--- title: Hollywood Salaries Are Steadily Dropping description: Hollywood is an industry where payouts once knew no limit, so dropping salaries are shocking. authors: - name: Kristen Bahler role: Managing Editor url: https://money.com/author/kristen-bahler/ bio: Kristen Bahler has spent more than a decade turning culture, work and consumer spending trends into conversation-driving stories. Today, she leads Money's sponsored content channel and reader-favorite franchises like Best Places to Live and Best Places to Travel. education: Northeastern University, MA Journalism at_money_since: 2016 articles: 52 covers: - Lifestyle - Banking - Business - Career Advice - Credit - Credit Cards - Economy and Politics - Education - Health and Wellness - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Loans - Mortgages - Personal Finance - Pets - Professional Services - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology social: - https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristen-bahler/ published: '2016-09-29T20:27:46.000Z' modified: '2024-04-17T03:57:58.000Z' section: Lifestyle tags: - Careers - pubdesk - salaries word_count: 464 canonical: https://money.com/hollywood-salaries-dropping/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![160929_em_hollywood_salaries](https://img.money.com/2016/09/160929_em_hollywood_salaries.jpg) *Leonardo DiCaprio, who still bags $25 million per picture, is the exception.* So Hollywood pay is stellar? Well, actually, actor, director, and producer compensation is going down. *The Hollywood Reporter* has released salary trends for 2016, with this startling observation for some of your favorite celebrities. 'There's never been a better time to be a CEO," the magazine said in a [blog post](http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/hollywood-salaries-2016-who-got-933037/item/hollywood-salaries-revealed-who-got-933041) on Thursday. "But actors, directors, and producers may want to start clipping coupons." Sure, it's a little tongue-in-cheek — but for an industry where payouts once [knew no limit](https://money.com/hollywood-wage-gap/?iid=sr-link1), the data is shocking nonetheless. Here are some noteworthy changes: **Movie Stars** There was a time, *THR* notes, when A-list actors would earn $20 to $30 million up front for every picture. Not so these days, when even Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, one of the [best-paid actors](https://money.com/dwayne-johnson-highest-paid-actor/?iid=sr-link1) in Hollywood, nabs just (just?) $19 million a film. Leonardo DiCaprio still [makes about $25 million](https://money.com/leonardo-dicaprio-net-worth/) per starring role, but he's in the minority. As a result, some actors are taking more of an ownership stake in films, compared to previous years. As the publication notes: > Vin Diesel, who gets paid tens of millions for the *Fast & Furious* movies, recently cut a similar deal for *XXX3*; sources say he's getting $1 million up front plus an ownership stake. "More and more of these deals will be happening," predicts one producer who works in the studio and indie worlds. "It's smart and modern." **Directors** Like actor salaries, director compensation isn't as clear cut—or as colossal—as it once was. Christopher Nolan (*The Dark Knight, Interstellar*) is said to be nabbing $20 million upfront and 20% of the gross for his upcoming World War II epic *Dunkirk*, but that far outpaces most. The average director salary for a studio film is in the $750,000 to $1.5 million range, depending on past credits, according to *T**HR*. > ... even a director as esteemed as David Fincher can find himself getting nickeled and dimed when a studio is less certain of a project’s future; Fincher lost *Steve Jobs* to Danny Boyle because he wouldn’t back down from his $10 million asking price (plus, he wanted control of marketing). **Producers** First-time producers are faring better than their predecessors salary-wise, but "once you get to the top of the food chain, you hit a ceiling," *T**HR* says. > "For the most part, those super-plum deals that used to spew out tens of millions of dollars now are all but extinct, replaced by stingier cash break-even contracts, where producers don’t get paid until the studio recoups its production and marketing budgets." Big names are still pulling in the big bucks, though. Superstar producers like Scott Rudin (*Steve Jobs, Ex Machina*) and Lorenzo di Bonaventura (*Deepwater Horizon, Transformers )* make as much as $2.5 million in upfront cash, plus a percentage of box office earnings, *T**HR* observes. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/hollywood-salaries-dropping/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Lifestyle", "item": "https://money.com/lifestyle/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Movies", "item": "https://money.com/movies/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Hollywood Salaries Are Steadily Dropping" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/hollywood-salaries-dropping/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/hollywood-salaries-dropping/", "name": "Hollywood Salaries Are Steadily Dropping", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2016-09-29T20:27:46.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/hollywood-salaries-dropping/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/hollywood-salaries-dropping/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-04-17T03:57:58.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "Hollywood Salaries Are Steadily Dropping", "articleSection": "Lifestyle", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2016/09/160929_em_hollywood_salaries.jpg", "width": 2100, "height": 1400, "caption": "160929_em_hollywood_salaries" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Kristen Bahler", "url": "https://money.com/author/kristen-bahler/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/kristen-bahler/#author", "description": "Kristen Bahler has spent more than a decade turning culture, work and consumer spending trends into conversation-driving stories. 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