8 Supporting Actors Who Were Paid SIGNIFICANTLY More Than The Main Star

4. Sigourney Weaver Made More Than Sam Worthington (Avatar)

Dr Grace Augustine Avatar Sigourney Weaver
20th Century Studios

With $2.7 billion in the bank, Avatar was the highest-grossing movie of all time for almost a decade, only being overtaken by Avengers: Endgame in the summer of 2019. But surprisingly, none of the actors involved were paid mega-high salaries.

According to The New York Times, even the legendary Sigourney Weaver - despite being the "highest paid" - didn't earn a great deal, working for a "small fraction" of the $11 million she earned on 1997's Alien Resurrection.

Meanwhile, Zoe Saldana and Sam Worthington (the latter being the lead of the movie) made even less than Weaver, and amazingly, their fees didn't make them feel "financially secure". They undoubtedly made more money in backend points and residuals and things like that, but their upfront numbers were, reportedly, paltry.

On the plus side, there are roughly four thousand Avatar movies still to come, so all the actors involved will be making some serious green over the next couple of years.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!