Quiet Power vs Relentless Hustle: Zendaya and Sydney Sweeney Show Two Ways to Rule Hollywood

Two Euphoria breakouts. Two very different playbooks. Zendaya tends to wait for the right part and make it count. Sydney Sweeney will sell the movie, sell the moment, then sell the soap if she has to. Here is how both got here, what they are doing next, and why their career math does not add up the same way.

Same show, different lanes

Both started young. Zendaya came up through Disney with Shake It Up, then eased into mainstream Hollywood as MJ in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Sweeney was popping up all over TV as a preteen (Criminal Minds, Grey's Anatomy), then got real attention with Netflix's Everything Sucks! (well-liked, canceled after one season) and HBO's Sharp Objects. The real breakout for both hit in 2019 with Euphoria.

Zendaya: selective, surgical, and clearly obsessed with the work

On screen, she can do awkward-charming (MJ) and then land a sledgehammer of raw intensity (Rue). Off screen, she simply does not take every offer. Post-Disney, the credits tell the story: a turn in The OA, the showtune flex in The Greatest Showman (2017), the two-hander Malcolm & Marie opposite John David Washington, then Chani in Dune: Part One and the biggest box office of her career with Spider-Man: No Way Home.

2024 was a one-two of huge and heady: Dune: Part Two and Luca Guadagnino's Challengers, which critics loved. She took 2025 off from releases, but 2026 is loaded: reuniting with fiance Tom Holland on Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey and on her fourth Marvel movie, Spider-Man: Brand New Day; returning as Chani in Dune 3; and starring with Robert Pattinson in The Drama, which is next up in theaters.

She has said she chases roles that complicate how you feel about a character, pointing to Rue as someone who hurts people but is still human and hurting herself. And the roots of that are not subtle:

"I learned about my love for acting from the stage. My mom worked at the California Shakespeare Theater since I was a kid. So I really fell in love with acting because of actors I got to see on stage every day since I was two. It was my life. And I just was obsessed with what they were doing. I didn't really understand it. All that said, this felt like a full-circle moment for me."

Translation: she is not picking projects for opening weekend alone. The choices look like someone who loves the craft and is patient about it.

Sydney Sweeney: a marketer's dream who makes her own noise

2025 was peak 'only in Hollywood' for Sweeney. She leaned into a deliberately provocative 'bathwater' soap gag and then did a polarizing American Eagle campaign. Both blew up. Both made her and the brands a lot of money. That is basically the Sweeney model: generate attention, then convert it.

Yes, there have been rough patches and projects that sputtered (Americana, Eden, Echo Valley, Christy), but she also turned Euphoria heat into a rom-com win with Anyone but You and kept stacking reps with The Voyeurs, Immaculate, and The White Lotus. She is also producing now: executive producer credits on Anyone but You, Immaculate, and Christy.

The road there was not clean. She told GQ she once had a plan to buy back her family home at 18 and could not pull it off, and a casting director told her she would never be on TV. Then came Cassie Howard on Euphoria, an Emmy nomination in 2022, and a persona that Hollywood loves to argue about. Her latest swing with Amanda Seyfried, The Housemaid, has been playing to the crowd on purpose. One review called it 'fun, trashy, gaslit Hallmark porn in the best way' — which honestly captures the knowingly pulpy lane she has been choosing.

There is some very business-forward maneuvering under the hood too. Trade chatter says Anyone but You only got the greenlight after she agreed to take a supporting role in Sony's Madame Web. That is not a normal cause-and-effect for a star — it is a reminder she is playing the long game with the studios.

The money part (because you asked)

Euphoria did not pay them the same. Zendaya already had two Spider-Man movies at $300,000 each (per Parade), then reportedly made at least $500,000 per episode on the HBO series across its two seasons. Sweeney earned a reported $350,000 for 13 episodes (via Yahoo! Life). After Euphoria, Zendaya's movie money jumped hard — Us Weekly says Challengers marked her first eight-figure upfront — while Sweeney started threading acting and producing to increase her take-home on certain films.

• Zendaya salaries: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) - $300,000; Spider-Man: Far from Home (2019) - $300,000; Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) - $2 million; Euphoria (2019-) - $9 million; Dune: Part One (2021) - $300,000; Dune: Part Two (2024) - $2 million; Challengers (2024) - $10 million
• Sydney Sweeney salaries: Anyone but You (2023) - $2.25 million (including a $250,000 producer bump, per THR); Madame Web (2024) - $750,000; Immaculate (2024) - $250,000; The Housemaid (2025) - $7.5 million

Net worth snapshots, for those keeping score: Celebrity Net Worth estimates Zendaya at $30 million and Sweeney at $40 million. Zendaya also has music credits (2011 singles 'Swag It Out' and 'Watch Me'), because of course she does.

So who is 'ahead'?

Depends what you value. Zendaya is building a filmography that screams staying power and awards heat, with massive franchises as muscle. Sweeney is building an empire in real time — starring, producing, and frankly out-marketing half the town. One is playing chess with the roles, the other is playing chess with the entire board.

Which path do you prefer? Tell me below.