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Big Bang Actors To Earn $1M Per Episode

Posted by timothy on from the starving-grad-students dept.

Cludge (981852) writes with a snippet from the BBC: "And rich they will be: With The Big Bang Theory commissioned until 2017, the show's three biggest names, Jim Parsons (Sheldon), Johnny Galecki (Leonard) and Kaley Cuoco (Penny) are guaranteed to earn $72m (£42.6m) each over the next three seasons. Unsurprisingly, the cost of producing the sitcom has spiraled." I wonder what that works out per line?

28 of 442 comments (clear)

  1. Nerd Blackface by mythosaz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The argument against is that BBT is, essentially, Nerd Blackface.

    The argument for BBT is that the material and situations are relateable, especially with the mainstreaming of geek culture (Dr. Who, BSG, Marvel films).

    Meh. It's funny. I watch. I read the vanity card at the end. I think they're all good actors - at least within the scope of the show.

    1. Re:Nerd Blackface by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      One comment I've read sums it all: "Arrested Development was a smart show about dumb people. BBT is a dumb show about smart people".

    2. Re:Nerd Blackface by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Pullleeeze. To even suggest that is to suggest that the persecution of nerds is equivalent to the persecution of African American minorities in the United States. Certainly nerds are persecuted, particularly in high school, but they are in no way equivalent. Besides, it's not like the show doesn't make fun of people who are "smart and good looking".

      Tell that to the parents of any "nerd" that has committed suicide due to the bullying. Go on. Straight to their face.

    3. Re:Nerd Blackface by E-Rock · · Score: 5, Insightful

      We're talking about a fictional example, but Sheldon is highly successful, and seems quite happy with his life. He doesn't need to be medicated just because he doesn't meet stereotypical norms.

    4. Re:Nerd Blackface by nine-times · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The argument against is that BBT is, essentially, Nerd Blackface.

      That wouldn't be my argument against it. My argument is that it's not a good show. I don't find the characters relateable. I don't think it's particularly funny. It seems like someone took a very bland, unoriginal sitcom and attached a geek gimmick to try to make it interesting, but in my mind it fails. It's not interesting, and the geek gimmick doesn't really work.

      If you wanted to talk about it's problem with relation to "geek culture", I don't feel like it's right to say it's like "nerd blackface". I would argue the problem is more like, if you had a bunch of kids thinking that they understand urban black culture because they're listening to rap music, but the rap music they're listening to is Vanilla Ice.

      Sorry, no, you don't understand geeks and nerds and "geek culture" from watching Big Bang Theory. You don't understand comic books and Doctor Who from learning the references that the show uses. From the episodes that I've seen, the characters don't seem like authentic geeks and nerds. Not really. It mostly seems like a crappy "Friends" ripoff where the characters are all wearing nerd costumes and talking in nasal voices. I don't think it's mainstreaming geek culture, but more like jumping on the bandwagon of geek culture that has managed to mainstream itself.

      That's my take. I don't require that anyone else agrees.

    5. Re:Nerd Blackface by retchdog · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Maybe. But it ends, is my point. It ends, and one is rewarded relatively richly afterward (relative to one's intrinsic ability, of course, and subject to the vagaries of fortune).

      The discrimination against blacks (to whatever extent it is, and for whatever reason) is much more persistent.

      --
      "They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
    6. Re:Nerd Blackface by UnknowingFool · · Score: 3

      I would argue the problem is more like, if you had a bunch of kids thinking that they understand urban black culture because they're listening to rap music, but the rap music they're listening to is Vanilla Ice.

      Well most people would see that as satire and not that the elements of geekdom are to be taken literally as 100% true. There is a category for shows like that: documentaries. I would argue most TV shows does not follow subjects faithfully. Since you mentioned "Friends", I don't think people really believe that New Yorkers spend all of their time hanging out in a coffee shop. Chuck probably does not represent a true government agent any more than Will Smith was your average Bellaire teen.

      Personally I thought one of the funniest episodes was "The Alien Parasite Hypothesis" where Howard and Raj decide to settle a dispute by wrestling. In real life, two people angry at each other would have actually wrestled regardless of lack of skill instead of the hilarity of two nerds circling each other endlessly.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    7. Re:Nerd Blackface by CanHasDIY · · Score: 4, Funny

      As a self professed nerd/geek, the "Nerd Blackface" doesn't offend me, and I certainly don't feel "persecuted" by it. But I can't stand it in a TV show, and so I pretty much stopped watching after half an episode. That, and after many modern examples of sitcoms and half hour comedy shows without laugh tracks, I absolutely cannot stand shows with laugh tracks anymore.

      (cue laugh track)

      --
      An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
    8. Re:Nerd Blackface by roc97007 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      We're talking about a fictional example, but Sheldon is highly successful, and seems quite happy with his life. He doesn't need to be medicated just because he doesn't meet stereotypical norms.

      This. The Sheldon character holds down a high paying job and manages to interact with an admittedly small circle of friends. He's already doing better than a good segment of the population. That his personality quirks should be wrung out of him through therapy and/or medication is more than a little offensive.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    9. Re:Nerd Blackface by roc97007 · · Score: 3, Informative

      I agree on the annoyance of laugh tracks, but TBBT is filmed in front of an audience, and it's the audience's actions you hear, not canned laughter.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    10. Re:Nerd Blackface by AudioEfex · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Oh please. I don't think many of you have ever seen a sitcom before.

      Sam Malone had a sex addiction problem. Monica Gellar had severe OCD. Roseanne had anger management issues.

      That's what's hilarious about the folks who cry about BBT - they take it so seriously because it hits a lot closer to home than they would like folks to believe and they simply don't have the ability to laugh at themselves.

      Did folks criticize Mary Tyler Moore Show for not being an accurate enough representation of life in a network news room? Probably, if they worked in one and didn't have a sense of humor.

      As to TFA, I'm very glad for them - they earned this - this show is going to bring in billions because of the syndicated deal, the hell is merchandised out of it as well (I was at a LCBS yesterday and they had an entire section of BBTS merch), and they are getting a small cut now. Is everyone on TV overpaid to some extent, sure. But comparatively, these are not outrageous salaries, particularly in this current climate of a hit TV show being as rare as it is, particularly on networks. If the entire industry is going to rake in such money, I'm glad that the folks in front of the camera who are largely responsible for my enjoyment of the show as opposed to executives who just sit and approve shit.

    11. Re:Nerd Blackface by Kaenneth · · Score: 4, Funny

      Sheldon is one disfiguring accident away from being a Batman villain.

    12. Re:Nerd Blackface by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Perhaps for the young and healthy.

      For the unhealthy, suicide can be a logical exit.

      Geeky, if you were going to be in severe pain for the rest of your life and drugs wouldn't help- you wouldn't be able to sleep more than 2 hours at a stretch without being woken up by the pain-- how long before suicide would seem like a rational way out.

      Not everyone's pain is physical.

      --
      She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
    13. Re:Nerd Blackface by roc97007 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The Sheldon character holds down a high paying job and manages to interact with an admittedly small circle of friends. He's already doing better than a good segment of the population.

      Do you really think that an IRL Sheldon without script immunity would be able to do the same? The TV Sheldon also seems to be a pretty crap physicist, given to conspiracy theories, junk science, and an inability to distinguish between fiction and reality.

      Script immunity, reasonable point. Nevertheless...

      I personally know a highly paid programmer who believes in witchcraft and astrology. I had a hard time understanding that someone with such a logical mind would believe in something so illogical, but apparently it's more common than one would think. It's what puts the the "quirk" in "quirky", I guess. Otherwise brilliant people who have strange blind spots in areas where you'd think they'd know better. You really don't know anyone like that?

      My dad worked with a guy very much like Sheldon. He was brilliant, and so dedicated to his work that he would rarely and only under certain circumstances acknowledge the existence of others. Arguably someone with even more intense quirks than Sheldon. Although admittedly, Dad said that the guy had a "handler", a guy almost as brilliant as him who acted as confidant, kept him out of trouble, and acted as interpreter to the more normal people.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    14. Re:Nerd Blackface by mythosaz · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Remember. There is selection bias.

      Live studio audiences for {Network_Comedy_Show} is composed primarily of uberfans from flyover states on vacation in sunny California, those willing to wait hours in line just to gush over seeing a C-list celebrity do a cameo with Kaley Cuoco 40 times until they get it right from all angles.

      Of course they laugh like hyenas. The stand-up comedian that warms them up doesn't hurt either.

      I had a friend attend a BBT taping. He reported it was the funniest thing he had ever seen -- but of course he went to the taping, because he thinks the BBT is the funniest thing, so... there you go.

    15. Re:Nerd Blackface by radarskiy · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If you were paying attention you would notice that they are not making fun of nerd culture as distinct from not-nerd culture. The basis of the humorous situations typically turn out to be the kind of things that really happen to anyone: poor communication in relationships, one spouse making significantly more money than another, existential crises over career shifts, overbearing parents, etc. The closest they get to a distinct nerd situation is when the PhDs mock Wolowitz for only having a Master's degree.

      There may be the meta-criticism that they are mocking nerds for not recognizing that their problems as problems anybody could have... then again *you* failed to recognize this as well.

    16. Re:Nerd Blackface by Xest · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This is exactly what's great about The Big Bang theory, and especially discussions on Slashdot about it, there are always a bunch of geeks who will sit and say they don't relate to it and it doesn't represent "proper" geeks, all the while completely oblivious to the fact they're sounding exactly like Sheldon hence disproving their own theory that it's not representative. If you sat Sheldon down in front of a show like the Big Bang Theory this is probably exactly what he'd say:

      "That wouldn't be my argument against it. My argument is that it's not a good show. I don't find the characters relateable. I don't think it's particularly funny. It seems like someone took a very bland, unoriginal sitcom and attached a geek gimmick to try to make it interesting, but in my mind it fails. It's not interesting, and the geek gimmick doesn't really work. "

      It's like a kind of circular ignorance of what makes the show great. I'd say that contrary to your assertion people watching Big Bang Theory exactly understand geeks and nerds, because when they think of Sheldon and what he'd have to say about it, they'd imagine exactly the sort of holier than thou, no true geek (aka no true Scotsman) argument you've made.

    17. Re:Nerd Blackface by nine-times · · Score: 3, Insightful

      That's a great, clever argument, since it basically closes off my options. No matter what I say, you can just respond, "Oh you, you're such a Sheldon! That's exactly what he'd say!" In reality, you're only illustrating the sort of dumb ideas that the show inspires. It makes people think they understand-- like I said, in about the way that a bunch of rich white suburban teenage boys, a couple of decades ago, might think that they understood inner city black culture because they bought a Starter jacket and listened to Vanilla Ice. And it's not a "no true scottsman" argument and more than it would be to say, "in fact, Vanilla Ice was not a true inner-city black person".

      But fundamentally, it's not a "no true geek" argument. Really, it's a "these characters are weak, poorly written, and representative of nothing" argument. It's a "I've tried watching this show, and found it painfully unfunny" argument.

  2. Re:They are the rich by mythosaz · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They've made quite clear that Sheldon is paid well by the university, and that he's got piles of un-cashed checks laying around.

    Only Penny is ever in need of cash.

  3. Re:It's not that much by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 3, Interesting

    considering Miami Vice was pulling these kinds of numbers in the '80s. Granted, it was only for one actor, but still.

    Yes, and if you remember, the other lead actor was paid less well because he was rather less white, and he was rather pissed off about it, understandably.

    These star actors cost a lot, yes, but they also brought in a lot of money. So I suppose it was, and still is a sound investment.

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  4. Shouldn't they be starving to death? by denzacar · · Score: 4, Insightful

    After all... it's a show about and for people and culture who promote file sharing. Sorry, piracy.

    Checking Piratebay it is obvious that it is heavily shared, with thousands of seeds.
    Why isn't this show being canceled due to everyone involved with making of it dying from starvation?
    I was told that sharing... sorry, pirating of video directly hurts people who make these shows.
    I demand that someone does something about it!

    Like... take them all behind the shed and shoot them in the head.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  5. I'd love to be wrong, but ... by xfizik · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Given that the show is going into season 8, I wouldn't be too surprised if it went downhill from here, like it usually happens to long running sitcoms. It's not like money will reflect the quality of acting.

  6. Yawn by wcrowe · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't get the controversy. I like the show. It makes me laugh. I don't care what the actors get paid. It's none of my business. I think the comparisons to "black face" are in error. Poking fun at people because of their behavior is not the same as poking fun at people because of their skin color. It's just a sitcom. They come and go. It hasn't jumped the shark yet (not for me, anyway). When it does I'll probably stop watching. And if CBS should cancel it tomorrow, I won't care. My life does not revolve around characters on a tv show, nor does it revolve around the actors and writers. They're getting $1million per show... yawn.

    --
    Proverbs 21:19
  7. Re:It's not that much by edawstwin · · Score: 3

    Yes, and if you remember, the other lead actor was paid less well because he was rather less white

    If you think PMT was less-well-paid because he wasn't white, then you don't understand anything about TV. If people tuned in to watch PMT more than Don Johnson, he would have been paid more than Don Johnson. The truth is, Don Johnson and hot girls in bikinis were about the only reasons to tune into that show. Just about any decent actor (white or not) could have played Tubbs, and we wouldn't have cared.

    --
    I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it by not dying. - Woody Allen
  8. Re:They are the rich by sycodon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And the show really isn't that funny.

    Penny has nice tits though.

    --
    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
  9. Re:They are the rich by Stormy+Dragon · · Score: 3, Funny

    Sheldon doesn't trust banks because he believes that ATM machines will be the first wave of the robot uprising.

  10. Re:They are the rich by TeknoHog · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Only Penny is ever in need of cash.

    OMG, so that's why they named her Penny, rather than something like Trillian.

    --
    Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
  11. Wrong measure by Camael · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You are using the wrong measure.

    The cast of BBT are not being paid that much because they are good at acting.
    They are being paid that much because collectively, they enable the BBT show to continue being produced, which show generates substantial amounts of income for their corporate overlords through advertising, merchandising, syndication and whatnot.

    The "hundreds of thousands" of other better actors you allude to sadly do not have this earning potential and hence, do not have this kind of paycheck.

    Quality of acting is irrelevant.