It’s time to take a look at Oscarless actresses – those that have never won a competitive Oscar or any other award from the Academy. That leaves out the likes of Lauren Bacall, Greta Garbo, Judy Garland, Lillian Gish, Deborah Kerr, Angela Lansbury, Myrna Loy, Maureen O’Hara, Gena Rowlands, Cicely Tyson, and Liv Ullmann, all of whom won honorary awards for acting. It also leaves out Debbie Reynolds and Rosalind Russell, both of whom won the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award for their charitable works.

That baker’s dozen aside, we are still left with a plethora of legendary actresses who never won, some of them with multiple nominations behind them. Not counting still living actresses who have never won but may still do so, here then are a half dozen of the very best who should have been recognized with either a competitive win or a career achievement award somewhere along the line.

Jean Arthur (1900-1991) had been in films since 1923 but didn’t reach her pinnacle until the mid-1930s when she starred in a series of comedies reaching her peak with 1936’s Mr. Deeds Goes to Town opposite Gary Cooper. She further excelled in such classic comedies as You Can’t Take It with You and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington opposite James Stewart, The Devil and Miss Jones opposite Robert Cummings, The Talk of the Town opposite Cary Grant and Ronald Colman, and The More the Merrier opposite Joel McCrea for which she received her only Oscar nomination. She retired after making the classic 1953 western, Shane opposite Alan Ladd.

Marlene Dietrich (1901-1992) rose to prominence in the German made classic The Blue Angel opposite Emil Jannings and her first Hollywood film, Morocco opposite Gary Cooper, both in 1930. Subsequent hits included Shanghai Express opposite Clive Brook, Blonde Venus opposite Herbert Marshall and Cary Grant, The Garden of Allah opposite Charles Boyer, and Destry Rides Again opposite James Stewart, all in the 1930s. She had two of her biggest hits late in career with 1957’s Witness for the Prosecution opposite Tyrone Power and Charles Laughton and 1961’s Judgment at Nuremberg opposite Spencer Tracy.

Irene Dunne (1898-1990) was nominated for Oscars five times between 1931 and 1948 for Cimarron opposite Richard Dix, Theodora Goes Wild opposite Melvyn Douglas, The Awful Truth opposite Cary Grant, Love Affair opposite Charles Boyer, and I Remember Mama opposite Barbara Bel Geddes. She was equally as effective and deserving of nominations for at least five more including Magnificent Obsession opposite Robert Taylor, Penny Serenade opposite Cary Grant, The White Cliffs of Dover opposite Alan Marshall, Anna and the King of Siam opposite Rex Harrison, and The Mudlark opposite Alec Guinness.

Dorothy McGuire (1916-2001) began her film career opposite Robert Young in 1943’s Claudia and 1945’s The Enchanted Cottage which along with that year’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn opposite James Dunn and Peggy Ann Garner cemented her career. Oddly, her only Oscar nomination came for 1947’s Gentleman’s Agreement opposite Gregory Peck, but she was equally memorable insuch 1950s films as Three Coins in the Fountain opposite Clifton Webb, Friendly Persuasion opposite Gary Cooper, and A Summer Place opposite Richard Egan as well as 1960’s The Dark at the Top of the Stairs opposite Robert Preston.

Eleanor Parker (1922-2013) had been in films since 1942 but reached her pinnacle with back-to-back Oscar nominations for 1950’s Caged opposite Agnes Morehead and 1951’s Detective Story opposite Kirk Douglas. A hit in Scaramouche opposite Stewart Granger and The Naked Jungle opposite Charlton Heston, she received a third Oscar nomination for 1955’s Interrupted Melody opposite Glenn Ford. She had her last great dramatic starring role opposite Robert Mitchum in 1960’s Home from the Hill before turning to supporting work, most memorably in 1965’s The Sound of Music in support of Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer.

Jean Simmons (1929-2010) was a teenage sensation in Great Expectations, Black Narcissus, and Hamlet for which she received an Oscar nomination opposite Laurence Olivier. Unforgettable opposite Richard Burton in The Robe, Marlon Brando in Guys and Dolls, Paul Newman in Until They Sail, Gregory Peck in The Big Country, Rock Hudson in This Earth Is Mine, Burt Lancaster in Elmer Gantry, Kirk Douglas in Spartacus, and Robert Preston in All the Way Home, she incredibly didn’t receive another Oscar nomination until 1969’s The Happy Ending opposite John Forsythe.