EW's 2016 Entertainers of the Year

Ryan Reynolds

EW's Entertainer of the Year for 2016, Ryan Reynolds, isn't made of stone. It's a rainy afternoon in New York a few days after Thanksgiving, and the actor is ruminating on his holiday... and getting a little reflective. “I hate to sound overly sentimental, but I had a good year,” he says. He and wife Blake Lively welcomed their second daughter in September. “I have great kids under 2, so that’s the kind of stuff you focus on.” Awww. “The rest of the year they’re dead to me.”

Reynolds, 40, brought that signature smart-ass humor to Deadpool, a subversive, profane adaptation of the Marvel comic about mutant mercenary Wade Wilson. It’s a passion project that Reynolds labored to get off the ground for 11 years. “He is Deadpool in a way that I have not ever quite seen an actor be and create a character,” says the film’s producer Simon Kinberg (X-Men: Apocalypse). “The humor, the tone, the pathos came from Ryan in a very organic and almost unconscious way.” The movie opened to a record-breaking $132 million in February and became the highest-grossing X-Men universe film of all time, with $783 million worldwide. (Deadpool 2 is currently in preproduction.) "I knew that this was going to speak to the very core of the Deadpool fan base, and I knew they would embrace it," he told EW of the film. "I think it just really landed at a fortunate time. We were right at 'peak superhero,' particularly in the sense that the superheroes were all [intermittently] clenching their jaw muscles and brooding. Deadpool came along and sort of threw all that on its ass." —Tim Stack

Lin-Manuel Miranda

The Hamilton mastermind, 36, didn't just dominate Broadway — he stretched his influence to the Grammys, Saturday Night Live, and beyond. "This caps the end of an insane year. I’m out!" he tells EW. "I’m out of Hamilton things to give you! There was the mixtape! There’s Drunk History! There was a book! The show itself! I feel like Hamilton was a giant boulder we threw in a pond, and the Mixtape is the last ripple coming back... [My emotional hangover from departing Hamilton] was delayed because I immediately went into the studio with J. Lo to raise money for Orlando victims. Once that was done, I went away and just floated. Any hangover I felt was outweighed by the relief of tucking my [2-year-old] kid into bed, a pleasure I had been denied for about a year. And now that’s my favorite part of my day, every day." —Marc Snetiker

Samantha Bee

For the first time in more than a decade, Bee, 47, wasn’t a correspondent on The Daily Show. Instead, she launched her own critically acclaimed satirical news series, Full Frontal With Samantha Bee, on TBS. And what a year it was to talk politics. "It was good to do the extra show on election week," Bee tells EW. "But I wouldn’t choose to do that all the time. It was extremely challenging because we had planned a show, and then the unexpected happened, so we had to create something brand-new overnight basically, responding in real time to something that no one thought was going to happen. I’m proud of being able to pull a show together in such short order... I’ve had so many pleasant interactions — really edifying, pleasant, wonderful experiences with people. You know, at the RNC this year we had so many Republicans who told us they watch the show and find it funny! I really appreciated that. Republicans can take a joke — that’s a good thing." —Ray Rahman

Ben Affleck

The actor-director, 44, landed an impressive threepeat with the movies Live by Night, The Accountant, and — haters be damned — Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. "I wanted to make a classic-looking and -feeling throwback movie," Affleck tells EW of Live by Night. "It’s a love letter to those ’30s and ’40s gangster movies. [But] it’s the hardest movie I’ve done... The more you direct, the more your brain is occupied with stuff — and that means less bandwidth to concentrate on acting." —Sara Vilkomerson

Emma Stone

Since her debut as Jonah Hill’s sweet high school crush in 2007's Superbad, Emma Stone has applied her breathy Bacall voice, curious cat eyes, innate playfulness, and genuine grit to fully realized young women in Easy A, The Help, Zombieland, Crazy, Stupid, Love, and her Oscar-nominated part in Birdman. But her role as a struggling actress named Mia in Damien Chazelle’s joyous musical romance La La Land is quite simply a career best. And it’s a performance that Stone, 28, admits she couldn’t have delivered even a few years ago. "[Mia] has scars and she’s been through things,” she says. “The maturity of the character was very important to me." Stone’s wondrous mixture of melancholy and hopefulness, not to mention her singing and dancing, has placed her on a short list of Oscar contenders. And though Stone is quick to self-deprecate — “I can tell you all the things I should’ve done differently” — she’s enjoyed watching herself in La La Land. Maybe a little too much. Recently, she’s found herself humming the movie’s song "City of Stars"... in public bathrooms. “After these screenings I’ve been to, the song’s stuck in my head, so there’s me singing it next to people using the facilities. Not too humiliating, huh?" —Joe McGovern

Kevin Hart

It might take less time to cover what Kevin Hart didn’t do this year, but here for your consideration is an abridged list of highlights: Bring in more than half a billion dollars at the box office between Ride Along 2, Central Intelligence, and The Secret Life of Pets? Check. Sign to Motown and release a mixtape to accompany the feature length stand-up Kevin Hart: What Now? under the alias Chocolate Droppa? Yep. Star in high-profile ad campaigns for H&M (with buddy-slash-brother-from-a-blonder-mother David Beckham) and Nike (with a supremely patient Serena Williams)? Done and done. “It’s been incredible,” the 37-year-old acknowledges, calling in from the Atlanta set of Jumanji, due next year. Though the proudest achievements, he says, are more personal: marrying longtime love Eniko Parrish in August, receiving a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and connecting with a whole new pint-size audience via Pets’ irascible animated rabbit, Snowball. “Just seeing kids’ reactions, I love that,” says the father of two. —Leah Greenblatt

J.K. Rowling

If it feels like there's more Harry Potter than ever, you can thank J.K. Rowling, the patron scribe of ceaseless magic who allayed the woes of the real world by letting readers apparate into unseen spheres of her wizarding world. The author and political activist compounded her own canon in 2016 with several surprising entries: the jaw-dropping stage play sequel (and comparably captivating published script) Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, November’s nascent Fantastic Beasts series (the first of a five-film franchise, it’s already cashed in over half a billion dollars worldwide), and enough interstitial additions to Hogwarts lore via Twitter and Pottermore.com to keep fans spellbound for at least two more decades. “Harry is done now,” Rowling told Reuters this year, but it’s tough to believe her. The writer’s creative strides in 2016 yielded something bigger than any plotting of Harry: Her triumph came from an almost unmatched ownership and care of the wonder of her mesmerized constituents. Unlike other Hollywood mega-storytellers, Rowling has struck a balance of stretching her adult legs (she continues penning her gritty Cormoran Strike crime novels) while simultaneously dancing on the same whimsical feet on which she learned to walk. Beasts marks the 51-year-old’s screenwriting debut; Cursed Child, her entrée into theatrical production. For a woman who’s already soared the skies, Rowling has jubilantly found new heights to explore — whether on a broom or not. —Marc Snetiker

Kate McKinnon

She stole the show in Ghostbusters. She broke our hearts as Hillary Clinton. And she’s giving us a much-needed laugh in Office Christmas Party. She’s Kate McKinnon, and since her 2012 debut on SNL she’s been charming us with her absurd yet humanistic portrayals of passionate, headstrong women. Of course, 2016 will remember her best for imagining Clinton as a fiery, ambitious policy wonk who has a hard time keeping her ideals in check. “Playing Hillary has probably been the greatest honor of my life, and I was really looking forward to doing it for the next four years,” McKinnon says with a sigh. “I felt so comfortable in those pantsuits, both physically and spiritually.” The other pantsuit McKinnon donned this year, as Jillian Holtzmann in Paul Feig’s Ghostbusters, also withstood its fair share of controversy, with McKinnon emerging as a bright spot in the highly scrutinized comedy. “[Jillian’s] absolute willingness to be her true self, as bizarre and inappropriate as it often was, maybe ended up inspiring people,” says McKinnon. The actress caps the year by playing an HR employee in Office Christmas Party — another oddball unique to the McKinnon oeuvre. “I think self-consciously I’m trying to put out there women with an overwhelmingly strong sense of self.” —Nicole Sperling

Beyoncé

The Lemonade-addicted minds of EW can only imagine Beyoncé's 2016 to-do list, but if we had to dream up the 35-year-old pop star's supersecret plan to rule the year, we hope it would look something like this:

-Slay

-Upstage Chris Martin at Coldplay’s Super Bowl halftime show

-Beat Bruno Mars in a dance-off at same halftime show

-Pretend to almost fall at Super Bowl— hah!—for viral Vine potential

-Drop the best album of the year

-Do Jay a solid: Give fans the only reason to subscribe to Tidal

-Debut my album on HBO—just one step closer to an EGOT!

-Casually dominate a whole other industry — athleisure — with my Ivy Park line

-Do Frank Ocean that favor I owe him, sing backup on Blonde

-Launch tour, gross more than $100 million in ticket sales

-Smash a camera with a baseball bat on national TV

-Slay harder than before

Benedict Cumberbatch

“Incremental" is how Benedict Cumberbatch describes his brilliant movie, TV, and stage career. “The success of Sherlock was overnight,” he clarifies, “but that didn’t immediately lead to everyone knocking down my door.” Fair to say that door has since been vaporized. Cumberbatch played Marvel’s newest superhero Doctor Strange, arrogant surgeon–turned–defender of the multiverse, and the film has grossed $636 million worldwide so far. For the actor, the response is a validation of last year’s hard work: “Five months filming and, before that, crunching up to prep, on top of becoming a new dad and playing Hamlet [at London’s Barbican Theatre] by night.” Cumberbatch went Shakespearean again this year, playing Richard III in the BBC’s The Hollow Crown. “There are huge parallels,” he says of his disparate projects. “The scope of these dramas, the metanarratives of the Marvel universe and other cinematic universes of comic characters are epic.” Next up? Three new eps of Sherlock and the return of Strange, possibly in next year’s Thor: Ragnarok and definitely in 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War. And Cumberbatch sounds the precise opposite of joking when he says he plans to do “the occasional radio work.” So has he learned anything from his big 2016? “We’re not momentary specks in an indifferent universe. We’re momentary specks within a very caring, loving universe.” Words of wisdom from our real-life Sorcerer Supreme. —Darren Franich

The Chainsmokers

The Grammy-nominated duo behind the smashes "Closer," "Roses," and "Don't Let Me Down" — as well as nearly 2 billion Spotify streams — reveal how they became kings of the charts in 2016.

They found fresh talent to sing their hooks: After Rihanna passed on singing “Don’t Let Me Down,” the Chainsmokers followed the success of “Roses,” featuring the singer ROZES, and tapped another newcomer: rising pop star Daya. “We always look for someone who has a unique style,” says Alex Pall, who scouted the pair’s other collaborators Phoebe Ryan, Halsey, and XYLØ. “If it’s an established artist, people already have a perception of what that song will be.”

They were heroes of the summer festival circuit: Two days before the Chainsmokers made their Coachella debut — during a coveted Sunday - evening time slot — Pall and Andrew Taggart were at a Baltimore bar, joking about how great it would be to surprise fans with a guest appearance from Third Eye Blind’s Stephan Jenkins. (Yes, “Semi-Charmed Life” had just come on the jukebox.) So after a few 4 a.m. text-messaged pleas to the band’s bassist, frontman Jenkins agreed to perform “Jumper” with the duo in Indio, Calif. Says Pall, “To have a drunk idea on a Friday night and then make it come to fruition on Sunday was epic.”

They ruled radio—by not listening to it: “We don’t listen to what’s popular right now and try to create that,” says Taggart. That’s why, after releasing 2014’s viral novelty hit “#Selfie,” the Chainsmokers decided to ditch clichéd EDM styles. “We just got burnt out,” says Pall. “When we decided to f--- it and do what we wanted, we started having a lot of success.” —Jessica Goodman

Sterling K. Brown

With a pair of unforgettable roles — as prosectuor Christopher Darden on FX's The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story (for which he won an Emmy) and as family man Randall Perason on NBC's This Is Us — the 40-year-old actor broke big... twice. "I was at the gym playing basketball, and talking trash is part of the game. This kid kept saying, ‘Hey, young Darden! Why don’t you come try to guard me?’ So I switched up on this cat and shut him down. What he didn’t realize was that I actually played Darden," Brown tells EW. "He thought I just looked like the dude! Somebody else was like, ‘You know, that’s the dude that plays Darden!’ And he was like, ‘Can I get a picture?!’... I received the script for This Is Us while working on O.J. It was the best network pilot I’ve ever read. I was just so eager and excited at the possibility of moving from job to job. [Usually] one job ends and you start over from ground zero. So I’d be in that courtroom, and while everyone else would talk about being bored, I’d be poring over lines for This Is Us so that when the audition came I was ready.” —Amy Wilkinson

The Kids of Stranger Things

After debuting in July on Netflix, Stranger Things, about an Indiana boy sucked into another dimension and the Goonies-like band of friends who try to save him, slowly became a bona fide summer sensation. Says Matt Duffer, who created the sci-fi hit with his twin brother, Ross, “[We felt] it on the internet; then it started happening where, like, I was out to dinner and at the table next to me, that’s what they were talking about.” Consequently, the show catapulted its young, mostly unknown cast to rock-star levels of fame, attracting fans like Lea Michele, Daniel Radcliffe, and Amy Schumer. “Mindy Kaling tweeted, ‘The kid who plays Mike in Stranger Things is my favorite actor,’” says Finn Wolfhard, 13, who plays the leader of the tween posse. “I was freaking out because I love her so much.” Adds Caleb McLaughlin, 15, who plays Lucas, “When we went to Paris, we were coming out of a hotel and there were about five teenagers waiting for us. This girl literally picked up Gaten [Matarazzo] and was hugging him. She did the same thing to me. It was hilarious.“ In September, Matarazzo, McLaughlin, and Millie Bobby Brown, 12, who plays telekinetic Eleven, were tapped to be Jimmy Kimmel’s warm-up act for the Emmys. “They said they wanted us to sing,” remembers Matarazzo, 14, who played Gavroche in Les Misérables on Broadway. “They gave us a choice of four songs: ‘Happy,’ ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling!,’ ‘Shake It Off,’ and ‘Uptown Funk!’ It was a landslide — ’Uptown Funk!’ ” Adds Brown, “I died when I saw David Schwimmer. I was on stage and I was like, ‘Oh, my goodness, it’s Ross Geller!’ ” The trio even passed out peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to the hungry crowd midway through the ceremony. But when Stranger Things’ second season premieres in 2017, it’s possible there may be one celeb who doesn’t watch. Says McLaughlin of the sandwich incident, “I ran out, and some people were like, ‘Aw man, you don’t have any more?’ I was like, ‘I’m so sorry, Chris Rock!’” —Tim Stack, with additional reporting by Ariana Bacle and Lynette Rice

Sarah Paulson

No American Story, whether Crime or Horror, was complete this year without the 42-year-old actress, who too khome her first Emmy for portraying porsecutor Marcia Clark in The People v. O.J. Simpson. "It certainly has been the best [year] in terms of the varied things I’ve gotten to do," Paulson tells EW. "I think I’ve done six different parts just for Ryan Murphy. That’s not to mention I just started [Murphy’s next mini-series] Feud and Ocean’s 8. Rihanna [Paulson’s Ocean’s 8 costar] did say to me how much she loved the O.J. thing and my performance in it. It was one of those moments where I thought, “This is f---ing bats---!” When Rihanna has seen your work and says something nice to you, I feel like that means you had a really good year." —Tim Stack

Viola Davis

Viola Davis gave voice to the powerless with Academy Award–nominated roles in Doubt (2008) and The Help (2011), but it was Shonda Rhimes who recognized her true power, tapping her to play morally murky Annalise Keating on ABC’s How to Get Away With Murder. That role may have also led to Davis’ casting as the ultimate baddie in 2016’s Suicide Squad. With the flick of a knife and a slow chew on a rare cut of beef, she proved that her Amanda Waller was more terrifying than a gaggle of supervillains. “It was a window into her character, or lack thereof,” Davis says. Suicide Squad earned Davis, 51, her geek bona fides, but her role as the stifled housewife Rose in Denzel Washington’s adaptation of the play Fences may finally land her the Oscar. Though she’d played Rose on Broadway in 2010, she still found new aspects of the character. “I wanted to show her age. It’s 1957. They are African-Americans. It’s a different sort of life,” she says. Whatever the part, one thing’s certain — no one can cry like Davis. “People are always talking about my nose running,” she says with a laugh. “But there are moments where vanity gets tossed out the window. I think about when my dad passed, or when I was 7 and my dog was hit by a car. I freeze those moments and understand their value in everything I do.” —Nicole Sperling