The SAG-AFTRA strike continues, and whilst you may think that actors are already paid enough, that simply isn’t the case as 13 Reasons Why star Tommy Dorfman explained on Threads.
Dorfman, who played Ryan Shaver in the successful but controversial Netflix show, broke down her paycheck from the first season of the show on her Threads account, demonstrating just how little money she actually made from her appearance. Despite being a regular character in the show’s first season, appearing in eight episodes, Dorfman was only paid $29,953.24 for six months of work.
“my earnings for the entire first season of 13 Reasons Why were $29,953.24 prior to agency and manager fees (20%) and taxes. 8 episodes over six months.”
And as Dorfman explains, she didn’t even get all of that as manager fees and taxes had to be deducted. She went on to explain the extra promotional work she did and the difficulties she faced financially.
“i did all of the promo and had KEY ART for this show, flew round trip from NYC to SF to shoot for every episode, was kept for days without pay/working. i barely qualified for insurance.”
Considering the success of the show and how significant a role Ryan Shaver played in the first season, that feels like a pretty unfair paycheck. As Dorfman says, “the show’s season 1 garnered a total of 476 million view hours.” It did well and made Netflix a lot of revenue and yet still the streaming giant underpaid its actors.
Comments under the actress’s post agreed with her statement and many more showing outward support for the strike as a whole. Fans also thanked Dorfman for opening their eyes to the reality that most working actors face.
“To those of us who just consume the shows/movies etc, we only see the headline figures on how much it makes, and what the big payments are, we’re never really shown the breakdown of what all the other actors who make the entirety of the project earn. It’s a real eye opener when we hear the real life experiences of those who provide us so much joy in our lives.”
“Yall are being paid in peanuts while the execs are jetting around in first class.”
“I love these explanations. I hope people acknowledge art is not free.”
For the most part, we only ever hear about the highly paid actors and actresses and rarely, if ever, hear about the slightly smaller fish. But a majority of the acting scene is made up of those smaller actors, and those are the ones who are struggling the most. Many struggle along with smaller paychecks with little to no residuals and as Dorfamn sums it up best: “this is why we strike.”