There are a few keys to success if you want to become one of the 12 Highest Grossing Actors Of All-Time. First, you have to be willing to put in the work necessary to become a really, really good actor. Secondly, you have to be able to put together a relatively long career filled with successful movies and thirdly, you have to be able to cash in big and build a franchise around your most financially successful flicks.
Those are the common themes you’ll notice when you roll through this list. Unfortunately for women in Hollywood, all of the top 12 Highest Grossing Actors Of All-Time are male, but it should be noted that Cameron Diaz comes in at the number 14 spot, grossing well over $3.025 billion at the box office in the 34 movies she’s appeared in throughout her career. As promised here are the top 12.
12. Robert Downey Jr.
If there is one actor that will be eternally grateful for the concept of comic book-based movies it would be none other than Robert Downey Jr. From 1996 to 2001, he was arrested multiple times for drug-related offenses and it seemed like his career might be over. Fast forward to today, and it’s been so long since that time that most of us can’t even remember what his career used to be like before movies like the Iron Man series put him back on the map.
That big break came in 2008 and Downey Jr. continued to do well with the release of the movie Tropic Thunder. Just like that he was back and now that it’s been seven years since the Iron Man movies have made their return, and Downey Jr.’s bank account has never been stacked with more money. The comic book-based movie The Avengers racked up over $623 million at the box office bringing the total gross earnings of Downey Jr.’s movies to over 3.08 billion dollars, enough to give him the number 12 spot. For that amount of money any of us would put a heavy iron suit on, but nobody would do it with the charisma and humor of Robert Downey Jr.
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