Weekly salaries of lead actors on Broadway

Any input on what lead actors are earning these days weekly on Broadway shows?

It varies wildly. Minimum is now what, like $1,800 a week? Lane and Broderick made headlines for getting $100K a week when they resigned their Producers contracts, huge stars like Hugh Jackman probably make close to that, although it's rare. Theater stars like Idina Menzel and leads in long-running shows probably make on average between $10K and $20K a week, although that's merely an educated guess.

Updated On: 1/13/15 at 10:39 PM

Menzel made 30k a week when she did Wicked in London.

I think Jackman did that with one of his recent shows. Very, very rare thing though I believe.

The Lane/ Broderick salary for their Producers return is partially true. They had a lower base salary, but negotiated to receive a certain percentage of the weekly grosses. Their return was a huge bonanza, so their pay, when salary was combined with the percent of the grosses, was likely close to the $100K figure.

I have been told that unless a lead has a recognizable name that is growing to draw an audience, more than likely they are being paid the minimum. I hope I am wrong, but why pay more than minimum when there are 100 other actors just a qualified and talented for the same role.

Certainly with a recognizable name or an award that can be put on a billboard, $10,000+ per week can be expected.

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My guess for Jessie would be $5000-$10,000 per week. She was a Tony award nominee, along with other award nominations, prior to her role in Beautiful. I am thinking closer to $5000 at the beginning of the contract. After she won Best Actress, I would hope she was able to renegotiate her contract closer to $10k per week. In her new role in Waitress, I would like to think she will start around $10k per week.

Of course, that is all a wild guess. I could be way off.

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The union minimum for ensemble contracts is just over $1800 a week currently. Principals contracts, regardless of fame or popularity, usually start around $4000-$5000 weekly.

Really? The only thing I could find by forum search was something from 2011.

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Long story, but through my work I once had access to a document that listed the salaries for all performers in several Broadway shows. I was shocked at how low their weekly rates were. The leads were making approx $2300/week and they were recognizable theater names. No one huge by any means but I definitely knew who they were. I had assumed they would be able to negotiate for more, but I guess not...

For the record, this was in 2011.

@neonlightsxo: I and likely others are not about to look at a thread titled Billy Porter for general discussion/information about actor salaries. You're expecting something unreasonable.

@theatregoer3: Between mounting and running costs... Well, there was that Matilda article that mentioned how Broadway shows are just plain expensive to make these days, stating how American unions are a major culprit, so I wonder where the acting unions fall in terms of percent of mounting and/or running costs. Only tangentially related, but I read an article about royalties/residuals a while back about how actors in TV commercial spots account for a very small percent (like 2% or something) of the total cost to produce a TV ad.

But clearly the "percent of gross" approach (I guess the pre/post recoup I asked about above isn't a thing) is something certain star actors can afford and may do to both alleviate running costs and gamble on success. Hugh Jackman is amazing, though.

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