One of our latest movie pages here at Ultimate Movie Rankings.com was one that looked at the movie career of Jerry Lewis. The first 16 movies of Lewis’ career were with his screen partner, Dean Martin. As we were looking at the fantastic box office numbers of those 16 movies….a question popped into our heads…..who are the Top 15 Screen Duos of all-time? So the awesome wife went to our massive database ….wrote some code….did a query search and up popped some possible answers to that question.
The first thing we realized when we saw the search results was that we needed to have some rules. The 8 Harry Potter movies provided us lots of possible combos. We like Alan Rickman and Rupert Grint…..but we’re not thinking they are considered one of the greatest screen duos of all-time. So the first rule was if actors appeared together in a movie franchise, then they needed to have two other non-related movies to qualify. So goodbye to Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, Geoffrey Rush, and Keira Knightley and their Pirate movies…..goodbye to Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd and the Back to the Future movies. Goodbye to all the Harry Potter alumni and goodbye to almost every successful movie franchise out there. This really hurt us….because we really wanted to include the Screen Duo team of Michael Caine and Christian Bale.
The second rule we came up with was that the actors had to have a decent size role (preferable a lead role) in the movie. Cameos would not count towards the accumulated box office grosses. That rule eliminated more screen duos. The third rule was not to include computer animated franchises. A single “Voice Role” was ok…..but not more than one. Once again more screen duos were eliminated. So with the rules in place our list was looking more acceptable. We found 15 screen duos that have grossed more than $1 BILLION in adjusted domestic box office. The Walter Matthau/Jack Lemmon team just missed the Billion Dollar Club by $7 million dollars. Below you will find a table with the Top 15 and following that table is a list of those screen duos that did not make the Billion Dollar Club. We are sure we have forgotten some obvious screen duos that could crack the Billion Dollar Club….we look forward to hearing from you about duos we have carelessly left off.
Top 15 Screen Duos of All-Time – Ranked by Box Office Results
The really cool thing about this table is that it is “user-sortable”. Rank the screen duos anyway you want.
- Column 1 lists the different Screen Duos
- Column 2 lists the years the Screen Duos made their movies
- Column 3 lists how many movies they made
- Column 4 lists the total number of tickets sold for their movies
- Column 5 lists the total adjusted domestic box office gross for the Screen Duos
- Column 6 lists the average adjusted domestic gross for the Screen Duos
- Column 7 lists the Screen Duos biggest box office hit
| Rank | Screen Team | Years Active | Movies | Tickets Sold | Total Adjusted Domestic Box Office | AVG Gross Per Movie | Biggest Hit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bud Abbott & Lou Costello | 1940-1956 | 36 | 310.84 million | $2.58 billion | $71.66 million | Ride 'em Cowboy (1942) | |
| Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis | 1949-1956 | 16 | 233.73 million | $1.94 billion | $121.25 million | Living It Up (1954) | |
| Stan Laurel & Oliver Hardy | 1930-1951 | 26 | 231.16 million | $1.93 billion | $74.53 millions | Sons of the Desert (1930) | |
| Ben Stiller & Owen Wilson | 1996-2014 | 10 | 171.50 million | $1.38 billion | $138.00 million | Night At The Musuem (2006) | |
| Chris Evans & Scarlett Johannson | 2004-2015 | 5 | 166.26 million | $1.37 billion | $274.00 million | The Avengers (2012) | |
| Spencer Tracy & Katharine Hepburn | 1942-1967 | 9 | 162.65 million | $1.35 billion | $150.00 million | Guess Who's Coming To Dinner (1967) | |
| Paul Newman & Robert Redford | 1969-1973 | 2 | 161.44 million | $1.34 billion | $670.00 million | The Sting (1973) | |
| Bing Crosby & Bob Hope | 1940-1962 | 8 | 157.83 million | $1.31 billion | $163.75 million | Road To Morocco (1942) | |
| Jeanette MacDonald & Nelson Eddy | 1935-1942 | 8 | 150.60 million | $1.27 billion | $158.75 million | Maytime (1937) | |
| Bill Murray & Harold Ramis | 1981-1993 | 4 | 151.85 million | $1.23 billion | $307.50 million | Ghostbusters (1984) | |
| William Powell & Myrna Loy | 1934-1956 | 14 | 142.16 million | $1.18 billion | $84.28 million | The Great Ziegfeld (1936) | |
| Errol Flynn & Alan Hale Sr. | 1937-1948 | 12 | 139.75 million | $1.16 billion | $96.73 million | The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) | |
| Burt Reynolds & Sally Field | 1977-1980 | 4 | 136.14 million | $1.13 billion | $282.50 million | Smokey and the Bandit (1977) | |
| Elizabeth Taylor & Richard Burton | 1963-1972 | 10 | 132.53 million | $1.10 billion | $110.00 million | Cleopatra (1963) | |
| Clint Eastwood & Sondra Locke | 1976-1983 | 6 | 130.06 million | $1.08 billion | $180.00 million | Every Which Way But Loose (1978) | |
| Greer Garson & Walter Pidgeon | 1941-1953 | 8 | 129.96 million | $1.08 billion | $135.00 million | Mrs. Miniver (1942) | |
| Leonardo DiCaprio & Kate Winslet | 1997-2008 | 2 | 129.70 million | $1.08 billion | $540.00 million | Titanic (1997) | |
| Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers | 1933-1949 | 10 | 120.48 million | $1.00 billion | $100.00 million | Top Hat (1935) | |
| Mickey Rooney & Judy Garland | 1937-1943 | 8 | 120.26 million | $1.00 billion | $125.00 million | Babes on Broadway (1941) |
Screen Duos That Were Successful But Fell Short of the Billion Dollar Mark
- Walter Matthau/Jack Lemmon – 11 movies – $993.00 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Gary Cooper/Walter Brennan – 6 movies – $927.30 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Johnny Depp/Helena Bonham Carter – 6 movies – $903.39 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Marjorie Main & Percy Kilbride – 8 movies – $786.80 million in adjusted box office gross
- Errol Flynn/Olivia de Havilland – 8 movies – $784.30 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Clark Gable/Spencer Tracy – 3 movies – $723.50 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Clark Gable/Joan Crawford – 8 movies – $703.20 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Claudette Colbert/Fred MacMurray – 8 movies – $674.80 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall…..4 movies….$648.80 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Gene Wilder/Richard Pryor – 4 movies – $613.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Julia Roberts/Richard Gere – 2 movies – $605.29 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Clark Gable/Myrna Loy – 7 movies – $568.20 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Frank Sinatra/Dean Martin – 6 movies – $566.90 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Bruce Willis/Samuel L.Jackson – 3 movies – $553.24 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Jean Harlow/Clark Gable…..6 movies…$540.70 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Dean Martin/Sammy Davis, Jr. – 4 movies – $528.60 in adjusted domestic gross
- Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan – 3 movies – $524.60 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Doris Day/Rock Hudson – 3 movies – $522.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Doris Day/Gordon MacRae – 5 movies – $515.00 million in adjusted domestic gross
- James Cagney/Pat O’Brien – 7 movies – $514.80 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Johnny Weismuller/Maureen O’Sullivan – 6 movies – $509.90 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Gene Kelly/Frank Sinatra – 3 movies – $507.50 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Claude Rains/Bette Davis….4 movies – $495.30 million in adjusted domestic gross.
- Cheech Marin and Tommy Chong – 7 movies – $479.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Woody Allen/Diane Keaton – 5 movies – $454.68 million in adjusted domestic gross
- John Wayne/Maureen O’Hara – 5 movies – $451.62 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Paul Rudd/Steve Carell – 4 movies – $451.62 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Dean Martin/Shirley MacLaine – 5 movies – $446.60 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Burt Lancaster/Kirk Douglas – 6 movies – $432.80 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Simon Pegg/Nick Frost – 9 movies – $416.20 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Clark Gable/Claudette Colbert – 2 movies – $415.70 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Shailene Woodley/Ansel Elgort – 3 movies – $415.52 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Jeanette MacDonald/Maurice Chevalier – 4 movies – $413.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- James Stewart/Jean Arthur – 2 movies – $378.40 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Robert DeNiro/Joe Pesci – 6 movies – $370.50 million in adjusted domestic gross
- John Belushi/Dan Aykroyd – 3 movies – $369.03 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Tom Cruise/Nicole Kidman – 3 movies – $362.90 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Ben Affleck/Matt Damon – 3 movies – $360.43 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Howard Keel/Kathryn Grayson….3 movies….$353.20 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Shirley Temple/ Bill Robinson – 4 movies – $334.50 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Brian Keith/Maureen O’Hara – 3 movies – $300.40 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Bradley Cooper/Jennifer Lawrence…. 3 movies….. $295.63 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Goldie Hawn/Chevy Chase…. 2 movies….. $293.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Anna Kendrick/Elizabeth Banks – 3 movies – $292.58 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Cary Grant/Irene Dunne…. 3 movies….. $289.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Cary Grant/Katharine Hepburn – 4 movies – $287.50 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Olivia de Havilland and Bette Davis – 4 movies – $273.70 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Fred MacMurray/Barbara Stanwyck – 4 movies – $271.90 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Orson Welles/Joseph Cotten – 4 movies – $263.50 million in adjusted domestic gross
- Charlie Chaplin/Edna Purviance – 4 movies – $258.54 million in adjusted domestic gross
- John Cusack/John Malkovich…. 2 movies….. $220.10 million in adjusted domestic gross
- James Garner/Julie Andrews – 2 movies – $150.30 million in adjusted domestic gross
So who did we forget? We look forward to suggestions. If your suggestion cracks the 1 Billion Club…..we will add the Screen Duo and give you all the credit.
How we calculated adjusted box office grosses. We took the actual box office grosses….divided that total by the average ticket price the year the movie was released. That gave us tickets sold. We then multiplied tickets sold by today’s average movie ticket price.
Page Notes: Since writing this page we have gotten lots of suggestions for possible members of the 1 billion dollar club. Amazingly so far it looks like we only missed two Screen Duos. PS1999 correctly identified that the screen duo of Bill Murray and Harold Ramis had grossed over $1 Billion in adjusted domestic gross while She Lew correctly identified Errol Flynn and Alan Hale Sr. as members of the club. Thanks for the input PS1999 and She Lew….your movie knowledge is truly impressive.
Hi Mr. Cogerson,
Marcello Mastroianni and Sophia Loren.
Thx
Mike
I think that if The Work Horse hasn’t time to improve this page with partially more relevant selections he’d be better pulling it for now. But then my suggesting THAT makes it less likely that such will ever happen as he tends to be dismissive of my ideas. Indeed these days it often seems that to get his attention you have to be able to point him in the direction of a few missing commas here and there.
It is a pity though because the duos page was an excellent initial idea and could have produced a great page because as always with this site a lot of fine work has already gone into assembling those selections which WERE worthy of inclusion.
As it is however: Shailene Woodley and Ansel Elgort and Anna Kendrick and Elizabeth Banks more important legendary duos than Mitch/Kerr and Holden/Kelly? As I think I have done before I’ll close with an insistence that John McEnroe use to press in his regular rants against tennis umpires and other officials “C’mon man – you CANNOT be serious!”
Hi Mr. Cogerson,
Toby McGuire and Kirsten Dunst form Spider-man 1 thru 3.
Vin Diesel and Paul Walker from the Fast and Furious franchise.
Thx
Mike
HI ANONYMOUS MIKE: You’re wasting your time here. I have already drawn The Work Horse’s attention to a number of duos who I feel would better entries than some of those he has selected and here are a few more-
1/Bob Mitchum/Debs Kerr in 3 movies – Heaven Knows Mr Cogerson/Sundowners/The Grass is Greener-Overall adjusted US gross $455 million
2/Golden Holden/Grace Kelly in 2 movies – Country Girl and Bridges of Toko Ri-combined adjusted US gross $650 million [wow!]
3/Archibald Alexander Leach and Sophia Loren in 2 movies-Pride and the Passion and Houseboat-combined adjusted US gross almost $300 million.
The Phantom aside I think that after their 1949/50 peak I most remember Brodie as the gun-duelling fanatic Vinnie Harold in Charlie Bill’s 1956 Fastest Gun Alive and John Ireland as Chuck’s sidekick in the 1963 55 Days at Peking and for Kirk’s 1960 Spartacus. John’s role was not great in that one but the timing of one of his key lines of dialogue ensured I remembered him from the movie.
In those days when a long “epic” was shown there was always an interval half-way through the movie probably as much to highlight the importance of the film as to defer to the necessity of b**s on seats to get a leg-stretch. Astride his horse and with bony knees protruding from underneath his ye olden time skirt Ireland brandishes his sword and commands “Tell Spartacus we ride to the sea!” and with a swish the curtain dramatically came down and we were off to the foyer for 15 mins to have our ice creams and for nearly all of my group to proclaim how wonderful Kirk was.
I can recall arguing though that Brando or Wayne might have been better in the role. However even though still teenagers in 1960 we were analytical little devils about movies and a pal pointed out to me that The Duke may not have wanted to play a rebel against ANY body of authority and may well have seen Spartacus as a “leftie”.
Indeed it shows you how astute my pal was when one considers how Kirk resisted pressure fromt the Hollywood “right” and hired the blacklisted Dalton Trumbo for Spartacus so that Big John maybe saw the whole thing as a “leftie” project anyway. Previously he had clashed with Kirk for playing Van Gogh in Lust for Life and castigated Cooper for showing Small Town America up as “cowards” in High noon.
To paraphrase Son o Bob “I may not have seen as many films as have The Work Horse and Steve and Flora but in my youth I saw everything that COUNTED.” Anyway every cloud has a silver lining because I mean who unless they were a screwball themselves would want to have to own up to watching all those awful Al Leach screwball comedies?
Moving on to 1949 Brodie had great back to back success with All the King’s Men and Born Yesterday in 1949/50 and John Ireland and he had consecutive teamings in All the King’s Men and Cargo to Capetown. The duo were together again quarter of a century later in 1974’s TV horror film The Phantom of Hollywood. That was not as you might think a movie about Joel Hirschhorn but involved a slasher who ran amok on Tinseltown movie sets.
The heyday of Crawford and Ireland was of course long gone by then and in fact both men hadn’t aged too well. The male lead was Jack Cassidy who was the husband of Shirley Jones and father [not by Shirley] of TV star and pop singer David Cassidy.
Jack and Shirley divorced the year Phantom was made and Jack sadly died tragically 2 years later in 1976 in a fire accident after playing the guest villain in 3 Columbo TV episodes. Jack’s final role in fact was on the big screen as Damon Runyon in the Private Files of J Edgar Hoover which reunited Jack with Brodie in the title role and this time of course Crawford was the top-billed lead actor. I found Jack’s strong presence as the 3 Columbo villains highly entertaining