If you want to open a movie in theaters, you need a movie star. And while we constantly debate over who has the clout to bring people into the theater to see movies, the numbers don't lie.
And the new highest-grossing actor of all time is Scarlett Johansson.
Now, naysayers will point out her involvement in franchises like Marvel and now Jurassic helped give her a boost, but that's just the way things work. There's a reason those mega franchises went after her to star in them.
According to data from The Numbers, ScarJo is now on top, with $14.8 billion in box office grosses, and climbing. More than $8.7 billion comes from the Marvel movies she's starred in, and then if you add in the Sing movies and Jurassic and Lucy, she's doing pretty well for herself.
'Jurassic World Rebirth' SOURCE: Universal
Here's a look at the top 10 stars and their box office gross, age, and average movie box office.
The Top 10 Highest-Grossing Movie Stars
| 1 | Scarlett Johansson | $14,851,079,186 | 36 | $412,529,977 |
| 2 | Samuel L. Jackson | $14,605,054,357 | 71 | $205,704,991 |
| 3 | Robert Downey, Jr. | $14,315,312,353 | 45 | $318,118,052 |
| 4 | Zoe Saldana | $14,233,755,398 | 33 | $431,325,921 |
| 5 | Chris Pratt | $14,127,500,639 | 26 | $543,365,409 |
| 6 | Tom Cruise | $12,655,720,915 | 45 | $281,238,243 |
| 7 | Chris Hemsworth | $12,189,867,298 | 28 | $435,352,404 |
| 8 | Vin Diesel | $11,993,665,573 | 28 | $428,345,199 |
| 9 | Dwayne Johnson | $11,445,774,265 | 39 | $293,481,391 |
| 10 | Chris Evans | $11,428,299,065 | 29 | $394,079,278 |
One of the things that is staggering is how young Johannsson is and how she's become such a star with such a high per-movie average.
The top 10 is bolstered a lot by Marvel alums and Tom Cruise, who is a classic movie star working in Mission: Impossible and other blockbusters like Top Gun.
It's safe to say that if you want to package a movie, you should consider anyone from this top ten and feel really good about your chances of it getting made.
One of the things I generally critique when it comes to stardom is whether or not any of these people can open a movie outside of their franchises to make money.
Scarlett Johansson has done that as well, so I think she deserves a place on top...for now. It will be interesting to see how people battle this out time and time again over the next decade, as opening movies theatrically hopefully grows.
Are you surprised by any of the names on this list?
Let me know what you think in the comments.
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