The Center of the Hollywood Universe...

...is Dennis Hopper.

I was playing around with the Oracle of Bacon, which automatically forms Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon chains (or anyone else), and noticed a section on the Center of the Hollywood Universe. This refers to actors with extremely high connectivity numbers.

Kevin Bacon ranks 507th, but at number 1 is Dennis Hopper, who had a long and varied career, but I still found it stunning. My guess was Kurt Russell, who got started as a kid in Disney movies and worked steadily ever since in everything from romantic comedies to sci-fi action blockbusters, but he ranks 260th, way below the likes of German weirdo Udo Keir and old-school character actor Seymour Cassel. The first couple of hundred names are a fascinating who's who of movie stars and hey-I-recognize-that-guy-from-an-episode-of-The-Rockford-Files.

The list of 1000 "best centers"
The explanation of the concept