According to the Index — a three-year study that takes into account box-office revenues and video rentals per year for movies made by 65,000 Hollywood employees over their careers — Steven Spielberg generates the most money, with an average of N4.4bilion ($27.4 million) per year and N2.2billion ($13.7 million) per movie. Samuel L. Jackson comes in second, with N3.9billion ($24.4 million) per year and N987million ($6.2 million) per movie. Johnny Depp and Tom Cruise take the third and fourth spots.
But Forbes’ annual list of the industry’s highest-paid actors puts Robert Downey Jr. (pictured) at the top, earning an estimated N12.2billion ($75 million) in 2013, even though the Index rates him as Hollywood’s ninth-biggest revenue draw, generating N3.4billion ($20.6 million) per year for his movies. The next four highest-paid actors on Forbes’ list — Channing Tatum N9.7billion ($60 million), Hugh Jackman N8.9billion ($55 million), Mark Wahlberg N8.4billion ($52 million) and Dwayne Johnson N7.4billion ($46 million) — don’t even crack the Index’s top 10.
But, as box office analyst Paul Dergarabedian told USA Today, several of these seemingly overpaid actors anchor major franchises: Downey is the center of two Marvel franchises, The Avengers and Iron Man; Tatum has played key roles in the Step Up, 21 Jump Street and G.I. Joe series; Jackman anchors the X-Men and Wolverine movies; Wahlberg is joining the Transformers franchise; and Johnson has been a key player in the last two (and the next) Fast and Furious films and has also joined the G.I. Joe franchise.
“The studios are making an investment in the future, largely based o personality,” Dergarabedian says. “And you really can’t put a price on that.”
