Who Is The Most Successful Avengers Actor?
Together as Avengers, Earth’s mightiest heroes form an unstoppable box-office juggernaut: the combined Marvel Cinematic Universe has banked over £5.62 billion around the world since its inception in 2008. But is playing a superhero rewarding when the actors aren’t in the spandex? Which Avenger makes the most coin outside the MCU? Let’s fire up the calculator, check the receipts and find out…
10. Chris Hemsworth
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £409 million
Still a relative young gun when it comes to toplining motion pictures, Hemsworth made his mark with Marvel and his been given plenty of other extra curricular opportunities but few of them coined it quite like ‘Thor’. Michael Mann’s 'Blackhat’ was a flop, 'Rush’ under-performed on the box-office circuit and 'Vacation’ is unlikely to break the bank, so you have to go back to 2012’s 'Snow White And The Huntsman’ and its £253 million total for a number that’d make Odin blush.
9. Chris Evans
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £732 million
“Nobody sees my other movies!” cried the erstwhile Captain America in a recent interview, and he had a point: as Steve Rogers, fans can’t get enough of him; as plain old Chris Evans, not so much. That’s not because his non-Marvel movies are bad - they’re not, aside from the risible 'Fantastic Four’ movies - but Evans could probably put his box-office misfortune down to bad luck: 'Snowpiercer’ was his most exciting and interesting film in a decade and it didn’t even get a proper release over here. It’s no wonder he wants to retire. Aww. Poor Cap.
8. Anthony Mackie
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £876 million
Mackie’s catchphrase is “Cut the cheque!” but he’s yet to break off a slice of fried gold outside of his Avenging. Falcon hit great heights in 'Captain America: The Winter Soldier’ but 'The Fifth Estate’, 'Runner Runner’ and 'Gangster Squad’ were all misfires – even 'The Hurt Locker’ was the lowest-grossing Best Picture winner ever. Still, 'Pain & Gain’, 'Real Steel’ and 'The Adjustment Bureau’ contribute to an admirable total – but it’s still Marvel that cuts the cheques, not Mackie.
7. Paul Rudd
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £1.01 billion
The latest addition to the Avengers lineup arrives bearing awesome technology but very little in the way of box-office chutzpah – remember, that figure above is accumulated over a 20 year period. Rudd has never really been much of a household name – for years he worked under the name 'Mike from Friends, you know, Phoebe’s boyfriend?’ – so he took roles where he could get them, the two 'Anchorman’ movies being among the most successful. The movies he made with Judd Apatow did ride the gross-out gravy train to the tune of a combined £377 million, but will 'Ant-Man’ raise Rudd’s profile or will his lifetime box-office haul remain microscopic?
6. Mark Ruffalo
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £1.04 billion
Mark Ruffalo always gravitated towards the indie side of the spectrum until Hulk came calling: the pre-green days Before Banner were not gilded gold either, but the actor did enjoy a fair few surprising smashes. Magic heist movie 'Now You See Me’ was a sleeper hit and Martin Scorsese’s 'Shutter Island’ was an unexpected – but deserved – success; even weepie 'Just Like Heaven’ broke the $100 million mark. So does this mean Tony Stark is a bigger talent than Hulk? This could divide the Science Bros in rivalry…
5. Jeremy Renner
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £1.26 billion
Renner for the win! Our Jez may have got shafted in the first 'Avengers’ movie, but he more than made up for it while orbiting the Marvel universe with roles in not one but three financially successful franchises. 'The Bourne Legacy’, 'Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol’ and the soon-to-be-sequelised 'Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters’ (seriously, it made £144 million!) launched Jeremy as a bona fide standalone superstar, so much so Joss Whedon wrote a beefed-up role for him in 'Age Of Ultron’. Everything’s coming up Renner!
4. Scarlett Johansson
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £1.35 billion
For the longest time, Johansson picked her projects based on how interesting they were and not how successful they were likely to be (see: 'The Man Who Wasn’t There’, 'Ghost World’, 'Lost In Translation’, 'Under The Skin’ and 'The Island’ – okay, maybe not that last one). Black Widow and 'The Avengers’ marked a watershed for Scar-Jo: she’s now credible /and/ successful, as the frankly mind-expanding £293 million box-office total for last year’s sci-fi action blast 'Lucy’ will attest.
=2. Robert Downey Jr
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £1.44 billion
These days, Downey is a brand unto himself, and he owes it all to Marvel: without his career resurrecting turn as Tony Stark, it’s highly unlikely RDJ would be pulling in £32 million a movie (reportedly his pay packet for 'The Avengers’), especially after the fallow period that followed after his drugs arrests. Iron Man could upgrade to an all-gold suit with the money he brings in, but outside of the MCU, it’s really only 'Sherlock Holmes’ that casts a notable shadow on Downey’s earnings, but 'Tropic Thunder’ and 'Due Date’ weren’t too shabby, banking a combined £256 million between them – not bad for a couple of standalone comedies.
=2. Paul Bettany
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £1.44 billion It’s a tie!
Tony Stark is the one who straps on the suit and kills the bad guys, but JARVIS had just as much effect on movie audiences worldwide, according to this surprising statistic. Minus his voice work as Tony Stark’s AI butler across three Iron Man movies and two Avengers adventures, Bettany still has a cracking CV that includes mega-hits including 'The Da Vinci Code ’(remember when that was a thing?), Oscar smash 'A Beautiful Mind’ and Russell Crowe’s 'Master And Commander’. It just goes to show, slow and steady wins the race. Or ties for second, at least. Because there’s no beating this guy…
1. Samuel L Jackson
Non-Marvel box-office earnings: £5.42 billion
His role as the man who assembled the Avengers may take the form of walk-on cameos these days (seven and counting, Fury fans) but that’s because Samuel L Jackson earned the right to be that badass – the 'L’ stands for 'Loadsamoney’. 'Star Wars’! 'Jurassic Park’! 'The Incredibles’! 'Django Unchained’! 'Pulp Fiction’! Literally, like, a thousand other movies! Jackson is a box-office colossus who stands astride cinema, commanding money and respect and receiving both in equal measure. He’s the highest-grossing film star in history and could probably afford to pay the wages of his fellow Avengers all by himself if he wanted to. We still don’t talk about 'Snakes On A Plane’ though.
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