A fishmonger carries a shark on his motorcycle in Padang, West Sumatra, Indonesia August 25, 2016. (Photo by Iggoy el Fitra/Reuters/Antara Foto)

A woman worker prepares her stall at Tanah Abang textile market in Jakarta, Indonesia January 11, 2017. (Photo by Fatima El-Kareem/Reuters)

A businesswoman Maha Shalaby paints ostrich eggs in Cairo, Egypt November 27, 2016. (Photo by Mohamed Abd El Ghany/Reuters)

A woman sorts tobacco leaves at the Cohiba cigar factory “El Laguito” in Havana September 10, 2012. (Photo by Desmond Boylan/Reuters)

Dancers take part in the World Salsa Festival at El Pueblo Coliseum in Cali, Colombia, 26 September 2025. (Photo by Ernesto Guzman Jr./EPA)

Revellers dressed in mock military garb take part in the “Els Enfarinats” battle in the southeastern Spanish town of Ibi on December 28, 2017. During this 200-year-old traditional festival participants known as Els Enfarinats (those covered in flour) dress in military clothes and stage a mock coup d'etat as they battle using flour, eggs and firecrackers outside the town hall as part of the celebrations of the Day of the Innocents. (Photo by Jaime Reina/AFP Photo)

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.