Tuesday, August 20, 2013

STILL, MAKING MORE THAN I DO:  TV Guide's annual star salary list has some fascinating tidbits--not only has Jon Stewart surpassed Leno and Letterman as the highest paid late night personality, but Peter Dinklage is making substantial bank for Game of Thrones (though it's not clear if the $150K per episode is a $1.5M season salary or based solely on the episodes in which Dinklage appears).  Most shocking to me?  For returning to TV in The Crazy Ones, Robin Williams is only making $165K an episode--less than Amy Poehler makes an episode for Parks & Rec, or Jason Segel makes for HIMYM.

12 comments:

  1. Nigel from Cameroon11:24 AM

    Lots of Insanity on this list. Maddow at $7M? Wow!

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  2. Sophietje12:13 PM

    And how insane is it that I feel like Maslany is getting cheated at only $50k/ episode. (Um.. yes, please!) (but when compared to the other company on the lists, she and Greenberg are worth a lot more, IMO.)

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  3. I love Jon Stewart, and I think he's worth a high salary. But he seems to take one week off out of every three (and that's during the regular season when he's on at all).

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  4. I have never been paid less than $5 million to appear on an episode of Game of Thrones.

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  5. isaac_spaceman4:59 PM

    A $1.5MM season salary is not at all excessive in the context of the work that Dinklage does on GoT. He is the show's most recognizable star, the character most akin to an audience-surrogate hero, and probably the character with the most lines and call times. Although the show is only 10 episodes per season, my guess is that he spends more than the equivalent of 10 episodes' worth of time on location, since that clearly is not a show that films an episode a week. And while $1.5MM is a lot of money for real people, it's not a lot of money in the Hollywood scheme of things. Your average junior partner at a big LA law firm makes more, and her paycheck doesn't stop coming when GRRM runs out of books or keels over from eel-fat-induced health problems (looking at you, Wyman Manderly). Granted, the $1.5MM doesn't tell the whole story because Dinklage will get residuals and the role increases his chance of getting other work, but I wouldn't say he's "making bank."

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  6. isaac_spaceman5:03 PM

    My guess is that his summer vacation was a dry run to prove to Comedy Central that the show would be in good hands as a Stewart-produced show starring Jon Oliver. He's been doing it a long time and seems to want to do something else for a while. Maybe he takes a lot of vacations (1/3 seems to be an exaggeration), but I bet he puts in 70-80 hours for each four-show week, and that can take its toll.

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  7. Yeah, Stewart's making about what Kutcher is making annually, and Stewart does a lot more for the show--he writes material, clearly does a fair amount of prep for his interviews, and isn't just showing up to read lines. (Also, Stewart does more episodes in a month than Kutcher does in a season.)

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  8. Roger1:14 AM

    Am I the only one that would welcome that? Stewart has become stale and sanctimonious, and I thought Oliver's shows were great.

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  9. christy in nyc9:23 AM

    I agree, he's worth every penny. It's a weird thing to say about a show with such a huge, great cast, but I'm not sure there would even be a show without him.

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  10. isaac_spaceman2:00 PM

    I like Stewart more when he's trying to be funny than when he's trying to be serious, but I think you're being a bit harsh. The real problem is that comedy depends upon surprise. When we get too accustomed to a comedian's rhythms, they lose some of their power. Stewart has been in that chair a long time, and people who have watched him a lot can probably see everything coming. I like Jon Oliver a lot, but part of his appeal is just that he's something different.

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  11. Raka Kof1:05 PM

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