Daniel Craig is the highest paid movie star in the world

JAMES BOND star Daniel Craig has topped the list of the world’s highest-paid movie stars

In the latest list published on Wednesday, August 18, by the prestigious New York-based showbiz magazine Variety, the 53-year-old James Bond actor, Daniel Craig, is currently the world’s highest-paid movie star, earning a whopping total of $100 million (£117.5m or €88.5m), while Julia Roberts, and Jennifer Lawrence tied in first place as the top female earners, both with a juicy $25 million (£29.3m or €21.3m) each.

Craig beat other A-list stars like Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, Denzel Washington, and Will Smith, who also earned huge eight-figure salaries, but his earnings were not from his 007 role, instead, they came mostly as a result of his appearance in the Netflix streaming services smash, ‘Knives Out‘, in which he starred opposite the late Christopher Plummer, in a whodunnit-type mystery series, playing a Southern detective character called Benoit Blanc.

The original 2019 film, with its relatively low $40 million budget (£29.3m or €47m), without any connection to preexisting intellectual property or well-known franchises, made it perfect for bosses to make a huge profit on, as it became an unexpected smash at cinema box offices, which propelled Netflix to fork out a reported $450 million (£327.6m or €384.9m) on two sequels, from which it is alleged, Daniel Craig will be paid (£117.5m or €88.5m).

Many major stars are now opting for streaming services as their source of income, with Dwayne Johnson reportedly earning $50 million (£36.4m or €42.7m) to star in the action movie, ‘Red One’ on Amazon.

King Richard, the upcoming biopic starring Will Smith as Richard Williams, the father of tennis superstars Venus and Serena Williams, will be released simultaneously in cinemas and on HBO Max, which is estimated to be increasing Warner Bros profits by as much as $40 million (£29.1m or €34.2m) by also being streamed online, as reported by dailymail.co.uk.

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