Monica's Boyfriend "Fun Bobby" Didn't Know How Rich The 'Friends' Cast Was Until He Started Receivin
Highlights
- The cast of Friends still earns royalties from the display, making around $20 million per yr due to its persisted reputation and viewership.
- Guest-starring on Friends supplied a career boost for many actors, opening doorways for lucrative opportunities in the business.
- Some visitor stars, like Vincent Ventresca who performed Fun Bobby, nonetheless obtain royalty tests from the show, earning approximately $2,000 in step with 12 months.
When Friends first aired, no one can have predicted how massive of a success it will develop into. But over the years (and the seasons), the show generated tons of hype, especially when it added notable visitor stars to the cast checklist.
Appearing on Friends was a very powerful profession moment for everyone from Cole Sprouse when he played Ben (and crushed on Jennifer Aniston) to Reese Witherspoon and countless others. Not everybody earned a ton of money from the opportunity, although. Fortunately for some, the guest superstar royalties weren't half dangerous.
The Friends Cast Still Earns Royalties From The Show Today
Even even though their earnings started out decrease, the Friends cast began incomes extra money with every passing season. Given how widespread Friends stays today, the royalties are still flooding in, earning each cast member around $20 million per year.
This was the consequence, of course, of years of hard work, a little of negotiating on the part of the six-member core cast, and the viewership's penchant for reliving actually each episode more than one times over the years.
They have earned it, particularly as a result of the fame highlight on them hasn't all the time been rosy. From Jennifer Aniston's relationship drama to Matthew Perry coming under fire for his memoir, being super-famous has its drawbacks.
Long after the display ended, the cast continues to be earning spectacular royalties and driving on the waves of status. Friends was a jumping-off level for most of the actors and helped pave the way for profitable careers for each and every of them.
For the visitor stars who seemed alongside the noted cast, on the other hand, there might not be hundreds of thousands in residuals waiting of their mailboxes each and every month.
Guest-Starring On Friends Was A Career Boost For Most Actors
Friends was notable for its lengthy list of famous guest stars, together with Jennifer Aniston's then-husband Brad Pitt, which turned out to be an enjoyable experience for all. Though Brad, at the time, was already a large name in Hollywood, no longer each and every visitor megastar was anyone uber-famous.
Case in point? Vincent Ventresca. When he performed "Fun Bobby," Vincent had appeared on a few shows, but none so beloved today as Friends.
His profession in TV started with a single-episode look on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air in 1991, however it took until a minimum of 1996 for him to gain extra well-liked recognition (on the sequence Boston Common).
So when he gained the name for Friends, why would Vincent turn down the opportunity?
In a chat with The Guardian, Vincent admitted he was feeling cocky after completing a pilot for Fox. He said of receiving word that Friends was auditioning for small portions, "I thought I was the coolest person in the world... But something inside me told me, just do it."
During his first appearance as Fun Bobby, Vincent stated the "energy was good." By his go back for the second iteration of Fun Bobby, "it was like a circus" because of how fashionable the display was.
Fortunately for Ventresca, that supposed long-term pay for his small part.
How Much Did Friends Pay Its Guest Stars?
To date, there doesn't appear to be a typical for how a lot Friends visitor stars were given paid. In truth, it's rumored that some didn't; Brad Pitt was said to have 'phoned in' his look because he didn't get a paycheck for the gig.
Other stars like Reese Witherspoon never spoke about their salaries, while Bruce Willis reportedly donated his salary to charity—after being pressured into taking the gig after dropping of venture to Matthew Perry.
However, Charlie Sheen reportedly earned $200,000 for his look on Friends in 1996, a role that lasted a single episode (he played Ryan in "The One with the Chicken Pox").
As for lesser superstar guest stars, the up-front pay may now not were nice, however the long-term royalties were a perk.
Fun Bobby Still Receives Royalty Checks From Friends
The details of the visitor stars' earnings have by no means been fully revealed, but a few of the actors themselves spilled the beans, and Vincent was one in every of them. He is obviously no longer the richest cast member from Friends, and he simplest seemed in two episodes, but "Fun Bobby" nonetheless receives some money from the show.
It might be that each and every guest star negotiates a special deal, particularly relating to giant names like Sean Penn or Jean-Claude Van Damme. Even regardless that Jean-Claude was a noteworthy visitor famous person, he was not fun to deal with on set, so most probably wasn't given a long-term deal.
As for Fun Bobby, AKA Vincent Ventresca, he was invited again for a second episode after taking part in Rachel Green's boyfriend one time.
Vincent instructed The Guardian that the primary cast "must be really rich," as a result of in 2019, he was still receiving royalty checks from Friends. According to Ventresca, his royalties quantity to about $2,000 according to 12 months, an apparent average over the years since his appearance on episodes "The One with the Monkey" (1994) and "The One with Russ" (1996).
For any individual lucky sufficient to have got a gig on Friends in its heyday, the ones royalty exams may well be small, but they most probably may not forestall coming.
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7tbTErZ%2Bippeoe6S7zGifqK9dosKktIydoJ1llqe2prrDrGSpmalitLax0q1krKyRp8Bw