For the past few years, cinema fanatics have been worried about box office numbers having slight drops offs from the glory they used to achieve. One of the causes of this concerning fact is speculated by many to be the lack of “movie stars” that seems to be a prominent topic of discussion about Hollywood. Many are worried that there’s not any actors and actresses to get butts in seats immediately anymore simply because of their acting reputation. A list actors show up and show out to big movies all the time, yet many still fall flat on their faces at the box office. Nowadays, big names can pop up on a film and many still have a lack of interest in the movie despite their favorite actor being in it which could boost the fun of the experience. Makes you wonder: are movie stars becoming faint memories or all but myths in today’s modern landscape of movie entertainment?
Before that question is answered, you must first define the term of what a movie star actually is. It seems simple enough: an actor all eyes are glued to no matter what, someone the general public will hop out their chairs at home just to see in theaters. And that truly is a decent definition for it, but there’s even more sectors of criteria to be a movie star you can fit that description into. All of these criteria are not exactly criteria each actor or actress has to have every single one of to be considered the coveted movie star, but at least checking one or two boxes could easily fit them into the description of a movie star. One of the most important criteria in my eyes is that the buzz of the film is always enhanced by the talks around their performance. To have a mark of consistency as a prominent movie star throughout your career, you need to literally be one of the stars of the show. Getting buzz over their performance in the film is basically free promo for it that builds up excitement in at least one aspect of the movie for audiences not immediately interested in the premise. That consistency in being the talk of the town in movies, is also what eventually lands those actors the privilege of constantly being sought after for more and more big movies. The second box to check off for being a movie star is being able to carry original movies or films from smaller studios.
Original blockbusters or films from smaller companies like A24 or Neon, at times struggle to get a broad mainstream appeal with a lack of having a sense of established target audiences in the general public prior to even promoting it. Actors boosting a smaller film’s reach from their name, proves that their popularity alone can bring an impact in any space, even with little beginning ground to work with from a large studio or popular IP throwing them out there. Another sign of being a movie star as I mentioned a bit earlier, could be the fact of being consistently sought after for lead roles in movies. Booked and busy for 2-3 movies a year is a big indicator that studios trust that actor to deliver on a role and catch the eye of many to bring the popularity of the film up. They’ve seen the reputation of acting that person has put in and the box office resume, and see it as legitimate enough of a pull from that actor’s name alone. So with all this criteria, that seems like a recipe for marketing success, which also makes it seem like an oddity that it’s beginning not to work. Big ticket actors no longer have quite the same pull as they used to and companies are starting to promote around the film narrative rather than the actors playing the characters within it.
The primary reason Hollywood’s began to shift slightly away from the traditional movie star tactic is because fans crave good stories which trumps good actors in this day and age of so much mediocrity propped up by production companies in the mainstream circle. the mainstream movie world is filled with recycles of lazy remakes or cash grabs void of substance, which makes even a good actor being in it unappealing. If there’s no script to help them show off how good of a dynamic performer they are, then what good does the movie star in it make at that point? At that rate of strategy, it’s a flat out waste of their talent and potential to put out more emotionally nuanced performances. Now with that, the new move should be expected to go back to putting out original movies with a quality of intuition and inspiration to them, not just bare minimum art slapped together for a hollywood paycheck. The bar for what brings people to theaters has gotten higher for audiences as the bar for what’s worth a studio greenlighting has gotten frustratingly lower. There’s a certain point where solely actor popularity is enough to get butts in seats, but it’s nowhere near a bankable enough strategy now with the repetitiveness of it leading to devaluing attempts at taking shots on original and intellectual films beyond shock value entertainment.
It’s a quiet insult to market only entertainment over true substance movies to audiences, with it being a sign that CEOs and blockbuster filmmakers don’t trust casual fans to understand messages with greater profound meaning or subtle nature. Despite this reason for the shift, there are still a select few movie stars left in this generation of actors that fit well into the mold of that criteria. Zendaya is one of the most obvious options out of the pack currently. Pedaling off her fame from past endeavors like Disney and Spiderman, she’s now even more heavily sought after by Hollywood, currently starring In multiple projects this year like Euphoria, Dune Part Three, and The Odyssey to name a few, all of them being big productions that the filmmakers see fit to higher the biggest A-listers for. She’s also led smaller budget original films like her most recent one “The Drama” with that film already garnering over $60 million at the box office on just a $25 million dollar budget. Another one that could fit the billing is easily Timothee Chalamet, being known for his range of roles in recent years and plethora of roles enough to get him in two Oscar nominated films in the same year, one being Dune Part Two and the other A Complete Unknown. He also recently propelled Marty Supreme to a box office hit of being A24’s highest grossing film from his aggressive marketing campaign majority led by himself, as well as riding off the hype his performance got from critics & audiences as his best performance yet.
Michael B Jordan is also a notable actor who propped himself up as a movie star. While Black Panther mainly was a success at the box office due to its unprecedented representation for a marvel movie, his iconic villain performance as Erik Killmonger was still one of the main talking points of the discourse that made the film talked about more and more. Sinners is another example, with audiences shocked and impressed with his dual performances as the Smoke Stack twins in the film. His tight bond with Ryan Coogler to have 5 collabs with each other, also shows a mutual trust that Michael can deliver a good performance to have audiences in awe to go see it. The last example that comes to mind is Ryan Gosling. He’s been in a multitude of staples in popular cinema talked about all the time in modern day like La La Land, Drive and Barbie. He’s also formed a distinct identity as an actor that consistently has people coming back to see him. He’s managed to gain a notoriety off of his dynamic acting range, being able to seamlessly switch between emotionally poignant characters to charming comedic ones. Project Hail Mary is the biggest example of that audience pull within his character he plays, Ryland Grace, with the film soaring to $500 million at the box office thus far. The movie star isn’t exactly dead in the waters just yet. There’s still plenty of examples of so many beyond the few I just listed. But the main lesson gotten across with this is, maybe studios should focus on a story worth understanding rather than strictly a popular actor seemingly worth the attention of fans in order to keep mainstream cinema a thriving lane.
