In a groundbreaking agreement Friday, the commercial producers who finance Broadway’s big hits have agreed to give a percentage of profits to performers who help develop successful shows.
The deal, reached between Actors’ Equity, a union representing 51,000 performers and stage managers, and the Broadway League, a trade organization for producers, is a milestone, marking the first time that the industry’s financiers have tacitly agreed to acknowledge that performers are contributing ideas, not just labor, to shaping new musicals and plays.
3 comments:
The title of this article was enough to pull me to read it because it dealt with something as profits being shared with the much-deserved performers who help create a performance.
For a long time, the general idea has been that the producers hold the biggest share in the success of a production. Even though it makes sense because essentially the producers are the ones who are giving the required resources to performers, the fact that the performers, who have essentially put in the labor that people are coming to see were not credited with their much deserved appreciation did not always sound very nice.
But this article stands strong to tell everyone that maybe now things are going to change for the better for everyone involved in a Broadway production. With the producers agreeing to pay the performers what they truly deserve as a token of appreciation for all the hard work that they put in, it is just tells us how much time is changing for the better.
This article is so exciting to read on two accounts. The first is seeing the change. It is great to know how much power the Actor’s Equity union holds and how much it can change. The second is to see that people are getting financial compensation for their hard work. As someone who hopes to be a successful Equity manager, I anticipate working on labs and developmental processes in my early career and it is nice to read about how I will be making more money for the work that I do. It is said to here that the compensation of $1000 dollars a week hasn’t changed in more than a decade as the cost of living has risen. Not to get on a soapbox but this problem of wages not inflating while the cost of living rises is ridiculous. The median cost of a house in 1980 was 47,000 dollars and is now close to 120,000 dollars – a 155.319% difference while the minimum wage has gone from $3.10 to 7.25 only a 123% difference. There needs to be more inflation in wages. Hopefully, this deal sparks more livable wages for artists.
It’s great to hear that actors are being compensated for their work beyond just the performance aspect. Theater is a collaborative process and not many of us are out here living the dream and rolling in money, so it’s only fair that everyone be paid for every part of the process they take part in, especially since the money exists and has just been going to the suits this whole time. It’s crazy to think that this is essentially the first “raise” that performers and managers will be receiving in lord knows how long, even though a dollar just doesn’t stretch as far as it used to, especially in New York City. Rent is ridiculous, food is ridiculous, and transportation is ridiculous, so how can we expect people to pay their bills and take care of themselves at $1000 a week? The point is, I am grateful to hear about this agreement, not only because it is going to positively impact the industry as it is now, but it may set a precedent for the future.
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