Plot Twist: Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson Tops Forbes Highest Grossing Actors List

Let’s talk about how Dwayne Johnson was named the highest grossing actor of 2013. No seriously, you did not misread that. Thanks to profits from the incredibly successful Fast & Furious 6, The Rock has topped Forbes’ list of biggest earners for this year with his films making $1.3 bn this year. That’s cool, since Johnson seems like a pretty chilled and hardworking guy, etc.

That is what you would call a $1.3 billion smile.

But what about Robert Downey Jr. or F&F co-stars like Vin Diesel? Surely the man who starred in the highest grossing film of 2013 (Iron Man 3, in case you’ve spent most of this year in a cave with no wi-fi) must be somewhere around the top? That he is, in fact Downey took second place. This maybe because, while Iron Man 3 was a huge success at the box office, it was the actor’s only film this year, while Johnson starred in four, including blockbuster G.I. Joe: Retaliation and of course Fast & Furious 6.

Iron Man only got the silver this time around.

The third name on the list might also come as a surprise – it’s Steve Carrell. The actor made the list with $964m from the hugely successful animated sequel Despicable Me 2 and indie also-rans The Way Way Back and The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, which teaches you that a packed schedule really does pay off. As for the ladies, Sandra Bullock’s films came in first (and third overall) with The Heat and Gravity raking in a total of $862 million. Naturally, Jennifer Lawrence was the other female star to make the list, with $700 million putting her in tenth place.

Thanks to a packed schedule, Steve Carell came in third.

Forbes calculated the staggering numbers by tallying the worldwide box office hauls of all movies released during the past calendar year. If anything, these profits show that the movie industry is definitely far from stalling as some high-profile statements have led us to believe this year.

Sandra Bullock and Jennifer Lawrence were the only women to make the top 10 this year.