Vulture’s Most Valuable Stars of 2014

Were it anyone but Leo, there's no way that Warner Bros. would have financed a period like The Great Gatsby to the tune of $105 million. Were it anyone but Leo, Martin Scorsese might not have gotten away with a theatrical cut of The Wolf of Wall Street that ran a gargantuan three hours. But because both films did star Leonardo DiCaprio — the rare star who can not only get an auteur drama financed but then turn it into a smash hit — studio executives were willing to take the sort of risks that don't come naturally in today's franchise-driven movie world. If DiCaprio didn't consistently seek out challenging films like The Revenant, the one he's currently shooting from director Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman), the modern movie landscape would look very different.

Photo: Jason Merritt

It's not a bad time to be George Clooney, folks. He had the biggest hit of his career supporting Sandra Bullock in Gravity, his marriage to Amal Alamuddin gave him a sky-high tabloid score, and even his directorial effort Monuments Men, which opened weakly, eventually made enough to be considered amongst his highest grossers. if next year's Brad Bird–directed fantasy film Tomorrowland is a success, that could give Clooney the high foreign grosses he'd need to start moving up into the highest echelons of this list.

Photo: Chris Jackson

What a difference a year makes: In 2013, Matthew McConaughey began to climb the Most Valuable Stars list thanks to a series of well-received indies and supporting roles. This time around, he leapt all the way into the Top 20 (and his studio score surged to one of the highest numbers in our 100) on the back of his Dallas Buyers Club Oscar win and a stunning turn on HBO's True Detective. Codifying his ascent: A lead role in Christopher Nolan's sure-to-be-blockbuster Interstellar, which could give him the box-office muscle he needs to vault into next year's Top 10.

Photo: Frederick M. Brown

That Oscar-nominated, va-va-va-voom turn in American Hustle bumped up Amy Adams's studio value this year, and Hollywood's more bullish on her than ever, even if the Man of Steel franchise she was meant to co-lead has now been overstuffed with so many other superheroes that she's now an ensemble player. But it's telling that Adams is now bankable enough to lead films like this winter's Tim Burton–directed period drama Big Eyes on her own — in a role that was once earmarked for Reese Witherspoon at her height, no less.

Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris

Shailene Woodley made the highest debut on this list, landing in the Top 25 off this year's one-two punch of Divergent (which gave her a big franchise) and The Fault in Our Stars (where she got to show off her tearjerking dramatic chops). She's still got room to grow — her awareness is the lowest in the Top 50, with young women comprising the majority of her fan base — but a strong studio score means that Hollywood is determined to make her a household name.

Photo: Stephen Lovekin

Meryl Streep has long been one of our most reliable actresses, but even she couldn't push August: Osage County over $40 million, and YA hopeful The Giver didn't get much further than that. Both of those disappointments dinged Streep's studio score a bit, but if Into the Woods is a big splash this December, she should bounce back.

Photo: C Flanigan

After she won the Oscar for 2012's Les Misérables, Anne Hathaway took a concerted step back, vanishing from the screen for two years. Did her hiatus manage to quell the persistent cries of so-called “Hatha-hate”? Well, her likabilty score did tick up a few notches in the interim, but the truth is, Hathaway's always done well with the general public (as opposed to the rabid bloggerazzi), and she couldn't have picked a better comeback vehicle to reappear in: She's the female lead in Christopher Nolan's Interstellar.

Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris

With the Harry Potter franchise behind him, Daniel Radcliffe starred in two well-reviewed indies, Kill Your Darlings and What If, which did negligible business over the past year. That's why Radcliffe has one of the lowest studio scores in our Top 50, but he'll return to the big-money fold with next year's Frankenstein, and he's still unique on this list as the only man in the 25-and-under age group. With those things going for him and his Harry Potter halo still potent, Radcliffe will have no trouble getting hired.

Photo: Pascal Le Segretain

Comic-Con appeal doesn't always cross over into the real world, but when Benedict Cumberbatch made his first appearance at the San Diego geek convention this summer, fan screams could be heard all the way up in Hollywood executive suites. He's got plenty of fantasy appeal after making Star Trek Into Darkness and the Hobbit films, but Cumberbatch will position himself as one of our foremost serious actors this fall with the WWII drama The Imitation Game, an early Oscar favorite.

Photo: Anthony Harvey

Natalie Portman's on pause. Yes, she had a big hit recently with Thor: The Dark World, but we hear she's trying to wriggle out of that series, and the Thor sequel was the first movie she'd made in ages after becoming a mother. On the other side of that pregnancy (and her Oscar win for Black Swan), Portman seems more intrigued by behind-the-camera work, producing the troubled Jane's Got a Gun and making her directorial debut with A Tale of Love and Darkness. Can she be enticed back into the studio fold?

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Kate Winslet's “what the hell” decision to come onboard Divergent for a few days of work and a hefty paycheck actually paid off: The smash-hit franchise-starter gave Winslet some high-exposure work (she'll be returning for next year's sequel Insurgent) and helped lift the taint of her last two flops, Labor Day and Carnage. Still, Winslet is one of the most acclaimed actresses of her generation, with the Oscar score to prove it … can't we find her some better work these days than easy-money supporting parts?

Photo: Leonard Adam

Why did Cate Blanchett drop down on our list during a year that saw her take home an Oscar for Blue Jasmine? It's because over the five-year period we measured, Blanchett's career was far more skewed toward supporting roles — as in this year's Monuments Men — instead of leads, which incurred a Most Valuable Stars penalty. (Perhaps that's why Blanchett was so vociferous during awards season when she said that Hollywood needed to create more strong roles for women.) Fortunately, things are looking up for Blanchett, who's got a passel of intriguing projects due next year, including the thriller Carol from Todd Haynes and Kenneth Branagh's remake of Cinderella, where she plays the Wicked Stepmother.

Photo: Lennart Preiss

Gyllenhaal's recent predilection for indies and tough dramas has kept his studio score low, but could he be on the verge of a major resurgence? His career-best work in Nightcrawler has caught the eye of Hollywood power players, and he's currently shooting a film with director Jean-Marc Vallee, who engineered comebacks for Matthew McConaughey and Reese Witherspoon with Dallas Buyers Club and Wild. More telling is Gyllenhaal's willingness to throw his name into the ring for Marvel's Doctor Strange casting derby. After Prince of Persia burned him, is Gyllenhaal ready to pursue franchise superstardom?

Photo: Noam Galai

One of the most acclaimed actors of all time, Daniel Day-Lewis has a stunning three Best Actor Oscars and is coming off the biggest film of his career, Lincoln. The only fly in the ointment? Day-Lewis is so selective that no one has any idea when he'll work again. Still, execs are confident in his abilities, giving him a high studio score that belies his middle-of-the-pack placement.

Photo: Jemal Countess

It's fitting that Fassbender is ranked just under Daniel Day-Lewis on our Most Valuable Stars list, since he takes after Day-Lewis with his potent blend of leading-man sex appeal and character-actor chops. Fassbender, though, is more than willing to play the studio game, mixing up gigs like his Oscar-nominated 12 Years a Slave turn with the X-Men franchise, where he plays the villainous Magneto. If only people knew who he was: Though he's a big name in Hollywood, Fassbender still has one of the lowest awareness scores on this list.

Photo: Noam Galai

Emma Watson has taken her post-Potter career very carefully, signing on for supporting roles in films as disparate as The Perks of Being a Wallflower, The Bling Ring, and Noah. Can she carry her own film, though? She'll soon star with Ethan Hawke in Regression, the latest chiller from Alejandro Amenábar (The Others), and then sing and dance with Miles Teller in the musical La-La Land, but studios have yet to find the right vehicle that takes advantage of her sky-high appeal scores.

Photo: Robin Marchant

At 17, Chloë Moretz is the youngest entrant on the Most Valuable Stars list, and certainly, she has a knack for getting cast: She toplined movies like If I Stay and the Carrie remake, co-starred in the Best Picture nominee Hugo, and won her prostitute role in The Equalizer while opposite a host of actresses in their 20s. Still, Moretz is looking for a breakout role as a young adult akin to the one she had as a teen in Kick-Ass. She's a red-carpet staple who's well known to her target demographic but has yet to land the kind of event movies that made Shailene Woodley a star.

Photo: D Dipasupil

Bridges spent years trying to produce Lois Lowry's The Giver for the screen, and though he eventually found financing because the story was superficially similar to a rash of other successful, dystopic YA novels, that feeling of numbing sameness also held The Giver back, and it premiered to so-so box office. We fear, then, that Bridges is in a bit of a rut: The Giver was his follow-up to the disastrous R.I.P.D., but he has the equally shady effects vehicle The Seventh Son coming out next year after years of delay.

Photo: Gary Gershoff

The right-left-right punch of Mamma Mia, A Single Man, and The King's Speech was supposed to raise Colin Firth's profile to the point where he wouldn't be consigned to fusty Masterpiece Theater vehicles. As his recent efforts like The Railway Man and Arthur Newman prove, that happened anyway. Firth did get to star in Woody Allen's latest, but it's next spring's amped-up action vehicle Kingsman: The Secret Service that could finally start turning his stuffy screen image on its ear.

Photo: Dave J Hogan

For years, Javier Bardem was one of Hollywood's most elusive talents, constantly flirting with big studio roles and then withdrawing at the last minute. It's a miracle that Skyfall managed to retain his services, but that huge hit may have coaxed Bardem to accept a paycheck role now and then, as he's currently in negotiation to play the baddie in the next Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Let's just hope that Hollywood can start offering him more than just villains.

Photo: Carlos Alvarez

Jessica Chastain is doing everything right as her career takes off: She's picking interesting Oscar-nominated roles in good indies and smart studio movies, her glamorous looks have earned her countless magazine covers, and she's conducting herself with grace and good cheer. That said, her awareness levels are still awfully low, which may explain why our studio execs have always given her a just-okay score instead of one with real heat. Maybe her centerpiece role in Christopher Nolan's Interstellar will finally convince them.

Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris

With the final Twilight movie nearly two years gone and a series of indies since that have struggled to even break $1 million, Kristen Stewart plummeted down this list, and maybe that's what she needed right now: The E-Poll audience called her “overexposed,” thanks to high tabloid value and a critically derided franchise that Stewart herself seemed to bristle against. One silver lining: Stewart was the least-liked star on last year's list, but that likability metric has slowly begun to tick up, suggesting that some time away from the spotlight has done her good.

Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris

Lupita Nyong'o proved to be awards season's most captivating presence, turning heads on the red carpet, touching hearts with her emotional speeches, and eventually taking home the Oscar for her film debut in 12 Years a Slave. Off that significant launchpad, Nyong'o booked a supporting role in Star Wars: Episode VII … but thus far, Hollywood has not stepped up to offer her the leads she deserves. We hold out hope, especially because Nyong'o's appeal score is one of the highest on this list (and a mere percentage point less than our No. 1, Jennifer Lawrence).

Photo: Paul Morigi

Keira Knightley got two of her best roles this year — in Begin Again and Laggies — when Anne Hathaway dropped out of them, which sort of sums up her current career conundrum: She's the go-to gal for period pieces like The Imitation Game (which she might get an Oscar nomination for), but when it comes to contemporary movies, Knightley still hasn't made a strong connection. Still, for as long as Hollywood is making corset dramas, she'll always have a niche.

Photo: Jason Merritt

Sean Penn doesn't work all that much, but lately, he's been signaling a willingness to try out traditional studio fare: After playing the baddie in Gangster Squad, he signed up for The Gunman, the latest action flick from Taken director Pierre Morel (and convinced Javier Bardem and Idris Elba to come aboard, too). Penn is revered by other actors, but his likability scores are low thanks to his polarizing political activism, though his post-divorce penchant for dating beautiful starlets has raised his tabloid value in recent years.

Photo: Kevin Winter

Julianne Moore slipped down this list after a string of mild indie movies like The English Teacher and Being Flynn, but a comeback is imminent: She was heralded at Cannes for her work in David Cronenberg's Maps to the Stars, and things got even better when her Alzheimer's drama Still Alice debuted at the Toronto Film Festival and spurred buzz that she might finally win her first Oscar. That's right: Julianne Moore, one of our best very actresses, has never gotten an Oscar. Next year, if pundit predictions hold and Moore takes home the gold, expect her to leap up this list.

Photo: Robin Marchant

In recent years, Joaquin Phoenix has fashioned himself into a gonzo director's muse, the sort of actor willing to go to vulnerable extremes in movies like The Master and Her. Neither of those titles were big box-office hits, but they earned him the best critics' score on this list, and Phoenix's studio value may rise if his recent flirtations with superhero movies — he was pursued to play Lex Luthor in Batman v Superman, and talked extensively with Marvel about the title role in Doctor Strange — are finally borne out.

Photo: Slaven Vlasic

With Twilight well behind him, Pattinson has nearly slipped off this list, but he doesn't seem to have studio stardom in his sights, anyway. Instead, he'd rather lend his name and foreign appeal to interesting indies like The Rover, Maps to the Stars, and Werner Herzog's Queen of the Desert, and who can fault that strategy? Still, his tabloid value remains high, especially as Pattinson starts publicly romancing singer FKA Twigs.

Photo: George Pimentel

It's debatable whether Eastwood ever wants to act again, though he remains a key player at Warner Bros, where he's made virtually all of his movies for the last 15 years. He cast Bradley Cooper in his coming awards contender American Sniper, but Eastwood's name still means a lot as a director, and if the 84-year-old deigned to act one more time, WB would no doubt jump at the chance.

Photo: Gilbert Carrasquillo

Waltz has won two Oscars in just five years, an incredible feat. It's just that no one knows who the hell he is: Waltz has got the absolute lowest awareness score on this entire list. Tim Burton's winter entry Big Eyes could help — though we hear he's a bit cartoonish in his role opposite Amy Adams — and next year's Tarzan may give him an actual franchise, but it's just as likely that Waltz will continue his acclaimed run without your mother ever quite learning his name.

Photo: Kevin Mazur

Penelope Cruz is famous and desired enough that she can be named Esquire's sexiest woman alive even in a year where she has no new movie coming out. That hiatus dropped her down a bit on this list, though, and her only coming movie of note is Grimsby, a comedy starring Sacha Baron Cohen, who's also seen better days. Fingers crossed something good comes along soon.

Photo: Jason Merritt

2013 proved to be one of the more disastrous years of Naomi Watts's carefully managed career. Yes, there was that Oscar nomination for the previous year's The Impossible, but then she followed it up with the critically derided duo of Adore (where she seduces her friend's son) and Diana (where she was pilloried for playing the famous princess). Still, she's moved on smartly as part of the comic ensembles in St. Vincent and Birdman, and she has the female lead in the next movie from Wild/Dallas Buyers Club director Jean-Marc Vallee.

Photo: Steve Granitz