Featured Image Credit: Monica Schipper/Getty Images
Topics: Celebrity, Euphoria, Sydney Sweeney, US News, Money
Kit Roberts
Topics: Celebrity, Euphoria, Sydney Sweeney, US News, Money
Just how much do you think Sydney Sweeney's net worth is?
The 28-year-old actor has recently starred in an adaptation of The Housemaid, but is perhaps best known for her role as Cassie in Euphoria.
But the latest season of the hit HBO show has been met with a controversial reception, in particular over scenes featuring Sweeney.
The third season is set five years after the events of the previous one, and sees the cast trying to build up a life for themselves and survive in the wider world.
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For Sweeney's character, this has included starting an OnlyFans page to raise money for her upcoming wedding.
It's this plot line which has led to some of the more contentious scenes, including co-star Jacob Elordi holding Sweeney on a leash dressed as a puppy, and another where she is fully topless as she poses for her fans.
Celebrity Net Worth estimated her as being worth approximately $40 million, despite not even being 30 years old yet.
This is from a combination of her movie salaries, such as a multi-million dollar contract on The Housemaid, for which she reportedly got a pay check of around $7.5 million.
Others have included reported payments of hundreds of thousands of dollars for projects like Madame Web, as well as her commercial appearances in advertisements.
Sweeney also has her own production company, called Fifty-Fifty Films, opening up another revenue stream.
Since its launch in 2019, Euphoria has become known for its controversial and unflinching portrayal of addiction, sex, and relationships.
But a lot of viewers have taken the view that the latest season has taken things 'too far', particularly with Cassie's scenes.
Taking to social media, one person wrote: "Honestly, Euphoria has always pushed boundaries, but it does feel like this season is going a bit too far for shock value.
"I get that it’s trying to portray dark and uncomfortable themes, but there’s a fine line between storytelling and unnecessary degradation."
Another added: "This is so embarrassing even for Jacob. But, how Sydney Sweeney can agree to do something like this? It's like a humiliation ritual."
Though others have defended the show, with one viewer writing: "But it's fiction. It's a mockery of those who make and consume that kind of stuff. It's like you complaining that a movie features a corrupt politician or a serial killer."
Someone else simply commented: "If you're a real fan of Euphoria this does not shock you."
The show's creator, Sam Levinson, has even weighed in on the debate, defending a scene where Sweeney engages in 'puppy play'.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, he said: "[Cassie] has got her dog house and her little dog ears and the nose, and that has its own humor, but what makes the scene is the fact that her housekeeper is the one filming it.
"What we wanted to always find is the other layer of absurdity that we’re able to tie into it so that we’re not too inside of her fantasy or illusion — the gag is to jump out, to break the wall."
After the first season of Euphoria premieres, Sweeney tells HuffPost: "The thing about the nudity in this show is that it’s not glamorized. It’s not, ‘Oh, here’s a pair of tits.’ It’s just real.
“I had to look at the whole picture of the entirety of the show, and I just fell in love with the rawness and the situations and the emotions that all these characters go through.”
Following the release of the second series, Sweeney reveals that on occasion she pushed back on the levels of nudity director Sam Levinson called for.
She tells The Independent: "There are moments where Cassie was supposed to be shirtless and I would tell Sam, ‘I don’t really think that’s necessary here.’ He was like, ‘OK, we don’t need it’.
"I’ve never felt like Sam has pushed it on me. When I didn’t want to do it, he didn’t make me."
Around the same time, she also calls out the double standard around nude scenes, telling Cosmopolitan: "There are hour-long compilations of world-famous male actors with nude scenes who win Oscars and get praised for that work. But the moment a woman does it, it degrades them."
The following year, Sweeney also reveals that fans are trolling her online with screenshots of Cassie's nude scenes.
She tells The Sun: "It got to the point where they were tagging my family. My cousins don’t need that. It’s completely disgusting and unfair
"You have a character that goes through the scrutiny of being a sexualised person at school and then an audience that does the same thing."
In spite of the trolling over her nude scenes and the sexism she’s come up against, Sweeney says she’s not hesitant to perform nude scenes when a script calls for it.
She tells W Magazine: "I don’t get nervous. I think that the female body is a very powerful thing. And I’m telling my character’s story, so I owe it to them to tell it well and to do what needs to be done."