No Oscars but plenty of millions: how Adam Sandler rewrote the rules of Hollywood and why streaming has made him the highest-paid actor in the world

The old Hollywood rules have been thrown out: box office records and awards are no longer needed to dominate the industry. This is confirmed by the latest ranking from Forbes, reported by Repubblica, which crowns Adam Sandler as the highest-paid actor in the world,

Margot Robbie is the highest-ranked woman and comes in at second place in the new Forbes list of “Hollywood's Richest,” being by far the youngest among those listed. The 33-year-old actress, also involved as a producer of the summer blockbuster inspired by the Mattel doll, earned $59 million last year.

At the top is Adam Sandler with $73 million, resulting from a comedy tour with 44 stops and the Netflix rom-com “Murder Mystery 2,” which is the fifth title by number of downloads on the platform, with 173 million total viewing hours.

Following are Tom Cruise and Mark Wahlberg, confirming a structural paradigm shift: today, the center of power lies in the ability to dominate streaming and to secure multi-year, multi-platform deals.

Sandler's top position is not incidental, but the result of his extraordinary “value to platforms”, particularly Netflix. The 54-year-old actor ensures a steady stream of original titles that, while far from traditional box office logic, enhance “retention,” loyalizing subscribers and mitigating the risk of cancellations.

Sandler combines acting and producing, earning additional fees and profit shares, and benefits from recurring revenues generated by a vast catalog of past successes.

A model that finds a parallel in Mark Wahlberg, who has become a “king of streaming” thanks to high-rotation titles and intense activity as an executive producer.

Different, but equally successful, is Tom Cruise's approach, which represents a true lesson in finance applied to cinema. The theatrical release is for him a powerful economic accelerator. His compensation is based on a sophisticated contractual engineering: alongside an initial fee, he receives profit shares and ancillary rights, with box office success acting as a multiplier for subsequent distribution windows and for streaming.

How are these figures calculated? The Forbes methodology estimates earnings related to entertainment net of agents' and lawyers' commissions, generally excluding personal income from advertising and endorsements. Hence the strong fluctuations year over year: Sandler, for example, went from an estimated $73 million in 2023 to $26 million in 2024, before rising again to $48 million in 2026.

These “step” variations are physiological and depend on production cycles and the generous “buyouts” from platforms, which prefer to pay large advances to acquire exclusive rights and sterilize the uncertainty of the box office.

However, the ranking also highlights the cracks and deep inequalities in the Hollywood system. The gender asymmetry stands out: the presence of only two women in the top ten indicates an ecosystem where the richest contracts, those that guarantee strong economic returns (back-end) and creative control, remain firmly in male hands.

Additionally, there is a marked age factor: the average age of the highest-paid stars often exceeds 50 years, a sign of how difficult it is for new talents to secure equally advantageous deals without an already established reputation.