“I have a particular cinematic countenance that I carry into any movie, the same way that De Niro carries a malevolence into every role that he plays,” he told the New York Times in 2022 when asked if he was concerned about being put in a box. “There can be new ways to explore what that means. For example, when Clint Eastwood said, ‘You want to be Sully?’ I said to him, ‘I’ve sort of played that role before,’ and he said, “Yeah, you have.’ I took that as a challenge.” The star has embraced several new challenges and adventures throughout his career, from taking on a bad guy role (!) in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis to adding producing and writing credits to his resume. But at the root of it all, he’s still bit by the acting bug. “I still view myself as a guy who gets bit by a bug and I have to go off and explore,” he told Parade in 2009. “I hope I’m not done—geez, that’d be depressing wouldn’t it? I love being an actor. I love being a creative partner in any number of other films. I can’t imagine a life in which I don’t wake up every day and somehow try to figure out how to help somebody tell a story. So I always begin all over at square zero loving what I do.” Hanks banks plenty for his acting career, in addition to racking up plenty of prestigious awards—from back-to-back Oscars to the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Keep reading for everything we know about Tom Hanks’ net worth—and how he even funded scenes from Forrest Gump out of his own pocket.
How did Tom Hanks become famous?
Hanks first caught the acting bug when he watched his friend play Dracula in high school. “Up until then I’d had no clue that acting was ever an option,” he told Interview in 2016. “The next year I signed up for the drama class and tried out for the plays, and got into them, and had more fun than I could possibly imagine.” It would be man more years, however, before he scored his first movie role in the 1980 horror film He Knows You’re Alone, in addition to a breakout role in the sitcom Bosom Buddies. “You know, I was not an overnight sensation,” he added in the Times interview. “I had been in movies for a long time until I had enough opportunities and experience to realize that I don’t have to say yes to everything just because they’re offering me the gig. Some of that was, What am I going to do instead? Wait for the phone to ring? The phone rang! I said yes!” Starting with his role in A League of Their Own, he began his pivot from being known as a leading man in romance movies. “I was fortunate in that my sense of self and artistic thirst grew at the same time,” he continued. “I had done enough romantic leads in enough movies and had experienced enough compromise to say, I’m not even going to read those scripts anymore.”
What is Tom Hanks’ net worth in 2023?
Tom Hanks has an estimated net worth of $400 million, according to Celebrity Net Worth.
How much does Tom Hanks make per movie?
Hanks reportedly has a base salary of $25 million per movie, but often earns much more than that thanks to his box office power garnering him huge bonuses for movies like Forrest Gump, Saving Private Ryan and more.
How much did Tom Hanks make for Forrest Gump?
Hanks could buy a lot more than a box of chocolates with his Forrest Gump earnings. The star, who opted for performance-based pay for the film, walked home with an estimated $60 million of the film’s $680 million worldwide earnings, according to Entertainment Weekly. He also won the Oscar for Best Actor for the titular role, marking his second consecutive win. Sunset Boulevard/Getty Images Despite his high payday, Hanks even funded certain scenes out of pocket—a move that seemingly only increased his earnings in the end. He previously said that Paramount refused to fund the now-iconic scene of Gump running across the country, despite director Robert Zemeckis arguing it was important to the film. “And he said, ‘Well, this run is going to cost X amount of dollars.’ And it wasn’t cheap. And I said, ‘OK,” Hanks recounted on In Depth With Graham Bensinger in 2020. “He said, ‘You and I are going to split that amount, and we’re going to give it back [to Paramount]. We’ll give you the money back, but you guys [Paramount] are going to have to share the profits a little bit more.’ Which the studio said, ‘Fabulous, great. OK.’ And it was good for us, too.”
How much did Tom Hanks make for Toy Story?
Hanks’ Toy Story salary started off as much less than “infinity and beyond.” He and Tim Allen (who played Buzz Lightyear) each made just $50,000 for the first Pixar film, according to the Los Angeles Times. Hanks reportedly received a pay bump for reprising his role as Woody in the second and third films, however, with rumored salaries of $5 million and $15 million, respectively. It’s unclear how much he made for the fourth film in the franchise, which won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature. Disney/Pixar
How much did Tom Hanks get paid for Cast Away?
Hanks made $20 million for Cast Away according to Celebrity Net Worth. He also produced the film, which follows the story of a FedEx systems analyst executive, Chuck, who gets stranded in the Pacific Ocean following a plane crash. Although Chuck is trying to return to his girlfriend Kelly (played by Helen Hunt), the film also included a nod to Hanks’ real-life wife, Rita Wilson. Yup, Chuck’s Wilson Sporting Goods volleyball named Wilson wasn’t a coincidence. 20th Century Studios “[Cast Away] was written by Bill Broyles and that movie took about six years to figure out,” Hanks said on the Smartless podcast in 2021. “Bill Broyles and I started talking about it and we didn’t shoot it until six years later. He came up with the idea of a volleyball and he named it Wilson in honor of my beautiful bride.”
How much did Tom Hanks make for Polar Express?
You won’t believe how much Hanks made for his Polar Express roles (he voiced seven characters, to be exact). According to the Los Angeles Times, the actor and producer made a $40 million salary plus 20% of the first-dollar gross, which adds up to an estimated $100 million total. Warner Bros.
How much did Tom Hanks get paid for Captain Phillips?
The actor took home $15 million for taking on the titular role in Captain Phillips, according to Celebrity Net Worth. As for what he hopes audiences took home? “You can always try to do something,” he told Parade in 2013, when asked what he hoped people would take away from the movie. “Keep moving forward. Keep trying stuff.” Columbia Pictures He also discussed the multi-faceted challenges of playing a real-life person, saying: “I think it’s important not to redefine somebody’s motivations. [In a movie] you have to have people do or say things they never did or said, and be in places they never were. But you can take that to an extreme where it’s not really why this person does what he does, and that’s the key. You’ve got to be a journalist and a historian and a filmmaker all at the same time.”
How much did Tom Hanks get paid for 1883?
While it’s not publicly known how much Hanks made for his cameo in 1883, we know we have Tim McGraw to thank for the surprise appearance. “Tom and [his wife] Rita [Wilson] and Faith [Hill] and I have been friends for a long time,” McGraw told Entertainment Tonight in 2021. “So I gave Tom a call and just asked. He goes, ‘Tell me when to be there.’ And he showed up and did it and he killed it.” Paramount
How much did Tom Hanks make for Elvis?
While Elvis famously sings “one for the money, two for the show,” it’s unclear exactly how much money Hanks made for playing the iconic musician’s notorious manager Colonel Tom Parker in Elvis. In an interview with PEOPLE, he described Parker as “a man who brought joy into everything he did with just a little bit of larceny.” He jokingly added: “By the way I’ve incorporated some of those into my own life now. You learn a little something from every role, you know.” Warner Bros. Before he fully committed to the role, even using prosthetics to transform into the character, Hanks initially questioned his decision to star in the Luhrmann-directed biopic. “Baz talked about the Colonel as this great carney. Knowing that, the carney’s job is to bring people to the glittering lights on the outside of town, promise them something they’ve never experienced before, and then, almost giving it to them, at a cost,” he said of the role, which marks a break from the typically affable characters he’s played. “When he said that, I said, ‘I’m your man, now please show me a picture.’ When he showed me a picture of the Colonel I thought, ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’”
How much did Tom Hanks make for Pinocchio?
Hanks’ payday for Pinocchio isn’t publicly known. That said, his upfront fee was likely a bit higher than many of his other projects because the film was released right to Disney+, which means there wouldn’t be box office bonuses added to the back-end of his salary. Disney
How much did Tom Hanks make for Saving Private Ryan?
A combination of business savvy and box office power earned Hanks one of the biggest paydays of his time for Steven Spielberg’s Oscar-winning Saving Private Ryan in 1998, raking in between $30 million and $40 million from his upfront fee and back-end box office bonuses. DreamWorks Pictures
What has Tom Hanks produced?
Hanks has also stepped behind the camera and co-owns the production company Playtone with Gary Geotzman. The company was named after Play-Tone Records in the movie That Thing You Do (which Hanks wrote, directed and starred in). Hanks has 24 producing credits to date, per IMDb, including both films he starred in—such as Cast Away, The Polar Express, and Charlie Wilson’s War—and ones he didn’t, like Mamma Mia! and My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2. In April 2022, Playtone signed an exclusive multi-year deal with Apple TV+. The streaming service is already the home of the film Greyhound, which Hanks both wrote and starred in.
How much did Tom Hanks get paid for Carly Rae Jepsen video?
In 2015, the Oscar winner appeared in the music video for Carly Rae Jepsen’s single “I Really Like You.” He told E! News at the time that the cameo was a “fluke,” as he didn’t know the pop star prior to starring in the video. (Perhaps it had him saying, “Hey, I just met you and this is crazy”?) When asked how much he was paid for the gig, Hanks replied: “One word: gratis. I received no remuneration for it. I got a free sandwich at lunchtime, that was about it. No complaints.” Next, look back at Tom Hanks’ wisest quotes on life and love.
