The union would like performers “to share in the rewards of a successful show, without bearing any of the risk,” the group that lobbies for studios says.
“According to the group, the proposal gives performers their usual fixed residuals for streaming projects “also a new residual which ‘shares’ in revenue that is somehow attributed to the show.” The group added, “the Union proposes to ‘share’ in success, but not in failure. That is not sharing.” (Of course, before streaming entertainment arrived, actors did share in success but did not in failure — if a project was a hit and re-used or re-run, those performers were compensated with residuals beyond their upfront payments, but were not penalized if the project did poorly.”
This is the biggest sticking point apparently. The union seems to be asking for the same protection actors have historically had against failures. I don’t see a good reason in this article why they should be forced to share in failure when that has never been the case. The studio is, shockingly, just being greedy.
which initially reading sounds like “I mean that’s fair”, but then no actually it’s not. It’s not their fault studios keep rejecting good ideas for movies and instead doing reboots ad neaseum, sequels of sequels, and boring bland flat stories. If studios are so worried about failures… maybe they need to stop making such crappy movies instead of blaming actors.
I agree with you in spirit but…
Those crappy movies make billions… The good movies are the risky ones!
Look at last year, of the top grossing movies the top one that was an original (non comic book, sequel or remake) was the 11th most porofitable (and Chinese so unsure if it was actually original.) The next? 16th overall, Elvis. Which pulled in 287 million, or about 12% of Avatar 2’s take.
This year, well, we’ll see what Barbie pulls but right now the top 9 box offices are all remakes, comic book movies or sequels.
So we can blame the studios all we like but our wallets seem to betray us, making those crappy movies the profitable ones.
Opinion: actors are not unique in deserving residuals. Everyone else should be getting them too: writers, directors, makeup artists, camera operators, grip - basically everyone who appears in the credits. Maybe call the relative share of residuals “shares”, and advertise shares in job postings: “$20 + 20 shares per hour”. Then you get hours*20/(total shares for everyone) of profits from then on.
I mean as a developer I don’t get a share of the profits from software I write.
I don’t see why actors should be treated different to any other worker really.
In an ideal world we’d all get a share of the money we generate. But we’re far from that.
Don’t crab bucket. Fight for your right to a share of the profits.
As has been stated, that has always been the case. Conversely “Studio bosses want to share in the rewards of a successful show, but do none of the acting,” doesn’t sound fair, does it?
Exactly. How are exactly actors support to “share in failure” as their nonsense quote suggests?
I found it to be a valid argument. If an actor wants a cut of the profit, they should have to take a huge pay cut to do the show.
Keanu is kind of famous for this. He gave up his salary on The Matrix to the production team and raked it in via royalties.
It’s how it works in private industry as well…I’ll take a lower salary at a start up for a percentage point.
It’s a valid argument IMHO.
I’ll take a lower salary at a start up for a percentage point.
These aren’t startups. This is WB, Paramount, Disney, and Netflix. An actual indie studio, A24, already made a tentative agreement with the guilds.
I mean, I do agree that bearing that risk of investing in a project deserves rewards, but I think the performers are staking a lot when part of a project. They get paid for their time, sure, but there’s a huge gamble in terms of the opportunity cost, especially with respect to reputation.
A professional actor’s value is more than just in the price of their labour, but their personal brand. If someone stars in a brilliant series that barely anyone sees because of mismanagement at the executive level, them that’s a gamble that hasn’t paid off for that actor and I think it’s pretty significant. The most depressing part of the last season of Game of Thrones was the actors’ reactions, because they were dismayed to see how things ended after investing so much of their hearts into the show. They still got paid, so why care? Because money isn’t the only thing at risk.
This is just more bullshit from the studios
Ya, I feel terrible for the actors in game of thrones. I can’t help but feel like most of them would be doing much more with their careers if the series had a proper ending instead of the complete dumpster fire it got.
Isn’t this one of the rumors Things negotiated during contracts? Like, I’ll take 2 mill upfront, but no residuals, or 200k plus a really good residual.
It’s a risk for the actor and studio. Pay more now or later potentially if it is actually good.
