Los Angeles city firefighters battle a massive fire at a seven-story downtown apartment complex under construction in Los Angeles, California December 8, 2014. Over 250 firefighters battle the early morning blaze which shutdown two major freeways the Los Angeles Fire Department and California Highway Patrol said. (Photo by Gene Blevins/Reuters)

“Dubai is sometimes called the “City of Gold” because of its stunning growth from a sleepy Gulf port to a world-famous business crossroads in the space of a single generation. Its nickname has a literal meaning for traders in the precious metal. The city is building itself up as a center for the gold trade, between sources in Africa and consumers in the rising economies of China and India”. – Kamran Jebreili via Associated Press

Photo: A gold press operator collects 10 gram gold blanks to press them with the logo of the Emirates Gold company in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Gold prices remained relatively steady in 2012, close to $1,700 an ounce. (Photo by Kamran Jebreili/AP Photo)

Lindsay Knutson plays in the heavy snow with her family dog, Aspen, and daughter Flora Bejblik, 4, cq, as her husband Bob Bejblik, rear left, shovels, Tuesday, March 5, 2013 in southwest Minneapolis. The National Weather Service predicted a two-day snow total of 8 to 12 inches for much of southeastern and east-central Minnesota, including the Twin Cities. (Photo by Elizabeth Flores/AP Photo/The Star Tribune)

Pope Francis greets the crowd from his popemobile in downtown Rio de Janeiro. Pope Francis touched down in Rio de Janeiro on Monday, starting his first foreign trip as pontiff and a weeklong series of events expected to attract more than a million people to a gathering of young faithful in Brazil, home to the world's largest Roman Catholic population. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters)

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.

Members of the Times Square Alliance snow clearing team take a photo on a snowbank at Times Square in the Manhattan borough of New York January 23, 2016. A winter storm dumped nearly 2 feet (58 cm) of snow on the suburbs of Washington, D.C., on Saturday before moving on to Philadelphia and New York, paralyzing road, rail and airline travel along the U.S. East Coast. (Photo by Shannon Stapleton/Reuters)

Pokot men carry a part of a carcass of a bull killed by a young man during an initiation ceremony in Baringo County, Kenya, January 20, 2016. Far from the bustling city of Nairobi, in an isolated corner of Kenya's Rift Valley, young men from the Pokot community spear a bull in a ceremony called Sapana that takes them into adulthood. (Photo by Siegfried Modola/Reuters)

People look at huge waves crashing on the San Esteban de Pravia seafront, northern Spanish region of Asturias February 8, 2016. (Photo by Eloy Alonso/Reuters)