Actors in 2 or more best picture oscar winners:

This is a list of actors who have appeared in 2 or more best picture oscar winners.
Things we can learn from this list:
-If you judge actors and actresses by this criteria, it boosts the status of Clark Gable and Dustin Hoffman, the only 2 actors to earn play a leading role in leading three seperate pictures to best picture oscars. Hoffman and Gable each got a best actor nomination in each of those 3 pictures that they led to an oscar which are Rain Man, Kramer vs Kramer and Midnight Cowboy for Hoffman and Mutiny on the Bounty, Gone with the Wind, and It Happened one Night for Gable.
-Gable had less competition, in the sense that in the 1930s, I don't believe many of the stars that we associate with the Golden Age really were up and rolling with their careers. Jimmy Stewart had little outside Frank Capra's pictures, John Wayne wasn't a hit until Stagecoach, and Humphrey Bogart had more hits in the 40's, I believe. I think the same goes for Henry Fonda. Gary Cooper and Clark Gable were the two biggest leading men in the '30s and Gable brought enormous revenue to whatever projects he chose. I think that Gone with the Wind might have done so well, because of Clark Gable
-Morgan Freeman, Dianne Keaton and Meryl Streep get kudos for lead or supporting roles during each of those three pictures
-This list indicates that in the oscars there really aren't any dynasties, as in a certain kind of picture wins year after year. Even if actors might not be as steadfast to a certian type of genre as directors are, you'd think that if for example, gangster films were the ones that won all the time, that Robert De Niro or Al Pacino would win over and over. If you looked at directors, like Frank Capra, who's been honored a LOT of times by the academy with 5 best picture noms and 3 directing oscars (2 best picture winners), or John Ford, who's won 4 oscars (but only one of those was for a best picture winner), you'd find that even their type of genre doesn't win every time it's up. So no one really is ever on a roll, from an actor's perspective in leading a picture to win every time.
-Finally, we can also conclude, that this list doesn't neccessarily mean much. It could be dumb luck that you found yourself in 2 or 3 best picture nominees, especially since Around the World in 80 Days cast a lot of people like Shirley MacLaine and Peter Lorre as extras

How I did this:
It's not that long of a list, nor are there any that I could find who had appeared in over 3 films. It actually was somewhat simple to look this up. I went to the imdb.com's section on best oscar winners and clicked on every one. When that happens the links sort of change color to indicate that it's a link to a film that you've already seen, and then i started clicking on names under the best picture winners and scrolling down to see how many colored links they had. I didn't click on every extra and side player so there might have been someone who have been in 4 films, for all I know

John Gielgud 3 (Around the World in 80 Days, Ben Hur, Chariots of Fire)
Hugh Griffith 3 (Tom Jones, Ben Hur, Oliver)
Ward Bond 3 (Gone with the Wind, It Happened One Night, You Can't Take it With You)
(all as an extra....this guy has actually appeared in 11 oscar nominated films, more than anyone including Jack Nicholson, Dustin Hoffman, Gary Cooper, and Henry Fonda)
Donald Crisp 2 (Life of Emile Zola, How Green was my Valley)
Clark Gable 3 (Gone with the Wind, It Happened One Night, Mutiny on the Bounty)
Dustin Hoffman-3 (Rain Man, Kramer vs Kramer, Midnight Cowboy)
Meryl Streep-3 (Deer Hunter, Out of Africa, Kramer vs Kramer)
Dianne Keaton-3 (Godfather, Godfather II, Annie Hall)
Morgan Freeman-3 (Unforgiven, Driving Miss Daisy, and Million Dollar Baby)
Shirley MacLaine-3 (Around the World in 80 Days, The Apartment, Terms of Endearment)
Gene Hackman-2 (Unforgiven, French Connection)
Richard Harris-2 (Unforgiven and Gladiator)
George Saunders-2 (All About Eve and Rebecca)
Jack Hawkins-2 (Ben Hur and Bridge ont he River Kwai)
Claude Rains 2 (Lawrnece of Arabia and Casablanvx)
Anthony Quayle 2(Hamlet and Lawrence of Arabia)
Al Pacino 2 (Godfather and Godfather II)
Marlon Brando-2 (On the Waterfront, Godfather)
Peter Lorre-2 (Casablanca, Around the World in 80 Days)
Clint Eastwood-2 (Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby)
Karl Malden 2 (Patton and On the Waterfront)
Rob Duvall 2 (Godfather, Godfather II)
Russell Crowe-2 (Beautiful Mind and Gladiator)
Jack Nicholson 2 (One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest and Terms of Endearment)
Lawrence Olivier 2 (Hamlet, Rebecca)
Christopher Walken 2 (Deer Hunter and Annie Hall)
Peter O’Toole 2 (Last Emperor and Lawrence of Arabia)
Gladys Cooper 2 (My Fair Lady and Rebecca)
Rod Steiger 2 (On the Waterfront and In the Heat of the Night)
Cathy O’Donnell 2 (Best Years of Our Lives and Ben Hur)
Leslie Caron 2 (Gigi and American in Paris)
Ernest Borgnine 2 (From Here to Eternity and Marty)
Ian Holm 2 (LOTR: Return of the King and Chariots of Fire)
Nigel Davenport 2 (Chariots of Fire, Man for All Seasons)
Evelyn Keys 2 (Around the World in 80 Days, Gone with the Wind)
Melville Cooper 2 (Around the World in 80 Days, Rebecca)