‘This is the first time I’ve not thought about the box office’: Dwayne Johnson on wrestling, reinvention and the role that could redefine him

<p>He became cinema’s most bankable strongman. But weary of his own persona, Johnson turned to indie director Benny Safdie – and delivered a bruising new role that rewrites his own rulebook</p><p>For much of his career, Dwayne Johnson has been stuck between the Rock and a hard place. In the early years of his transition from body-slamming World Wrestling Entertainment heavy to marquee movie star, he was still being billed under his <em>nom de ring</em>. Even once he retired that moniker, he seemed to be lugging behind him a persona from which he might never be free. There are people-pleasers and then there is this affable brawler-turned-actor, who appears to regard the contentment of the world’s multiplex-goers as his personal responsibility. Whether in vehicles comic (Central Intelligence, Baywatch), family-oriented (Jumanji, Jungle Cruise), four-wheeled (the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/fast-and-furious">Fast &amp; Furious</a> series) or disaster-based (San Andreas, Skyscraper), he is a rip-roaring razzle-dazzler, shiny of scalp and tooth, and so colossal that he isn’t merely the circus showman but the whole damn big top too.</p><p>Not that he hasn’t been lavishly remunerated for all that heavy lifting. He can out-grin <em>and</em> out-gross Tom Cruise: Johnson has 392 million Instagram followers to Cruise’s 15 million, and was Forbes magazine’s highest-paid actor for five of the last nine years. That includes 2024, when he pocketed $88m. (Cruise didn’t make the top 20 that year.)</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/sep/26/this-is-the-first-time-ive-not-thought-about-the-box-office-dwayne-johnson-on-wrestling-reinvention-and-the-role-that-could-redefine-him">Continue reading...</a>