Tyler Perry, who lived and worked from his car in his early 20s, has officially joined the growing list of Hollywood billionaires.
Forbes magazine, known for keeping track of celebrities’ financial worth, announced on Tuesday, September 2 the the longtime filmmaker, 50, is worth one billionaire dollars.
According to the American business magazine, the entertainment tycoon has a networth of $1 billion and has earned more than $1.4 billion in pretax income since 2005.
Forbes also reports that the ace filmmaker owns the entirety of his creative output, which includes more than 1,200 television episodes, 22 films, at least two dozen plays.
Perry also owns a 330-acre studio near Atlanta which now plays home to a ton of creative projects, including other production company’s paying him to use the location – The studio worth $280 million.
Speaking with the magazine, the filmmaker said he learnt the value of ownership at a young age, saying;
My father was a subcontractor, and he would get paid on Fridays and be so happy that he had made $800. But I would watch the man that owned the house sell it and make $80,000.
So I always knew that there was more power in the man that owned the house rather than the man that actually was working on it and building it. So I always wanted to be the guy that owned the house. Ownership for me was easy because I was underestimated. They said, ‘Sure, you can own it.’ They didn’t think it’d be worth anything.
On lack of diversity in his movies, Perry said;
I wanted to foster an environment where minorities and women and LGBTQ, anybody who wanted to come and work and do a great job was welcome. What I found is, if you invest in the underdog, if you invest in the people who haven’t had the opportunity, the level of gratitude and understanding for what is happening for them is so powerful. It’s just wonderful.
It was also reported that his movies alone have grossed nearly $1 billion to date, and he owns the rights to all of them.
According to Forbes, Perry used his ownership of all his creative output to broker a deal with ViacomCBS that pays him $150 million a year for new content and gives him an equity stake in BET+, a streaming service it debuted last September worth $60 million.
He has homes in Atlanta, New York, Los Angeles and Jackson Hole, Wyoming, as well as two private jets worth $40 million.
The mogul has now joined a group of Black billionaires which includes Robert F. Smith, Michael Jordan, Oprah Winfrey, David Stewart, Jay-Z and Kanye West.
