The $3.7 Million Diaper: Inside the Most Audacious Paycheck in Hollywood History

The original Richard Donner Superman movie is remembered for many things, including making everyone at the time believe a man could fly.

But the behind-the-scenes stories were as good as anything that made it to the big screen.

And of all the ones to pick, my favorite is Marlon Brando's contract, which became the thing of Hollywood legend.

There are some numbers you should know about it: in just 12 minutes of screen time, Brando walked away with a staggering $3.7 million salary plus a 11.75% cut of the backend. When the box office receipts were counted, Brando’s total haul ballooned to roughly $19 million (according to Variety).

If you want some perspective on all that, Brando was paid more for a cameo than the stars of the movie, Christopher Reeve and Gene Hackman, combined.

Let's dive in.

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The "Brando Math"

Since we're nerds here, we thought it would be fun to really break down what Brando got paid on Superman.

And I'm not talking just salary, I wanna see the numbers in some new ways.

Keep in mind that the median U.S. annual salary in 1978 was about $15,000.

Acting via Diapers

The story of Brando on set is not just about the money. It's also about how hard it was to get this expensive performance out of him. At the time, he had famously gotten sick of acting and refused to memorize his lines.

The production had to hide cue cards across the set of Krypton so Brando could nail his performance.

And as the legend goes...Brando even read his lines off a prop diaper.

During the scene where Jor-El places the infant Kal-El into the escape pod, the script was taped to the baby's swaddling clothes.

Brando peered down at the kid not just with fatherly love, but so he could read his lines.

And his impression on the rest of the cast was not a good one.

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Was It Worth It?

Here's the real question: after all these struggles and annoyances, was it worth it to have Brando in the movie?

So here's one way to look at it: Brando wasn't about his acting. It was about legitimizing comic book movies and making them real and important to the audience.

By using the most famous actor in the world, they were able to buy that feeling.

And when Superman was a great success, and thus bet paid off, it probably seemed like it was worth it.

Summing It All Up

We often look at movie marketing and wonder how much you really have to send to get audiences into seats. But the Superman movie is a good case study. It launched a new genre, the superhero movie, and to do it, it spent a lot of money making sure audiences bought into its legitimacy before they even stepped into the theater.

It would have been nice to have Brando be easy to work with, but sometimes even the most volatile investments pay off.

He arrived, he read off a diaper, he collected enough money to buy a private island (which he did), and he changed the economics of the blockbuster forever.

Let me know what you think in the comments.