Greek actress Xanthi Georgiou, playing the role of the High Priestess, lights up the torch during the flame lighting ceremony for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics at the Ancient Olympia archeological site, birthplace of the ancient Olympics in southern Greece on October 18, 2021. The Olympic flame will once again be lit in an empty stadium on Ovtober 18, 2021, as it starts its truncated journey to Beijing for the Winter Games in February. Like the ceremony in March 2020 to light the flame for Tokyo, and like those Games, which were put back a year, Monday's ceremony is a victim of coronavirus restrictions. (Photo by Aris Messinis/AFP Photo)

Ocean Rebellion put on a display of puking oil heads ahead of climate change conference COP26 in Glasgow, Britain, 29 October 2021. (Photo by Robert Perry/EPA/EFE)

Tali Spira of Baltimore, Maryland lets the wind aid in her Flow Art style dance moves (using silk material and fans) at the Tidal Basin in Washington, D.C. on March 25, 2022. She danced amid the backdrop of the cherry blossom trees that were still at their peak. (Photo by Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

Mexican clown Gabriela Munoz, whose clown name is Chula the Clown, looks at herself in the mirror after putting on her make up during an interview in Mexico City, Friday, August 26, 2022. (Photo by Berenice Bautista/AP Photo)

People have their photographs taken as they throw fallen leaves in autumn colours in Tokyo on November 13, 2022. (Photo by Yuichi Yamazaki/AFP Photo)

A gull gives its familiar cry on the roof of a beach bar on the Baltic coast on July 16, 2024. (Photo by Jens Büttner/dpa)

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.

Derek Hough, right, and Julianne Hough, co-winners of the award fo rOutstanding Choreography for “Dancing with the Stars”, pose in the press room at the Creative Arts Emmy Awards at the Microsoft Theater on Saturday, September 12, 2015, in Los Angeles. (Photo by Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP Photo)