George Clooney Lost An Absolute Fortune By Rejecting Movie Roles He Thought He Was Too Good For

Highlights

• George Clooney has likely lost at least $164 million by turning down movie roles.
• Clooney was paid a staggering amount of money for his top roles, averaging $14 million per role.
• Clooney’s decision to mostly give up acting was influenced by the lack of quality roles.

These days, it often seems like virtually everyone in Hollywood is afraid of doing anything to upset the power brokers. As a result, most actors are afraid of doing anything that is even remotely controversial. On the other hand, George Clooney has been pretty open about his controversies.

While Clooney has been willing to rock the boat, that doesn’t mean that he doesn’t care a lot about his career. After all, Clooney once stopped talking to Brad Pitt over a role. With that in mind, it is staggering to know Clooney has largely given up the acting career that made him rich over his frustrations with Hollywood.

George Clooney Likely Has Cost Himself At Least $164 Million By Turning Down Movie Roles

Since George Clooney has pretty much given up acting in recent years, there is no doubt that he has missed out on making millions. Fortunately for fans who are curious about the kind of money Clooney could have made, however, it is possible to estimate that figure.

According to a 2023 Cosmopolitan article, Clooney was paid a staggering amount of money for his most notable roles before he slowed down. In fact, Clooney got paid $20 million for more than one of his most popular projects.

How much money did George Clooney get paid for his top roles, according to Cosmopolitan?

In Gravity’s case, Cosmopolitan reports that Clooney received a $20 million flat fee. They also reported that Clooney negotiated to get a portion of Gravity’s profits that could have added up to an additional $14 million for the actor.

Averaging out seven of the movie salaries Cosmopolitan reported on, Clooney received $14 million per role. Based on that figure, some math can provide a simplistic estimate of how much money Clooney could have made if he continued acting regularly.

Since 2016, Clooney has only acted in six movies. However, Clooney only had a lead role in four of those projects. If Clooney had chosen to headline two movies annually since 2016, he would have starred in an additional twelve movies. If Clooney was paid $14 million for each of those projects, he would have received an additional $164 million.

Of course, $164 million is a staggering amount of money for anyone to lose. However, it is extremely likely that Clooney could have been paid a lot more than $164 million. After all, many actors of Clooney’s caliber make more than $14 million per role these days. On top of that, Clooney could have negotiated movie deals that included profit-sharing. Finally, it has to be noted that Clooney took more than three starring roles annually during the busiest years of his career.

What Happened To George Clooney’s Career?

At the height of George Clooney’s acting career, he was one of the biggest movie stars in the world. When Clooney was appearing in a slew of hit movies, he was making a fortune for himself. With that in mind, it is staggering to think about how much money Clooney has cost himself in recent years.

More recently, Clooney has barely been working, which means he has been missing out making millions of dollars. According to what Clooney once said, he seemingly believes that is the movie studio’s fault.

According to Rotten Tomatoes’ list of Clooney’s movie credits, he has only acted in six movies since 2015’s Tomorrowland flopped. While that seems strange, Clooney’s career has actually slowed down more than that fact makes it seem.

One of Clooney’s credits since the year 2015 involved him appearing onscreen in a superhero movie for seconds. On top of that, some of Clooney’s recent six movie roles were a part of films most people have never heard of.

Given that Clooney has barely been working, that begs an obvious question. Why has Clooney mostly given up his acting career knowing that he will lose a fortune as a result?

Even though most fans don’t know why Clooney barely works as an actor now, it isn’t a mystery. In 2021, Clooney spoke to The Guardian and explained that he has largely disappeared because the movie studios aren’t offering him roles that he thinks are worth the effort.

“In general, there just aren’t that many great parts – and, look, I don’t have to act.”

Even though Clooney mainly blamed his disappearance on the lack of quality roles, he went on to say more about his lack of Hollywood activity.

As Clooney explained to The Guardian, there are two other notable factors in his decision to mostly give up acting. According to Clooney, his age and marital status caused him to reflect on how much of his time he wanted to spend acting.

“My wife and I had this conversation when I turned 60 this summer. I said: ‘I can still bounce around pretty good, and we both love what we do. But we gotta make sure we don’t book ourselves silly.’ So, part of it is just us making sure we live our lives.”

While Clooney spending more time with his wife makes sense, it seems pretty obvious that isn’t the main inspiration for his Hollywood absence. After all, Clooney has been focused on another part of his career that also takes him away from his family.

Since the mid-2010s, Clooney has continued to direct movies regularly and he has also worked on films as a writer and producer.

What are the best movies George Clooney directed according to Screen Rant?

In recent years, Clooney has directed The Monuments Men, Suburbicon, The Midnight Sky, The Tender Bar, and The Boys in the Boat.

Source: NewsFinale