(Credits: Far Out / Philippe Collard)
Looking at Forbes‘ 2025 list of the wealthiest female celebrities in America, something intriguing immediately rears its head. While ten of the top 13 powerhouses have acted in Hollywood movies over the years, none of them are actors by trade. The likes of Oprah Winfrey, Taylor Swift, Madonna, Rihanna, Beyonce Knowles, Selena Gomez, and Barbra Streisand are all better known as TV personalities or pop stars.
The first dyed-in-the-wool actor to appear on the list is in 14th place, with a mind-boggling net worth of $440million. This total makes her the wealthiest female actor in Hollywood and, in truth, she’s head and shoulders above even her closest competition.
The next richest Hollywood woman is Jessica Alba, who reportedly has a net worth of $390million thanks to the incredible success of her eco-friendly beauty business, The Honest Company. After her comes Jennifer Aniston, whose $330m comes from her lucrative movie roles and even more lucrative residual payments from Friends, which still bring in millions every single year.
However, who is the mystery woman at the top of the money pile in Hollywood? Some likely candidates might be Nicole Kidman, Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts, Scarlett Johansson, or Jennifer Lawrence, but in reality, it is none of those hugely famous stars. Instead, the wealthiest female actor is Reese Witherspoon, who hasn’t even appeared in a theatrically released film in seven years. What gives?
Well, there are a few factors that play into Witherspoon’s incredible ability to make money hand over fist, despite refusing to join Tom Cruise in his quest to keep movie theatres alive. Firstly, Witherspoon has turned her acting focus to television and streaming movies, with HBO’s Big Little Lies and the AppleTV+ hit The Morning Show (which paired her with Aniston) doing very well for her. On the other hand, the dismal Netflix film Your Place or Mine and Prime Video’s You’re Cordially Invited weren’t exactly anything to write home about, but they paid Witherspoon handsomely as actor and producer.
In truth, producing is the key to Witherspoon’s wealth. In 2016, she formed Hello Sunshine, a production company dedicated to telling female-driven stories, and everything she’s been involved in since has had her fingerprints all over it. She doesn’t only produce star vehicles for herself, either. Hello Sunshine produced Where the Crawdads Sing, which raked in $144million at the worldwide box office in 2022, the Prime Video show Daisy Jones & the Six, and the upcoming Elle, a TV spinoff of her iconic Elle Woods character from Legally Blonde.
“Hello Sunshine was created around the idea that media was largely dominated by male voices and male perspectives,” Witherspoon told Harper’s Bazaar. “So, to be able to create opportunities where women are telling their stories in their own words, you’re just getting a better perspective of the human experience.”
The smiling star, who by this point has become a full-blown media mogul, added that she doesn’t ever want to go back to the media landscape her grandmother and mum grew up in, when “women were so sublimated.” She argued, “It’s just a new time, a new era for women to succeed and excel, and I’m happy to be the rocket fuel they need.”
In 2021, Witherspoon sold a majority stake in Hello Sunshine to Candle Media in a deal valued at an eye-watering $900million. She did this at the height of a flurry of celebrity-fronted production houses being bought by investors. Striking while the iron was hot worked wonders for her, as even though the bubble subsequently burst and Hello Sunshine is now worth less than a third of that $900m valuation, the 18% stake she still owns continues to be highly profitable for her.
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