All Actors Who Have Had Back-to-Back Billion Dollar Movies (Across Different Franchises)

Summary

• Only 9 actors have appeared consecutively in multiple billion-dollar films from separate franchises.
• Samuel L. Jackson leads with $10 billion in total films; Benicio del Toro and Andy Serkis are part of the exclusive group.
• Historical actors like James Earl Jones and Lupita Nyong'o have also accomplished this feat.

While billion-dollar films are becoming more and more common, there are still very few actors who have worked on different billion dollar franchises, not to mention releasing two films to cross this threshold consecutively. In 1998, Titanic became the first film to gross over $1 billion upon release. However, it took another 5 years for another film to reach the same milestone, with The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King becoming the second in 2003.

In the entire history of the box office, just over 50 films have managed to gross over $1 billion (via Deadline). Nearly a fifth of that total is in the MCU, but overall, each of these films belongs to a larger franchise or is part of a popular intellectual property, with the exception of Titanic. As the box office continues to grow and more films cross the threshold, actors appearing in these landmark films are becoming more common, but so far only nine actors have managed to stand out. appearing in several billion-dollar filmsin separate franchises, back to back.

9 Samuel L. Jackson

Avengers: Infinity War and Incredibles 2

Samuel L. Jackson is an incredibly talented actor with a wealth of experience. He has appeared in several of the biggest franchises of all time, including Star Warsthe MCU, jurassic parkand Disney Pixar The Incredibles. In total he appeared in the the most billionaire films with 10 distinct films in his filmography (via Business Insider). Of course, this also led to the close release of two of these films, with Avengers: Infinity War And Incredibles 2 both released in 2018.

8 Andy Serkis

Avengers: Age of Ultron and Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Black Panther

Andy Serkis comes in close behind with franchises of three billion dollars; The Lord of the Ringsthe MCU and Star Wars, and a total of seven separate films worth a billion dollars. Even though Serkis has fewer billion-dollar films, he has also managed to achieve success consecutively releasing several billion-dollar films. In 2015, Serkis appeared in Avengers: Age of Ultron as Ulysses Klaue, and later that year in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, where he was the voice and motion capture actor for Supreme Leader Snoke. Then Serkis did it again in 2017 and 2018 with The Last JediAnd Black Panther.

7 Lupita Nyong'o

Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Black Panther

Sharing the screen with Serkis for these last two projects, Lupita Nyong'o joined the exclusive club of actors to shoot two multi-billion dollar films in quick succession while the circus repeated its success. Nyong'o voiced Maz Kanata in Star Wars for the next three films, while she also played Nakia, T'Challa's love interest in Black Panther. This also means that Lupita Nyong'o is one of only two women to achieve this milestoneand the first woman to do so.

6 Benicio del Toro

Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Avengers: Infinity War

Benicio del Toro also managed to join the club with his billionaire films released in 2017 and 2018. Like Serkis and Nyong'o, he appeared in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. However, his the billion-dollar follow-up shot was Avengers: Infinity War. Benicio played the role of DJ, short for “Don't Join” in The Last Jedi, where he offers his help as a codebreaker to Finn, but quickly abandons him at the first sign of trouble. In Infinity Wardel Toro reprized his MCU role of The Collector, although this Collector is technically an illusion created by the Reality Stone in Thanos' hands.

5 Alan Tudyk

Aladdin and Frozen II

Alan Tudyk is an incredibly popular voice actor who also frequently appears on camera. However, his two consecutive billion-dollar films were for voice roles as part of two different Disney properties. Tudyk made the list thanks to his work as Iago in the live-action Aladdin film, and voicing the Duke of Weselton in Frozen II, both in 2019. Tudyk also appeared in Deadpool 2and characters voiced in video games for both Star Wars and the MCU, although he hasn't appeared in any main films so far.

4 Chris Pratt

Avengers: Infinity War and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Chris Pratt is another big star who is collect franchises worth billions of dollarslike the recent The Super Mario Bros. movie.the MCU and the Jurassic world franchise where he played the lead role. In 2018, he had an incredibly successful year with back-to-back releases grossing well over $1 billion. Like the hero Peter Quill, aka Star-Lord in Avengers: Infinity WarAnd Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom like Owen Grady. As Pratt ventures into more voiceover roles and major IP, he will likely repeat this success in the future.

3 James Earl Jones

The Lion King and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

Another actor who managed to achieve this success through his roles in major films is the legendary actor James Earl Jones. Jones is to date the oldest actor to achieve this feat.aged 88 in 2019 when he appeared in the live-action The Lion KingAnd Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Jones voiced Mufasa in The Lion Kingreprising the role he originally played in the 1994 animated original, and as the voice of Darth Vader in Star Warsagain a role he originally played in the 1977 film Star Wars film, although he was uncredited at the time.

2 Florence Kasumba

Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and The Lion King (2019)

Florence Kasumba may be the least known name on this list, but she's another incredibly talented actress with a long list of impressive credits, two of which managed to rack up over $1 billion with back-to-back releases in 2018 and 2019. In the MCU, Kasumba plays Ayo, a Dora Milaje general who protects the leader of Wakanda. She played this role in both Black Panther movies and Avengers: Infinity War. Then, in the live-action The Lion King film, she was voiced by Shenzi, the female hyena who is loyal to Scar for much of the film.

1 Luke Evans

Beauty and the Beast and Fast & Furious 8 (both 2017)

While Andy Serkis was the first person to appear in back-to-back billion-dollar films, Luke Evans followed closely, managing to do the same in 2017. Luke Evans played Gaston in the live-action version of The beauty and the Beastthen shortly after he appeared as Owen Shaw in Fast and Furious 8. Both roles were important in their franchises and managed to bring Luke Evans into the incredible exclusive group of actors to leave this incredible mark on cinema.