During the 2023 Hollywood strikes, Mandy Moore shocked a lot of people when she revealed that, despite a reported 18 billion streaming hours on Hulu, she only made “pennies” in residuals from This Is Us. A few months later, Aaron Paul shared that he did not earn any streaming residuals from his Emmy-winning role on Breaking Bad. Over on the production side of things, the writers for Suits revealed that even though it was one of the most-streamed properties on Netflix that year with over three billion minutes watched, they’d only made a couple of hundred dollars each. Basically, actors, writers, and creators were getting screwed while streaming executives were making bank.
Like Suits and Breaking Bad, Gilmore Girls picked up a ton of new fans after it started streaming on Netflix. Lorelai Gilmore herself, Lauren Graham, is busy promoting her new series, The Z-Suite. During an appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! recently, Lauren revealed that she doesn’t make much at all in GG residuals. Why? Because there’s “no residuals on Netflix.”
Lauren Graham is spilling some hot Luke’s coffee when it comes to her paycheck. The Gilmore Girls alum, who starred alongside Alexis Bledel on the WB series from 2000 to 2007 and in the 2016 four-episode revival on Netflix, detailed how much she gets paid now that the show has become popular on streaming platforms.
“There really are no residuals on Netflix,” Lauren said during a March 19 appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live. “But I’ve been paid in love and appreciation.”
While Lauren said she doesn’t make money from residuals—payments typically made to actors and the creative teams behind TV shows due to reruns, syndication or streaming deals—actors have been trying to make changes in Hollywood, with residuals being key discussion point of both the writer and actor strikes in 2023. (At the time, Mandy Moore also admitted her This Is Us streaming residuals were “very tiny, like 81-cent checks.”)
And for Lauren, her lack of compensation may be surprising to fans who have seen how much the show skyrocketed in popularity after it started streaming on Netflix.
“We have definitely reached more people than we were reaching on The WB,” Lauren continued. “And now it’s trickled into younger people, older people, men whose kids or wives probably have forced them to watch it. Yeah, I get stopped a lot. It surprises me every time though.”
Although the 58-year-old—who dated fellow Parenthood alum Peter Krause from 2010 to 2021—may not be growing her bank account as a result of her time on the show, she has been open about her undying appreciation for getting to play Lorelai Gilmore.
“It’s the best part I ever had,” Lauren said during a February appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. “I love doing it, and I think it was really wonderful. It’s just that thing where it was the perfect material at the perfect time with the perfect writer—and it just means so much to me.”
This is wild. During the strikes, Sean Gunn also mentioned that he was receiving almost nothing in GG residuals. Just like Breaking Bad and Suits, Gilmore Girls has made a ton of money for Netflix. In fact, Netflix made more than $8 billion in 2024. How much does it hurt their baseline if they shelled out an extra like $500 million to pay people what they’re owed? I thought that part of the strike negotiations was to make sure actors earned more money from streaming content. Apparently, the deal mainly applied to new properties and are dependent on them meeting certain streaming numbers. According to THR, many of them have met the threshold for bonuses.
I grew up watching Gilmore Girls, from mid-high school through just after college graduation. It will always hold a special place in my heart. I cannot believe that it’s been 25 years since it first aired! I did not have any type of crisis when I turned 40 last year, but I definitely had some sort of internal reckoning when I turned 32 and realized that I was now the same age that Lorelai was during the first season, only she was a badass with a 16-year-old and I was struggling with a two-year-old. It makes me so angry to learn that none of them are getting any residual money.
Photos credit: M10s/TheNews2/Cover Images, Eric Charbonneau and Marion Curtis for Netflix, Getty
Greedy 🤬 take the JOY OUTTA EVERYTHING IN LIFE! I remember reading Mark Proksch who played “Colin” in “What we do in the shadows” said he makes MORE 💲 of his stint as a GUEST on “The Office” than he has in all the seasons of being a primary for YEARS on the FX show😲…It looks like the ONLY way a lot of tv actors can make bank is on ABC/CBS/NBC…
I made software programs for some companies, I don’t get paid every time they used them. (Hey, that would be incredible !)
Those were production companies with people working day and night on assembly lines, I would rather THEY get a fair compensation.
@cafecito- that’s not an accurate comparison. Many people watch shows because of the human beings (actors) in the shows. The product is being utilized because of the artist that created it. And there are plenty of people making money off of these artists’ talents, it’s just not the artists themselves. I think the fairest comparison is the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, where their performances , merch etc makes a ton of money for the DC organization but that money stays with the fat cats at the top and doesn’t go to the people that are actually drawing in the consumers.
I am an actor and do receive residuals for Netflix etc. but the value is much less than other media (such as a rerun on regular tv or a renewal on a national commercial).
Artistes reman poor since they are never properly compensated for their creative efforts.
No one ever gets paid for the ‘product’ they make for corporations, creative or repetitive. And if you are in sales and build a client base, you can’t take that with you. Management in every industry is really good at keeping every future penny.
This. How much would it hurt to pay a fair wage? Apparently a lot, as it’s an issue across every industry. Look at Amazon. He already has more money than he could spend in his lifetime, yet the people at the bottom are getting arrested for trying to organize unions and negotiate for fair wages.
Note about the Suits numbers you include – after it premiered on Netflix it was streaming for 3 billion minutes – a week. Kept that up for 7 weeks and had set a streaming record by the time the writers were quoted as only earning a few hundred dollars despite such huge numbers. The final figure for 2023 was 57.7 billion minutes (believe the total is now over 80 billion).
Helps explain why Netflix’s Sarandos is so positive about H&M, despite the fact that the BM would have you believe they’re in jeopardy as their contract (supposedly) expires. Suits had already been on Amazon and Peacock, but the Netflix run started not long after the equally successful H&M documentary.
These Netflix numbers are crazy 🤪 no wonder the British media is foaming at the mouth for Netflix to abandon the Sussexes 😀 They are terrified of Meghan the Billionaire 💰
I hope all the unions continue to work to strengthen their position on this. I’ve heard a few actors and writers talking about this, how streaming changed everything in compensation and it’s really hard to make a living now, and they have to try to get more money upfront.
Yes. I’ve read several times about actors, directors, etc. getting nearly nothing from streaming. If they’re stiffing the creators and they keep raising their $$ subscriptions … where does the money go? 🤔
And herein lies the problem. Because TV actors traditionally got paid at a rate that assumed they would get some sort of residuals after the initial airing. Now that “reruns” are primarily on streaming, those residuals are gone, but I guarantee those actors’ pay rates have not gone up to compensate. I read Lauren Graham’s most recent book, Have I Told You This Already, and there are parts that paint a very bleak picture for most working actors. She mentions several times how you never know when your last job will be your LAST job, how she knows actors who just have never been able to get work again. And those actors likely don’t even have residuals to rely on now either.
As a songwriter that has had many song placements in shows on streaming networks, it is very infuriating that they do not pay residuals and not only that because there are so many options in the music field we don’t get paid a strong over all fee any more. Just another way to screw over creative artists….
I have long accepted I am in a dying field..
Which is why creators must have control over their work products.