HOLLYWOOD — Attention Will Ferrell, Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman and fellow A-listers: Your number may be up.
We’re referring to the number with seven zeroes at the end which has customarily denoted your asking price.
Along with the studio belt-tightening that has been taking place over the past year, there has been an across-the-board re-appraisal of marquee value, which has been further justified by a couple of more recent developments.
The first was this month’s release of Forbes magazine’s listing of Hollywood’s most- overpaid stars, with once-invincible Ferrell (but that was before Land of the Lost) coming out on top.
That ranking of actors who cost more than their box-office worth calculated that for every dollar Ferrell was paid, his movies earned an average of just $3.29.
Among the other dubious achievers on that top-10 list — Eddie Murphy, Jim Carrey, Cruise and Drew Barrymore.
But lending added credence to studios’ call for star salary re-evaluation was last weekend’s phenomenal $140.7 million opening ($259 million worldwide) for The Twilight Saga: New Moon.
It wasn’t many moons ago, actually just prior to last November’s release of Twilight, that leads Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner weren’t exactly household names.
Their combined income for that first instalment likely wouldn’t have equaled Angelina’s hair and make-up budget, but if Forbes had come up with a list of Hollywood’s most cost-effective stars, Stewart, Pattinson and Lautner would rank right up there.
So would Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, and, especially, Zach Galifianakis, whose names previously wouldn’t have tripped off the tongue, either, but that was before the summer’s sleeper smash, The Hangover, hit the comedy jackpot to the tune of $277 million.
More recently, Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat lived in comparable obscurity until a little, out-of-left-field thriller called Paranormal Activity, made for $11,000, came along, grossing about 10,000 times that figure to date.
Now Katie and Micah can’t go anywhere without being recognized.
And the success of those movies hasn’t gone unnoticed by studio executives, who have been seriously rethinking those hefty paydays, carried over from the Schwarzenegger era.
Horror films have traditionally never been dependent on star power, but now with other genres, especially comedies, drawing huge crowds without a Carey or Sandler in sight, the only thing those A-list quotes have been raising are studio brass eyebrows.
Julia Roberts apparently got a taste of the new reality when Disney reportedly balked at her asking price to star in a new romantic comedy.
So they instead went with Sandra Bullock, who had been in a bit of a drought, hits-wise, which effectively ended when The Proposal went on to sell $164 million worth of tickets.
By contrast, Roberts’ past two movies — Duplicity and Charlie Wilson’s War — earned a combined $107 million.
With Bullock’s latest, The Blind Side, also shaping up to be a tidy hit, her going salary quote is probably safe for the time being, assuming there’s not another All About Steve in her future. But the same can’t be assured for her colleagues.
In this climate, the only turkeys their lifestyles can afford are taking the form of Thanksgiving leftovers.
Michael Rechtshaffen, a Canadian entertainment writer based in Los Angeles, appears Wednesdays and Sundays
