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Forbes Determines Hollywood's Most Overpaid Actors

by Monika Bartyzel Nov 20th 2009 // 5:15PM

Filed under: Celebrities and Controversy, Box Office

Just the other day, I tackled the notion of whether A-List actors were becoming an endangered species. Now Forbes is adding to the celebrities woes with a list of Hollywood's 10 Most Overpaid Stars. Their criteria for the list: Look at the 100 biggest stars who have starred in at least 3 flicks opening in more than 500 theaters in the last 5 years, and calculate a return-on-investment by dividing total operating income on the 3 movies by the actor's total compensation (salaries and sales earnings).

So, who could possibly end up on such a list? Hazard a guess? Well, here are some hints. The 10-spot actor, who has the biggest earnings for his pay, earns an average of $8.62 for every $1 paid, while the worst offender skyrocketed to the #1 spot with a pretty big flop this year, earning only $3.29 for every buck paid. Some of the names in the middle are quite expected, especially Tom Cruise and Eddie Murphy, the former still dealing with image issues, and the latter found out that his silly-comedy formula isn't working like it used to. Also, there is one lone woman on the list, but this actress might be a little hard to guess.

Considering the previous post and some of the names on this list, I think we might be seeing a big decrease in star-power pay over the next few years. But for now ... Who's the least-bad investment, the worst, and the woman? Can you figure out the names in-between? Take a stab and then check out the list after the jump

10. Jim Carrey
9. Samuel L. Jackson
8. Leonardo DiCaprio
7. Drew Barrymore
6. Tom Cruise
5. Ice Cube
4. Eddie Murphy
3. Billy Bob Thornton
2. Ewan McGregor
1. Will Ferrell

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Tags: 10 Most Overpaid Actors, 10MostOverpaidActors, A-List, Cinematical, Eddie Murphy, EddieMurphy, Forbes, Hollywood, overpaid actors, OverpaidActors, Tom Cruise, TomCruise

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