Stupid Forbes List Lists Black Actors 3 of 10 Worst

By Alan Smithee

Blacks make up 13% of the national population but evidently 30% of the Hollwood actors with the worst return on investment according to a very stupid and ignorant Forbes list. How about retitling the poll: "More Stupid Ways To Make Blacks Look Bad in Hollywood." Forbes's 10 most overpaid stars (in order) were: Ferrell ($3.29); Ewan McGregor ($3.75); Billy Bob Thornton ($4); Eddie Murphy ($4.43); Ice Cube ($4.77); Cruise ($7.18); Drew Barrymore ($7.43); Leonardo DiCaprio ($7.52); Samuel Jackson ($8.59); Jim Carrey ($8.62). How in the world do you put Sam Jackson's name on a list like that when his movie grosses are the highest of any actor in the history of Hollywood? Leave it to Forbes. Next they will have Oprah going to the welfare office to get food stamps.

To create their list, they looked at the 100 biggest stars in Hollywood. To qualify, each actor had to have starred over the last five years in at least three movies that opened in more than 500 theaters. Forbes calculated each star's estimated earnings on each film, including up-front pay and any earnings from the film's box office receipts, DVD and TV sales. They then looked at each movie's estimated budget (not including marketing costs, which are susceptible to accounting chicanery) and box office, DVD and television earnings to figure out an operating income for each film. They added up each star's compensation on his or her last three films and the operating income on those films and divided total operating income by the star's total compensation to come up with each return-on-investment number. Yeah. Right. Okay. Uh huh. Sure.

As hard as it is for Blacks to get work in Hollywood, they sure do not need their biggest stars disproportionately included in some stupid list with a cooked formula that somehow manages to include Eddie Murphy, Ice Cube and Samual L. Jackson. Oh you can say it lists top white stars too, but if you look at the list of successful working actors in Hollywood, I think you will see that Blacks are disproportionately underrepresented on that list. How about it Forbes? (Complete List with Pictures)