News culture Zendaya made an astronomical sum on Dune for only 7 minutes on screen: she surpasses Tom Cruise and Keanu Reeves

Culture news Zendaya made an astronomical sum on Dune for only 7 minutes on screen: she surpasses Tom Cruise and Keanu Reeves

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Zendaya was paid handsomely for little screen time

If you like science fiction, you know that the second part of the film adaptation of Dune by Denis Villeneuve is currently in theaters. After years of waiting, the public can finally discover the continuation of this story which already promises to be a great classic and which recalls the best fantastic sagas of the seventh art such as The Lord of the Rings or Star Wars. If we are to believe the critics, this second part would even be much superior to the first, which had already amazed a large number of spectators. However, even if the first part satisfied the vast majority of fans, a certain point disappointed a few people. While all the promotion of the film had involved the famous main duo played by Timothée Chalamet And Zendaya, the latter only appeared for 7 minutes out of the 155 that made up the feature film.

Of course, this information in itself was already enough to make fans of the actress react who would have liked to see her a little longer on the big screen. But where the problem lies is that Zendaya was still paid very handsomely for his role in the first part of Dune despite his very little screen time. Indeed, she earned no less than $300,000 playing Chani even though the job only took her four days of filming.

A feat that surpasses those of Tom Cruise and Keanu Reeves

While it is common knowledge that actors and actresses are very often paid in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, or even tens of millions, it is generally for the most important roles which require significant filming time and work. relentless. At $300,000 in salary for 7 minutes of screen time, that brings us to a ratio of $42,857 per minute, or $75,000 per workday. An amount that would make many jealous… even within Hollywood. Indeed, this is not the first time that an actor or actress has been criticized for being very (too) well paid for little screen time or at least few dialogues. We can, for example, cite the lightning and mute appearance of Mark Hamill in Star Wars: Episode VII, or even the role of John Wick for Keanu Reeves.

Of course, for the latter, the ratio that matters is not that of the appearance time on the screen. Indeed, Keanu Reeves occupies as much space as any action movie main character in John Wick, and can even justify his salary thanks to the choreography he must master. But if we relate it all to its number of lines of dialogue, it is immediately more striking. For example, we know that Keanu Reeves was paid $15 million for his role in the fourth installment of the John Wick franchise. If we divide this amount with the number of words spoken, this gives us a rate of $39,473 per wordwhich is still less than Zendaya’s salary-to-screen time ratio for Dune.

And if you wanted to compare it to an actor who is even better paid, but spends a lot more time on screen, know that the difference is even more striking. Indeed, on average, Tom Cruise earns an amount close to $7,000 per word spoken in a film from the Mission: Impossible franchise. You will have understood, it’s difficult to do anything more attractive than Zendaya’s salary in Denis Villeneuve’s first Dune… And yet, this was indeed done by an iconic actor from the Star Wars saga. Obviously, this “problem” was corrected in the second part of Dune since the actress has a much more important role.