she is still alive)
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