3 weeks Ago By Ewan Gleadow
Shrek lovers were left stunned after realising how much money the cast of animated hit were given to return to the series. The Hollywood franchise is set to receive a fifth instalment starring Zendaya in 2027, but the success of the Dreamworks animated feature surprised some at the time. Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy and Cameron Diaz received a massive pay check after returning to the sequel, with members of the public amazed by the amount.
With the main trio returning to the sequel, which also featured veteran actors John Cleese and Julie Andrews, fans were surprised to see just how much had been spent on the film franchise. A post to the r/todayilearned subreddit reads: "Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, and Cameron Diaz negotiated an upfront payment of $10million each for voicing the sequel to Shrek (2001). "This was an increase from the $350,000 each received for the first film.
Also, the three actors were expected to each work between 15-18 hours in total on Shrek 2." The eye-watering sum for the return "made sense" to some fans, who suggested the core trio were paid well – and rightly so. One user wrote: "10million for less than 20 hours of work.
.. damn I picked the wrong career.
Makes sense though, first one was a huge hit and they knew the second would make bank." Another user added: "Good! Shrek 2 made $935million – the voice talent should make lots of money!" Some have also suggested the 15 to 18 hours of recording time given to the film would be harder now. One suggested: "Run time of 92 minutes, let's just split that in three even though the three of them weren't speaking through all of it.
So that's 1/2 hour per person. If they did the average between 15-18 that's 16.5 hours of work which is a ratio of 33:1 for voice work to screen time.
"It's probably a lot worse than that because there are times when there's no one or someone else speaking. So, just a guess is that it might even be 50:1 or higher. Thus, it takes a lot of voice work time to get the amount of time on screen.
"Filming is even worse because now you have factors like the correct lighting, script changes, resetting between takes, time to get props and such in place, and so on." Another suggested the 18 hours of work is perhaps an "underestimate" given just how many lines would need recording, and how many may need different versions. They wrote: "18 hrs of work is probably an underestimate, because thinking through one's lines how to convey each well, being familiar with the lines, etc.
isn't done only when you're recording.".
