Kate Winslet

When it comes to the Oscars, five-time nominee Winslet is always the bridesmaid but (as of yet) never the bride. But this sexy British thespian — who's happily married to Academy Award-winning director Sam Mendes — was the first actress to snag four Oscar nods before turning 30, due to her consistently superlative work. Born to an acting family (her parents, grandparents and sisters are all performers), Winslet began training at an early age. At age 19 she made a stunning film debut as a frail, romance-obsessed teen driven to murder in Heavenly Creatures. Set in the '50s, the fantastical film was the first of a series of period pieces for the actress. Her turn as another lovesick maid in the film adaptation of Jane Austen's 18th-century novel Sense and Sensibility earned Winslet her first Academy Award and Golden Globe nods and a SAG Award. But it was her sexy, Oscar and Globe-nominated performance as a healthy, headstrong society lady in Titanic that would turn her into a megastar. As the female lead in one of the highest-grossing films of all time, the modest Winslet was suddenly slapped on magazine covers and found herself idolized and analyzed. Her weight became a constant point of controversy, as she was curvier than most of her cinematic contemporaries. But Winslet publicly refused to starve herself and even criticized GQ magazine for retouching cover photos to make her look thinner. Due to her independent nature, Winslet eschewed typical Hollywood fare in favor of quirkier flicks (Hideous Kinky, Holy Smoke!) and prestige projects, such as Iris, which again earned her Oscar and Golden Globe nods. At this point, Winslet was divorced from her first husband, assistant director James Threapleton, involved with Mendes and mother to two children. Understandably, she slowed her pace a bit, yet she made a marked impression in every movie she found time to make, whether it was her endearing turn as an impulsive soul trapped in a dysfunctional relationship with her repressed boyfriend in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (more Oscar and Golden Globe nods) or a friendly widow who befriends the author of Peter Pan in Finding Neverland. In 2006, she lent her talents to a quartet of projects: Although the remake of All the King's Men was critically lambasted, and the animated trifle Flushed Away disappeared, the so-so comedy The Holiday proved she could evoke laughs, and her performance as an unhappy housewife involved in a torrid affair in Little Children netted her myriad award nominations, including the usual Oscar, Golden Globe and SAG nods.