Carlos Melendez prepares to feed his pet squirrel “Colita” in downtown San Salvador January 29, 2015. (Photo by Jose Cabezas/Reuters)

A police officer wearing a protective mask walks past the portrait of late communist leader Mao Zedong (not pictured) at Tiananmen Gate in Beijing on January 23, 2020. Large-scale Lunar New Year events in Beijing have been cancelled as part of national efforts to control the spread of a new SARS-like virus, city authorities announced on January 23. (Photo by Nicolas Asfouri/AFP Photo)

Men at work at the Cardiff Institute, making huge baskets, unique in size and construction, for loading oil cake in South Africa. (Photo by Maeers/Getty Images). 1938

Photographer Howard Schatz had an idea: place actors in a series of roles and dramatic situations to reveal the essence of their characters. Such was the premise behind his book, In Character: Actors Acting, which captures some of Hollywood’s most emotive stars in the act of, well, making faces. Luckily for us, he continued the tradition for Vanity Fair. Here are some of the best.

A view of the platform of the Leviathan natural gas field in the Mediterranean Sea is pictured from the Israeli northern coastal beach of Nasholim, on August 29, 2022. (Photo by Jack Guez/AFP Photo)

Harvesting water lilies in Dhaka, Bangladesh in the last decade of August 2023. (Photo by Mostafijur Rahman Nasim/Solent News & Photo Agency)

Flocks of seagulls swarm small fishing boats in the first decade of January 2024 like a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds. Colonies of Heuglin’s gulls can be seen almost every morning on the Yamuna River in Delhi, India. (Photo by Raghav Rai Ralhan/Solent News)

An aerial drone photo shows a view of the Wujiangzhai scenic spot in Zunyi, southwest China's Guizhou Province, March 14, 2024. The Wujiangzhai scenic spot, with its natural landscape and local folk customs, offers a blend of sightseeing, leisure activities and exhibitions, making it a popular destination for tourists. (Photo by Xinhua News Agency/Rex Features/Shutterstock)