In Hollywood, talent opens doors but relationships keep them open. The stars who last the longest are not always the most gifted. They are the ones who know how to build networks that work for them long after the cameras stop rolling. Here is who is doing it best.
Power in Hollywood used to mean having the right agent or the right studio behind you. Today it means owning the room, producing the content, picking the collaborators, and setting the cultural agenda yourself. These ten stars figured that out faster than anyone else.
Taylor Swift, the most connected person in music
Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour became the highest grossing concert tour in history, earning over two billion dollars in total revenue from 2023 through 2024. She struck a groundbreaking distribution deal directly with AMC Theatres for her Eras Tour concert film after studios failed to meet her terms. The film went on to gross 250 million dollars, becoming the highest grossing concert film of all time.
Swift has collaborated with producers Max Martin, Aaron Dessner, and Jack Antonoff across multiple albums and genre shifts over more than a decade. She finalized the purchase of the masters to her first six original albums from Shamrock Holdings in May 2025. Her ability to build lasting creative alliances while maintaining full ownership of her work has made her one of the most powerful people in the entire entertainment industry.
Ryan Reynolds, the business network behind the laughs
Ryan Reynolds co-founded the production and marketing company Maximum Effort in 2018 alongside George Dewey. The company was named one of Time Magazine’s 100 Most Influential Companies in 2025 and ranked fourth on Fast Company’s list of the most innovative film companies that same year. His investments in brands like Mint Mobile and Aviation Gin totaled over 14 billion dollars in combined valuations according to Forbes.
Reynolds used the viral marketing formula he developed for the Deadpool films to help sell Mint Mobile to T-Mobile for 1.35 billion dollars in 2024. Maximum Effort signed a first look deal with 20th Television in March 2025 and extended its deal with Paramount Pictures in February 2024 through December 2026. Reynolds built a genuine multimedia network across studios, brands, and streaming platforms by treating every project as a chance to connect more people to more things.
LeBron James, redefining the athlete-mogul playbook
LeBron James co-founded the SpringHill Company in 2020 alongside longtime partner Maverick Carter. SpringHill was valued at 725 million dollars when it received a capital investment from RedBird Capital Partners in 2021. The company signed a four-year first look deal with Universal Pictures in September 2020 and a scripted television deal with ABC Signature in June 2020.
In November 2024, SpringHill merged with UK production company Fulwell 73 in a 50/50 deal, raising an additional 40 million dollars from investors including Nike, Epic Games, and Fenway Sports Group. The merged company operates offices in Los Angeles, New York, London, and Sunderland, England. James turned his sports fame into a production empire that now has a global footprint spanning scripted, unscripted, branded entertainment, and live events.
Zendaya, the collaborator every director wants
Zendaya has built one of the most enviable creative networks in modern Hollywood through deliberate, sustained collaborations. She serves as executive producer on HBO’s Euphoria, the series that made her a two-time Emmy winner and one of the most watched actresses on television. In 2025, A24 announced her third collaboration with the studio, a Ronnie Spector biopic directed by Barry Jenkins.
Her work with director Luca Guadagnino on Challengers in 2024 and an upcoming A24 thriller co-starring Robert Pattinson cemented her status as a filmmaker’s first choice. She is represented by management firm Granderson Des Rochers, which also negotiated her return as MJ in Spider-Man: Brand New Day and a brand ambassador deal with activewear company On. Zendaya’s network is built not on volume but on carefully chosen relationships with the most respected people in the business.
Beyoncé, the creator who answers to no one
Beyoncé released her country album Cowboy Carter in March 2024 without a traditional press campaign or industry rollout. The album earned eleven Grammy nominations at the 2025 ceremony, the most of any artist that year. It became the number one album in the United States and number one on the Billboard Country Albums chart, making Beyoncé the first Black woman to top that chart.
She founded her own entertainment company, Parkwood Entertainment, in 2010, which handles her music, film, touring, management, and brand deals under one roof. Her Renaissance World Tour in 2023 grossed over $579 million, making it one of the highest-grossing tours by a female artist in history. Beyoncé built a network by refusing to need anyone else’s permission for anything and finding the best people in every field to work alongside her on her own terms.
Rihanna, the business network that changed fashion and beauty
Rihanna founded Fenty Beauty in 2017 in partnership with luxury conglomerate LVMH. The brand generated over $570 million in revenue in its first full year, making it one of the most successful celebrity beauty launches in history. Her shapewear brand Savage X Fenty reached a one billion dollar valuation after completing a Series B funding round in February 2021. The brand raised a total of 310 million dollars across multiple funding rounds from investors, including Jay-Z’s Marcy Venture Partners, L Catterton, and Neuberger Berman.
In 2021, LVMH and Rihanna announced a pause on her luxury fashion label Fenty, which had been the first fashion house launched by LVMH in decades. She performed the Super Bowl LVII halftime show in February 2023 while visibly pregnant, drawing 121 million viewers. Rihanna’s network spans fashion, beauty, music, entertainment, and luxury goods, making her one of the most diversely connected celebrities alive.
Issa Rae, the network built from the ground up
Issa Rae launched her webseries Awkward Black Girl on YouTube in 2011 with a budget of roughly 2,000 dollars per episode and built an audience of millions before Hollywood came calling. Her production company ColorCreative signed a deal with WarnerMedia in 2018 to develop projects from underrepresented creators. In 2025, investment firm KKR invested in ColorCreative as part of a broader entertainment portfolio deal.
Her HBO series Insecure ran for five critically acclaimed seasons from 2016 to 2021 and earned multiple Emmy and Golden Globe nominations. In 2023, she co-starred in the global blockbuster Barbie alongside Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, and others, which grossed over 1.44 billion dollars worldwide. Issa Rae turned a self-funded YouTube channel into a production empire that actively creates careers for other people.
Donald Glover, the multi-hyphenate with total creative control
Donald Glover created, wrote, directed, and starred in the FX series Atlanta, which ran from 2016 to 2022 and won a total of six Emmy Awards. He signed a massive overall deal with Amazon in 2021 reportedly worth hundreds of millions of dollars, which included the spy comedy series Mr. and Mrs. Smith. The show starred Glover and Maya Erskine and premiered on Amazon Prime Video in February 2024 to strong critical reviews.
Glover released the Childish Gambino album Bando Stone and the New World in 2024, announcing it as his final album under that name. His collaborative network spans directors, actors, musicians, and animators across television, film, and music simultaneously. He is one of a tiny number of Hollywood figures who has achieved genuine creative control across multiple industries at the same time.
Ava DuVernay, the network rooted in access for others
Ava DuVernay founded the film distribution and advocacy collective ARRAY in 2010 to release films by women and people of color that were struggling to find distribution. ARRAY Crew, an arm of the organization, connects underrepresented below-the-line talent directly with jobs on productions. ARRAY Releasing has screened films from underrepresented filmmakers at festivals and in theaters globally.
DuVernay directed the documentary 13th for Netflix in 2016, which received an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Feature. Her limited series When They See Us premiered on Netflix in 2019 and became one of the most watched original series in Netflix history at that time. Her network is built on a philosophy that the most powerful thing you can do in Hollywood is make sure other people get a seat at the table too.
Shawn Levy, the director every star calls first
Shawn Levy has built one of Hollywood’s strongest creative networks through frequent collaborations with major stars and studios. He directed Ryan Reynolds in Free Guy in 2021 and reunited with him for The Adam Project in 2022, which also starred Mark Ruffalo.
Levy later directed Deadpool & Wolverine in 2024, bringing Reynolds and Hugh Jackman together in one of Marvel’s biggest recent hits. The film grossed more than $1.3 billion worldwide and became the highest-grossing R-rated film of all time.
Beyond directing, Levy’s 21 Laps Entertainment has produced major projects ranging from Stranger Things to the Night at the Museum franchise. His network has grown because actors and studios repeatedly trust him with large-scale commercial projects that depend on both star power and audience appeal.
Featured Image: Photo by Gage Skidmore on Wikimedia Commons
