Disney and Marvel are reportedly spending untold millions to bring Robert Downey Jr. and the Russo Bros. back into the folds of the MCU.
According to a new report from Variety, Disney and Marvel have agreed to pay Anthony and Joe Russo an impressive $80 million to direct both Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars. Though the outlet cannot provide a precise integer, the companies’ plan to pony up “significantly more” that that in tribute to actor Robert Downey Jr., who’s shock announcement as the MCU’s Victor von Doom rocked San Diego Comic-Con this past weekend.
As the article additionally notes, the Russos’ deal “doesn’t include back-end compensation, but it does contain performance escalators that kick in at the $750 million and $1 billion thresholds.” The deal also allows the brothers to co-produce both films under their own production label, AGBO, rather than in-house directly at Marvel Studios, a rarity for the studio. Meanwhile, Downey’s perks are said to include “private jet travel, dedicated security and a whole trailer encampment” during filming entirely for himself.
This somewhere north-of-eighty-million dollar score on Downey’s behalf immediately elevates him to highest paid actor ever for a back-to-back production, usurping Keanu Reeves’ $30,000,000 payday for The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions in 2003. While we do not know exactly how much money he’s been hired to return for, Tom Cruise and Will Smith have both made over $100 million for individual films–the former for Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, the latter for Men in Black 3–making the actor’s offer of at least $40,000,000 per film appear comparatively modest.
io9 reached out to Disney for comment on the report, and will update this post if we hear back.
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