V.F. creative director (fashion and style) Jessica Diehl styles Jessica Chastain.

JESSICA CHASTAIN

actor, producer. 30 films, including Molly's Game (2017).

With her cherry hair and Creamsicle complexion, Jessica Chastain possesses a classical beauty suitable for Victorian high collars (Crimson Peak), to-the-manor-born hauteur (Miss Julie), heroic archery (The Huntsman: Winter's War), and parts requiring her to keep her dimpled chin cocked. Chastain has also dived into the netherworlds of counter-intelligence (Zero Dark Thirty) and high-roller underground gambling (Molly's Game, as real-life "poker princess" Molly Bloom) without losing translucence. On the horizon is perhaps Chastain's greatest challenge: playing the sainted country-music singer Tammy Wynette in George and Tammy.

ROBERT DE NIRO

actor, producer, director. 110 films, including The Irishman (2019); two Academy Awards.

It is impossible to determine which is more intimidating: Robert De Niro's scowl, which in his gangster roles signals a beatdown about to ensue (see GoodFellas), or his jack-o'-lantern smile, which indicates he's going to relish the beatdown about to ensue (see his Al Capone in The Untouchables). Violence isn't the only language his characters speak, but it is the one in which they are most articulate, especially in the collaborations with Martin Scorsese, which began with Mean Streets and continue today with The Irishman (Netflix), co-starring, among others, Al Pacino (as Jimmy Hoffa!), Joe Pesci, Harvey Keitel, and Bobby Cannavale—ya gotta problem with that?

HARRISON FORD

actor, producer. 54 films, including Blade Runner 2049 (2017).

Amazing how far Harrison Ford's cocky, goofball grin has traveled since he hot-rodded down the main drag in American Graffiti, a grin that would forge a conspiratorial pact with audiences worldwide. Ford's space jockey, Han Solo, in the Star Wars saga, and whip-cracking Indiana Jones were— and are—joyous throwbacks to the movie serials of lore, their boyish zeal unextinguished by age, gray, and grizzle. Ford also took on mortal danger with a straight mug as Jack Ryan (Patriot Games, Clear and Present Danger), the replicant terminator in Blade Runner, and Dr. Richard Kimble in The Fugitive.

MICHAEL B. JORDAN

actor. 12 films, including Black Panther (2018).

After appearing in a multitude of television series (most impactfully in The Wire), Michael B. Jordan had his big-screen moment of arrival in Ryan Coogler's Fruitvale Station, a haunter of a film based on a real-life tragedy that illustrated why Black Lives Matter. Since then, Jordan has muscled up into the heavyweight division, literally in Creed and figuratively as Erik Killmonger, not a name to trifle with, in Coogler's insanely anticipated rollout of the Marvel superhero Black Panther.

ZENDAYA 

actor, singer. 2 films, including The Greatest Showman (2017).

Another Disney sensation who has gone mainstream massive, Zendaya—star of the Disney Channel's K. C. Undercover— has zapped the sweet spot in pop culture where entertainment, fashion, and social media meet and cross-pollinate. She glammed down to play a dorky misfit in SpiderMan: Homecoming, then twirled up to loop the air as trapeze artist in The Greatest Showman, as if to say, "Why should Spidey get to do all the swinging?"

MICHAEL SHANNON

actor, musician. 70 films, including The Shape of Water (2017).

Everything Michael Shannon is, he intensifies. As the lawman in Nocturnal Animals, Shannon was an avenging angel in a white Stetson hat; in the keenly anticipated mini-series Waco, docudrama depicting the siege of the Branch Davidian compound, Shannon's resolute F.B.I. negotiator faces off against a crackpot messiah (Taylor Kitsch's David Koresh); and in 12 Strong, he and Chris Hemsworth take on the Taliban. Small or big, there's no theater of conflict he can't command.

OPRAH WINFREY

actor, producer, philanthropist. 15 films, including A Wrinkle in Time (2018); one Academy Award.

Oprah enrings the earth. Television host, author, producer, magazine publisher, powerhouse actress (The Color Purple, Beloved, Lee Daniels' The Butler, Selma, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks), influencer without equal, and the first black woman to win the Golden Globes' Cecil B. deMille Award, Winfrey is more than the sum of her accomplishments—she's a gravitational field that doesn't press down but lifts up. Everything she does is dedicated to betterment without being didactic or, worse, corny. Will Oprah's next act be a presidential bid?

TOM HANKS

actor, producer. 69 films, including The Post (2017); two Academy Awards.

The unfussy integrity, mission resolve, and cool-in-a-crisis humor of Hanks's Everyman heroes are among Hollywood's last lingering reminders that we were once a proud democracy, and may still be again. His characters are animated by duty and the common good, not personal glory or Ahab obsession. Whether piloting Apollo 13 back to Mother Earth, Saving Private Ryan, or guiding a planeful of passengers safely onto the drink in Sully, Hanks keeps everything human-scaled and emotionally relatable. In The Post, a sure Oscar contender, he is once again thwarting the forces of suppression and deceit, portraying The Washington Post's leonine executive editor Benjamin Bradlee, the role Jason Robards rasped into Oscar glory in All the President's Men. Let the presses thunder!

Gal gets a touch-up.

GAL GADOT

actor, model. 13 films, including Wonder Woman (2017).

Physically, the Israeli actress, model, and former Israel Defense Forces combat trainer Gal Gadot brought all the right attributes—imposing height and beauty, athleticism, goddessy glamour—to the task of playing Princess Diana, daughter of Hippolyta, better known around the neighborhood as Wonder Woman. But it was a secret power Gadot unsheathed that won the day: charm. In a blockbuster season with so little fun to be had, Gadot's exuberant high spirits (and Patty Jenkins's direction) redeemed the DC franchise from its male-menopausal funk. The rest of the Justice League should turn in their trunks.

Tom entertains Oprah and Reese.

REESE WITHERSPOON

actor, producer. 39 films, including A Wrinkle in Time (2018); one Academy Award.

Fresh from the starting gate, Reese Witherspoon radiated poignant yearning in The Man in the Moon. Only 15 at the time, Witherspoon was a natural on-screen, but a lot of naturals turn unnatural with time; not our Reese. Her special gift is for clear carbonated comedy, most memorably as Legally Blonde's Elle Woods, whose bunny fluff conceals a snap-crackle-and-pop brain. Rom-coms aplenty followed, girded by dramatic triumphs: country madonna June Carter in Walk the Line and scary momster Madeline Martha Mackenzie in HBO's smash mini-series Big Little Lies.

Nicole Kidman on set.

NICOLE KIDMAN

actor, producer. 66 films, including Boy Erased (2018); one Academy Award.

No matter how many gutsy dives Nicole Kidman takes from the high board in her choices of adventurous roles, directors, and projects (in this decade alone, The Paperboy, The Beguiled, The Killing of a Sacred Deer), the entertainment press insists on propping her on an ivory pedestal and harping on her frosty reserve. More fools they. As an actor, Kidman has never hesitated to get down in the funk. She brought the body heat to Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut, her maternal agon in Birth remains an undiscovered wonder, and she was outright freaky-deaky in The Paperboy. Conquering TV with an Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning splash in HBO's Big Little Lies, Kidman could rest on her laurels but won't. This Kid don't quit.

Graydon Carter and Robert De Niro talk between takes.

GRAYDON CARTER

journalist, producer. 11 films, including Agnelli (2018); 25 years at Vanity Fair.

CLAIRE FOY

actor. 7 films, including Unsane (2018); 16 television shows, including The Crown, Season Two (2017).

Quintessential Englishness is the viola Claire Foy plays, usually in period costume. Foy was outfitted with the poshy title of Lady Persephone Towyn in the remake of Upstairs, Downstairs (BBC), lost her head as Anne Boleyn on Wolf Hall (BBC), and was reconstituted for greatness as Queen Elizabeth II on The Crown (Netflix), contending with a moody husband, a lumbering Winston Churchill, a sprawling empire, and the deadweight of protocols and precedents—all while maintaining cameo-brooch composure. In royalty, as in theater, the show must go on.