Top-earning actor
Sylvester Stallone
$31,500,000
Forbes, $63M over 1987–88 (half shown)Reported
About $85.8 million in 2025 dollars
Just ahead of Eddie Murphy ($62 million).
Forbes Starts Counting · 1980s
1988
Top-earning actress
Meryl Streep
≈ $4,000,000
About $4 million a filmEstimate
About $10.9 million in 2025 dollars
No actress made Forbes' Top 40. Streep was still reported at about $4 million a picture.
The pictures that paid
Box office champions of 1988
By worldwide box-office gross
- 1
Rain Man
$355 million
- 2
Who Framed Roger Rabbit
$330 million
- 3
Coming to America
$289 million
Neither top earner was in one of the year's three biggest films.