Peak TV salaries may be over, but peak TV salaries haven’t gone away. The streaming revolution was a game-changer when it came to recruiting stars to appear in blockbuster series on the small screen, and the biggest stars continue to earn impressive salaries.
The slowdown in original series production has generally tightened the market. But with the right project arriving at the right time, the big names continue to make money on television. The film business, on the other hand, has been in a state of uncertainty for most of this year as the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger took place. The recent shakeup in Netflix’s content leadership has also put a damper on negotiations, at least temporarily, even as the film industry celebrates its strong box office this year.
Some of TV series’ eye-popping salaries have been well documented, including the packages that brought Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon to Apple TV’s “The Morning Show” at around $2 million per episode. More recent TV hires include Sylvester Stallone, who reportedly earned around $2 million per episode for his work on Paramount+’s Taylor Sheridan-produced drama, “Tulsa King.”
Others who have negotiated a tidy payday are “Only Murders in the Building” stars Selena Gomez, Steve Martin and Martin Short, who are easily earning more than $1 million per episode as the series enters Season 6. And popular faces who can immediately attract a fan base are also winning first coin: Jennifer Garner, for example, crossed the $1 million threshold for Peacock’s “The Five-Star Weekend.”
“The need for stars who can host these TV shows is greater than ever,” says one talent agent. “Before, it was unheard of for someone to get $2 million per episode.”
Stars who may have aged out of marquee movie roles have particularly benefited from the new market. They have found a lucrative place in streaming, where their appeal remains valuable. And unlike the 22-episode television season required in the days of broadcast networks, they are attracted to the less demanding commitment that comes with a 6, 8 or 10 episode order.
“Every star is now looking for how to anchor a show,” says an insider. “If you’re No. 1 or No. 2 on the call list, the financial situation has never been better.”
Although the conventional wisdom that Hollywood is in trouble and the job market is strained persists, TV talent agents may be the most optimistic people in the industry today.
“The TV actor salary game remains a very good deal,” says one agent. “There’s still a lot of money to be made as an actor on television. Certainly, for the more famous names, these people are still approaching the upper limit of anything anyone has ever made on television.”
Another rep says, “It definitely feels like the opportunities are there. I mean, this isn’t 2016-2019, when everyone was throwing a fire hose at the community, which was totally untenable. Comparing anything to that era, where streamers were spending like drunken sailors, is not a fair comparison.”
Of course, it’s mostly about the top stars on the call sheets, because boom times don’t suit everyone. It’s even harder than before for the middle class of actors – those who made a good living moving from pilot to pilot or show to show in the broadcast era. Back then, even if you weren’t on a hit show, you could still get away with it.
Those days are gone, as are the rigid exclusivity clauses that prevented actors from working on more than one TV series at a time. Because episodic orders are now shorter, limiting final take-home pay, networks and studios are more willing to let stars moonlight. (This is especially true for those who headline: just ask the omnipresent Nicole Kidman.)
Eight years ago, when California banned the use of the “actor quote” – an actor’s rate of pay for a previous role, which was used as the basis for that performer’s salary in negotiations – greater pay parity was introduced to the business. “It has leveled the playing field considerably,” says one agent. “Now the salary depends on the role.” Women and minorities, in particular, who have traditionally been paid less, can now demand more.
Among the major outlets, Apple is considered the most competitive in terms of salaries, with HBO and Amazon also in the mix. Even Peacock has shown a willingness to pay upwards of $1 million per episode for talent like Garner. Paramount+, meanwhile, has lured A-list talent (particularly from Sheridan and 101 Studios shows) by offering more than $1 million per episode to some of its lead actors. Disney is considered a bigger spender; FX, in particular, isn’t looking for high-salary stars as much because it focuses more on the power of the material with series like “Shōgun.”
If there’s one recent surprise, it’s how well traditional broadcast networks are doing with their original scripted fare — and it’s attracting some big TV stars returning to the small screen, including Blair Underwood, Felicity Huffman, Peter Krause and Hope Davis. And these leads are paid between $250,000 and $350,000 per episode initially, and more if successful.
“It’s completely competitive with the high end of a hit series,” says one agent. “Obviously, in streaming, they’re going to pay you a lot more because they’re only eight episodes. But you can definitely still get paid in streaming. That’s just without the obvious syndication bargains that used to come with those back-end points.”
Gn entert
