TV Salaries: How Much Money Writers Make?
You may have wondered how much money TV writers, who abandoned their jobs last week and hit the picket lines in protest over DVD residuals and digital media compensation, really make. Let's take a look at the minimums guaranteed by the writers' union basic agreement.
Writers on a prime-time TV series like "Desperate Housewives" earn a minimum of 30,823 USD for writing a story and teleplay per one episode.
If the network requires a rewrite, the applicable minimum is $8,634 per episode. The writer earns a minimum of $4,324 for polishing a script.
The writers are paid a minimum of $2,890 to $3,688 per week on week-to-week term employment basis. If they work in additional capacities they could earn a minimum of up to $6,879 per week (based on the number of weeks they are employed).
The writers also earn additional 'program fees'. A maximum fee of $3,312 per episode is however split among the writers.
Writers may also earn additional fees in case they are asked to come up with story outlines (in case the network wishes to preview an upcoming storyline).
If they are asked to come up with a 'bible' (an outline of up to 6 storylines for an upcoming season) the writers earn a minimum of $44,353 per bible plus an additional $4,435 per storyline if the bible contains more than 6 storylines.
Each prime-time rerun earns the writer credited for writing the story, the teleplay or both a minimum residual payment of $8,431 to $21,078 per episode.
The minimum compensation for reruns in other time than prime-time is 50% or less of the original compensation (50% for 2nd rerun, 40% for 3rd, etc.)
Original compensation is payable within 7 days following script delivery; rerun residuals are payable within 30 days of the rerun.
The writers are also entitled to foreign telecast residuals which is especially important if the show becomes a global phenomenon.
These are all minimum payments enforced by the writers union. Successful writers like Marc Cherry or Shonda Rhimes can have contracts worth 5 million USD per year.
48% of the 12000 members of the writers union are however believed to be unemployed and rely on residual payments.
All minimum payments listed in this post are based on the WGA Theatrical and TV Basic Agreement which expired on 10/31. The minimums were increased in each of the last 3 years for which the said document was valid.
Labels: TV Business, Writers Strike
posted by Justin Van De Kamp at
4:00 PM
9 Comments:
dude, 30.000 dollars per episode you write is like a SH*Tload of money
seriously...
Prince Igor, keep in mind that writing an episode involves an enormous amount of work, and despite what it says here, I've often heard that MOST writers are unemployed at any given time. Plus the cost of living in the L.A. area is very high. Unless a writer is on a show's staff then he/she might not get any more work anytime soon. Gotta put that $30k in the bank.
to be honest this strike is just making rich people more rich. for gods sakes, think about the people surving paycheck to paycheck. i started off this strike in supposrt to the writers goal but now it has just become a total mess. i read somewhere the last strike in 1988 caused many minimum wage workers to lose their homes. i know this is good in the long run but.... this is just too selfish. plus i want my shows back. i realise i sound selfish too, but i seriously dont understand why the writers dont just negotiate with the network heads reasonably instead of launching this dumb strike. its just a lose-lose situation. unless someone strikes a deal. for gods sakes.
Can't these unemployed writer's just get other jobs for the time being? I wish I could make half the money these writer's make.
Plus, I heard that a lot of people will loose their jobs because of this strike. So to help unemployed writers, we make a lot of other people unemployed? Yeah, that'll solve the problem.
$30k/EP IS NOTHING. In a full season the max is $660K/yr. If actors can be paid up to a mil/ep then it must be in the budget to give writers their FAIR share. Compared to some of the big hitters it's peanuts:
"Actors,writers...will never be divided"
NETWORK PRIME TIME (salary per episode)
William Petersen, CSI $500,000
Zach Braff, Scrubs $350,000
Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: SVU $350,000
Chris Meloni, Law & Order: SVU $350,000
Charlie Sheen, Two and a Half Men $350,000
Hugh Laurie, House $300,000
Patrick Dempsey, Grey's Anatomy $225,000
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Old Christine $225,000
Eva Longoria, Desperate Housewives $200,000
Ellen Pompeo, Grey's Anatomy $200,000
Jeff Foxworthy, Are You Smarter… $150,000
T.R. Knight, Grey's Anatomy $125,000
Chandra Wilson, Grey's Anatomy $125,000
Sally Field, Brothers & Sisters $100,000
http://www.tvguide.com/News/tv-star-salary/070726-03
Tom Freston-$22 million (2005), Leslie Moonves-$20 million (Viacom and CBS)
News Corp.'s Exec-Rupert Murdoch-$23.6 million/year.
Time Warner's Dick Parsons and Disney's Bob Iger took in about half that of Moonves, Freston and Murdoch. Parsons earned $10.6 million, Iger $12 million.
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117941905.html?cs=1&s=h&p=0
http://www.sean-malone.com/blog.html
Check out my article on the WGA Strike (I link to this fine post as well), which puts all of this into a bit better context. Writing an episodic Television series does require a lot of hard-work, but 100s of other people work for hourly wages and are absolutely crucial to the production process - the WGA strike hurts all of those people, and cannot result in better television - check out my blog to find out why.
http://www.sean-malone.com/blog.html
Just because actors make more money than writers doesn't mean that writers don't make a lot of money. Of course, Les Moonves makes more than a writer as he should. I don't see a comparison of their salaries as being relevant.
What is really unfair is the crew members being laid off because of the writer's selfishness. Small shows that get low ratings lose in this situation too. The whole situation is not fair, really.
Why is the writers guild responsible for the hardships suffered by the other workers? Is because they refused to negotiate? No that was the studios. Is it because they already earn the lions share of revenus, No that is the studio.
It is not selfish to demand a fair portion of the profits. Rather than blaming the writers other workers need to get organizing and get their fair share.
A writer will make more than most of us ever will, so what? Is that a reason to give more money to the executives at the studio? What we need is a little solidarity in support of fair pay.
Most of these comments were pathetic. It seems that most people did not support the writers because the writers make more money than they do. Jealousy...How sad...In the age of Obama we no longer want to reward success, we want to punish it and redistribute the wealth. This country would be happy if CEO's made minimum wage, and if these writers made the same...
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home