While attending Stanford University on the GI Bill, Palance developed an interest in the dramatic arts. He moved to New York and was cast in a number of bit parts, including his first stage role in the Broadway production The Big Two (1947). Later that year, he understudied Anthony Quinn in the Chicago production of A Streetcar Named Desire.

In 1950, director Elia Kazan cast Palance in his first studio film, Panic in the Streets, in which he appeared opposite Richard Widmark as the vicious street boss Blackie. The immediate success of Panic in the Streets influenced 20th Century Fox to offer Palance a long-term contract. Often cast in sinister, villainous roles, he earned praise for his Oscar-nominated performance opposite Joan Crawford in Sudden Fear (1952). Playing a vicious gunslinger, his next project, Shane, left an indelible impression and earned him a second Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

Palance continued to command lead roles, portraying a slew of menacing characters that ranged from a court magician in The Silver Chalice (1954) to a bank robber in I Died a Thousand Times (1955). In 1956, he won a Best Actor Emmy Award for his role in Rod Serling’s Requiem For a Heavyweight. Two years later, Palance moved to Switzerland, where he starred in over a dozen foreign features, most notably The Man Inside (1958), The Mongols (1960), and Contempt (1963).

Upon his return to America, he achieved success with parts in the films The Professionals (1966), The Desperados, and Che! (both 1969), as well as in the TV versions of classic thrillers like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1968) and Dracula (1974). Despite continued critical acclaim for his performances, fewer and fewer roles came his way. During the late 1970s, his credits included a handful of embarrassing foreign films like Godzilla vs. The Cosmic Monster (1974), The Sensuous Nurse (1976), Welcome to Blood City (1977), and Cocaine Cowboys (1979).

In 1982, Palance’s career received an improbable resurgence when Columbia Studios contracted him as the TV host of Ripley’s Believe It Or Not. Over the next few years, he appeared in a variety of high profile films, including the blockbuster Batman (1989) and the rollicking comedy-adventure City Slickers (1991), for which he won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Palance reprised his award-winning role in the 1994 sequel City Slickers 2: The Legend of Curly’s Gold.