Action: How much Hollywood’s Oscar nominees are paid per minute
Break a leg! Whether it’s viral superstar selfies, a lack of hosts, incorrect envelope readings or awkward on-stage disputes (sorry, Chris Rock), the Oscars has seen its fair share of controversies over the years.
With the latest edition of The Academy Awards fast approaching on March 2, we utilised actor and actress film earnings combined with their time spent on screen for Oscar-nominated films since 2015, to reveal which stars earn the most per minute.
We worked alongside Matthew Stewart, writer and founder of Screen Time Central, a film and TV database boasting screen time data of all Oscar-nominated features since records began.
Grab your popcorn and take a seat; the show is about to begin!
KEY FINDINGS
- 8 of the top 10 earners per minute for Oscar-nominated films in the last decade are men.
- Oscar-nominated men have earned, on average, $99,998 per minute spent on screen in the last decade; Oscar-nominated women have earned $72,839 by comparison.
- Bradley Cooper claimed the highest tally per minute of all Oscar nominees since 2015, earning a cool $591,856 per minute spent on screen for ‘American Sniper’. The Pennsylvania native was on screen for 84.48 minutes but lost out on the main award to Eddie Redmayne.
- Andrea Riseborough, nominated in 2023 for Best Actress following her performance in Indie picture ‘To Leslie’, made $403 per minute spent on screen for her efforts; the lowest out of all nominees in the Best Actor, Best Actress and best support categories since 2015.
Cooper leads the way for top earning men
Bradley Cooper remains without an Oscar, but he’s the top-earner in the last decade per nominated film after his performance in ‘American Sniper’.
Cooper made $591,856 per minute for his depiction as legendary shooter, Chris Kyle. He was also nominated for Best Actor in 2024 for ‘Maestro’ and 2019 starring alongside Lady Gaga in ‘A Star is Born’. Despite the lack of gold for the 50-year-old, he has earned over $1.2 million in the last decade for 4.5 hours of Oscar-nominated screentime. That’ll certainly help him to get over a run of trophyless form that threatens to compete with Leonardo DiCaprio’s, following his long wait for an Academy Award, which ended in 2016 with ‘The Revenant’.
Veteran actor Joe Pesci was second on the list of top earners per minute, making $461,148 every 60 seconds for his role in ‘The Irishman’.
From ‘Home Alone’ to ‘Goodfellas’ and the aptly named ‘Casino’, Pesci has seen and done it all in a five-decade career. His co-star Al Pacino also made the list for the same film, with the pair earning Best Supporting Actor nominations in 2020.
In third spot, Will Smith claimed $443,607 per minute during King Richard. Playing the father of Serena and Venus Williams, Smith’s 90.17-minute performance earned rave reviews. Unfortunately, his Best Actor success in 2022 was overshadowed by an incident involving host, Chris Rock, just moments earlier in the ceremony.
Completing the top five are Ryan Gosling (fourth) and Cooper (fifth), for their roles in ‘Barbie’ and ‘A Star Is Born’. Gosling earned $431,332 per minute; an astonishing 218% more than co-star America Ferrara, who made $135,563 per minute and, like Gosling, was nominated in a support category in 2024.
Hollywood pay gap still a barrier for leading actresses
Out of the top 10, only two women featured on the list when viewing the highest paid Oscar nominees per minute.
Academy legend Meryl Streep earned $353,153 per minute when nominated for ‘The Post’ in 2018 in the Best Actress category, putting her eighth overall. Octavia Spencer, nominated for Best Supporting Actress in the same year for ‘The Shape of Water’, made $314,848 per minute, putting her ninth.
Women did cover most of the highest earners between the 11th-20th spots, with honourable mentions going to Sally Hawkins ($300,044 per minute) for ‘The Shape of Water’, Nicole Kidman (Lion) making a cool $288,065 per minute, plus two-time Academy winner Emma Stone and three-time Best Actress winner Frances McDormand also earning over $270,000 per minute each for their roles in ‘La La Land’ and ‘Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri’.
Many of the lower totals earned per minute for Oscar nominees featured women, including Andrea Riseborough, who earned just $403 per minute despite being nominated in the Best Actress category for ‘To Leslie’ in 2023.
Perhaps surprisingly, Olivia Colman also made the list when it came to lowest earners for an Oscar-nominated feature. ‘The Crown’ actress only made $15,060 per minute for her role as Queen Anne in ‘The Favourite’; an award she won in 2019. Colman discussed the gender pay gap in 2024, claiming that “she would make more money” if her first name was Oliver, rather than Olivia.
Are there any signs of change on the horizon?
Oscar-nominated men have earned $27,159 more than women per minute spent on screen over the last decade, while that trend continued in 2024 with Best Actor winner Cillian Murphy (Oppenheimer) earning $16,935 more than Best Actress winner Emma Stone (Poor Things).
The placings could be reversed in 2025, with Wicked set to enjoy a key part in the ceremony. Ariana Grande (Best Support) and Cynthia Erivo (Best Actress) will both see a fair share of the film’s revenue, with the likes of Adrien Brody (The Brutalist) and Timothee Chalamet (A Complete Unknown) settling for second best financially on this occasion. In a rare feat for Supporting Actresses, Grande’s earnings ($112,013 per minute) are above Erivo’s ($93,316) at the time of writing.
Assessing the earnings per category between 2015-2024, it’s clear that more work must be done to bridge the Hollywood pay gap. The highest earning categories per minute since 2015 can be viewed below in bold.
- Best Actor nominees: $100,905
- Best Actress nominees: $65,395
- Best Actor winners: $115,715
- Best Actress winners: $86,527
- Best Supporting Actor nominees: $110,311
- Best Supporting Actress nominees: $80,925
- Best Supporting Actor winners: $84,011
- Best Supporting Actress winners: $25,160
Conclusion
Matthew Stewart, founder of Screen Time Central, believes that the parallels between screen time and salary data can show a mixed path to success.
“The last 10 years’ worth of Oscar nominee screen time and salary data clearly shows that larger paychecks usually do not lead to awards success. That’s bad news for Wicked star Ariana Grande, who stands apart from her fellow 2025 acting Oscar contenders in having earned more than $100,000 per minute on screen. Supporting nominees like her tend to fare better when their earnings per minute are below average, while the opposite is true for lead nominees.
“Last year, three of the four nominees whose per-minute earnings most closely aligned with their respective categories’ winner averages managed to bring home the gold, with Sterling K. Brown (American Fiction) being the odd one out.
“Using past screen time trends to estimate the performance lengths of 2025 nominees whose films are still playing exclusively in theaters, those closest to the current earnings per minute winner averages are lead actress Demi Moore (The Substance) and A Complete Unknown trio Timothée Chalamet, Monica Barbaro and Edward Norton.”
Methodology
We analysed revenue data from all films featuring nominated actors or actresses in the categories of Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress between 2015-2025. Data for 2025 is still not fully independently verified, as revenue figures are not up to date and complete.
As a guide, 9.07% of film revenue was used to calculate the Best Actor and Actress categories, with 3.33% utilised for the Supporting Actor and Actress sections.
Screen time data via Screen Time Central was then utilised to provide earning per minute projections for each nominated actor and actress. Revenue figures were sourced via BoxOfficeMojo. In rare instances where film revenues could not be source, net worths of the actors and actresses were utilised.
Fair Use
Feel free to use the data or visuals on this page for non-commercial purposes. Please be sure to include proper attribution by linking back to this page to give credit to the authors.
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