The Five Best Performances in the History of American Television Drama

Television drama in America isn't what it used to be. Television famously goes through cycles, of course; how many of you remember how in the early 80s the sitcom was declared dead? And then along came a little catalytic dynamo called The Cosby Show and a few years later there were more sitcoms airing each week than ever before. Another fantastic cycle unfortunately ended right about the time some Cheney-headed American network exec at CBS was told about a foreign game show where morons ate bugs and stabbed each other in the back on a semi-deserted island. In all his infinite wisdom he greenlighted an American version and the cycle of movie-quality American television drama that began in the early 80s came to a crushing halt in the late 90s. During that time, however, American television drama produced some truly incredible acting. It wasn't really that tough to choose what I considered the five best male performances in American dramatic episodic television history because they exploded so palpably off the screen. Had I had to expand to a top ten list, however, I probably would have banged my head on the wall figuring out who made the bottom five and who had to be moved down to the second tier.

5. Armin Shimerman. "Quark." Deep Space Nine.