Recommended Posts

One of the more fascinating salary negotiations in TV history involved the Friends cast, when Courteney Cox, David Schwimmer, Jennifer Aniston, Matthew Perry, Lisa Kudrow and Matt LeBlanc chose to negotiate their salaries together, having decided that no one actor on the cast was worth more than the other. That pleased Warner Bros. TV to no end, of course, because it meant they could say, ?Pay everyone LeBlanc money, not Cox money!? Even today, former execs from that era brag about how the actors left money on the table at the expense of keeping things harmonious on the set. (That might be true, but the cast?s friendships sure remained intact.)

Cut to 2010, when another salary renegotiation is winding its way through the halls of Warner Bros. TV. It just so happens to involve a comedy that?s pretty much replaced Friends in terms of popularity, critical praise, and its ability to generate millions in revenue: The Big Bang Theory. As is customary for any successful show approaching its fifth and sixth years (Bang is currently in its fourth season), the core ensemble of five have jockeyed for more money. Interestingly, three of those castmembers ? Jim Parsons, Kaley Cuoco and Johnny Galecki ? initially decided to follow in the footsteps of the Friends actors by negotiating as one but, as first reported by Deadline, the Emmy-winning Parsons made the decision to break away and negotiate on his own. Lucky for Cuoco and Galecki, his strategy didn?t work, and now all three are earning roughly $200,000 per episode this season ? up from $60k last year ? and will see $50,000 bumps each year over the next three years, as well as a piece of the comedy?s rich syndication profits.

That left Simon Helberg and Kunal Nayyar, who negotiated separately. Though it can be argued that Parsons, Cuoco and Galecki are lead material, both Helberg and Nayyar are certainly integral to the show?s success. Indeed, some of the comedy?s best moments are when Parsons, Galecki, Helberg and Nuyyar are together. But clearly, the studio wasn?t looking to follow a favored nations strategy because Helberg, who plays Howard Wolowitz, just closed a deal to earn north of $100,000 per episode, EW has confirmed. That?s up from around $40,000, but nowhere near what Parsons, Galecki and Cuoco are making.

Though Nayyar (Raj) has yet to sign a new pact of his own, it doesn?t appear that he was offered the same amount as Helberg or else he would have signed by now. Reportedly, Nayyar is expected to close a deal shortly; if not, the negotiations could be postponed to season?s end and he?ll have to continue earning around $25k per episode under his current, six-year contract. But it would be wrong to assume this was a contentious negotiation, said one interested party. ?Granted, no one was skipping to the mailbox and cashing a check ? there was some teeth pulling ? but in the end, everybody is going to make a ton of money,? the source said.

Man they should negotiate as a whole. Even though Jim is the lead man, it won't be the same show with out everyone else (Just like how "Kramer" tried to make a show of his own and failed). They should have the same salary and negotiate some "prosperity" bonus of some sort. Eg The actor who gets a certain amount of airtime per episode gets paid X amount. The same would be if that actor gets less amount of air time per episode = some other bonus. That's how I would've negotiated anyway... Nayyar earning 25k is just ludicrous !

Who makes a better superhero, Howard Wolowitz or Raj Koothrappali? EW snagged this exclusive first look from the Dec. 9 episode of The Big Bang Theory in which the two characters (played by the brilliant Simon Helberg and equally hilarious Kunal Nayyar) try to figure out which one has the right (or should we say better?) stuff. They test each other with various challenges. We may have to go with Koothrappali in this one.

Qjcn0.jpg

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Posts

    • Any Video Converter Free 9.2.3 by Razvan Serea Any Video Converter is an All-in-One video converting tool with an easy-to-use graphical interface, fast converting speed and excellent video quality. Any Video Converter supports all popular video formats and converts your videos to different video formats including MP4, MOV, MKV, M2TS, M4V, MPEG, AVI, WMV, ASF, OGV, WEBM, and more. It supports converting videos to customized percent (50%, 100%, 200%, and more) or resolution (480p, 720p, 1080p, 4K, and more); It supports encoding videos into x264, x265, h263p, xvid, mpeg, wmv, and more. Any Video Converter Free key features: Compatible with Windows 11/10/8.1/8/7 (32-64bit) User interface are available in 14 languages Convert all kinds of video formats including high-definition videos Extract audio from any videos and save as MP3/WMA for your mp3 player Take snapshot from any videos and build your own picture collection Support high-definition for both input and output Batch add videos from hard drive and batch convert Customize output parameters completely as you like Manage your output videos files by group or output profile Merge several video files into a single and long one Clip a video into segments Free Audio Filter: Adjust audio volume and add audio effects Crop frame size to remove black bars and retain what you want only Adjust the brightness, contrast, saturation Rotate or flip or add noise/sharpen effects Produce output video with subtitles of your own dialogue and much, much more... Any Video Converter Free 9.2.3 changelog: Fixed video download engine auto-update failures. Added custom speed control support in the speed change tool. Added support for downloading YouTube AI-generated subtitles. Added support for preserving original audio stream in the format convert tool (e.g., Dolby Atmos, DTS:X). Fixed other bugs and improved overall performance. Download: Any Video Converter Free 9.2.3 | 7.6 MB (Freeware) View: Any Video Converter Free Home Page | Screenshot Get alerted to all of our Software updates on Twitter at @NeowinSoftware
    • Not sure what country you’re in but in many countries you can absolutely jail the sellers behind businesses… in fact I’d say in most countries you can do that
    • I guess we are done since you refuse to read my comment you replied to or my other comment in another thread you were also a part of here.
    • I hate Slack, but Teams is much worse - maybe they've already optimized it, but it was a huge slog the last time I've checked about half a year ago. I miss my Skype.
    • Just ended up switching to Ubuntu. Not sure why I waited.
  • Recent Achievements

    • Dedicated
      jordanspringer earned a badge
      Dedicated
    • Rookie
      Rimplesnort went up a rank
      Rookie
    • One Year In
      Markus94287 earned a badge
      One Year In
    • One Month Later
      Markus94287 earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Markus94287 earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      510
    2. 2
      +Edouard
      175
    3. 3
      PsYcHoKiLLa
      155
    4. 4
      ATLien_0
      91
    5. 5
      Steven P.
      79
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!