Billy Porter says ‘f**k you’ to Bob Iger as Hollywood strikes force him to sell his home

Out actor Billy Porter opened up about the toll the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) strike is having on his finances, telling the Evening Standard that people don’t realize how many actors must live paycheck-to-paycheck. Porter said the studio executives’ unwillingness to compromise with the actors’ union means he now has to sell his house.

Porter said it hurts his feelings when people critique actors like him as being part of “a bunch of millionaires just trying to get more millions.”

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“I WILL NOT BE BULLIED INTO APOLOGIZING FOR HAVING AN OPINION.”

“They think we’re entitled,” he said, “Meanwhile, we’re getting six-cent checks.” He went on to blast Disney CEO Bob Iger, who recently called the union’s demands “unrealistic.”

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“To hear Bob Iger say that our demands for a living wage are unrealistic? While he makes $78,000 a day? I don’t have any words for it, but: ‘F**k you.'”

He then explained why he has to sell his house.

“The life of an artist, until you make f**k-you money — which I haven’t made yet — is still check-to-check. I was supposed to be in a new movie, and on a new television show starting in September. None of that is happening. So to the person who said ‘We’re going to starve them out until they have to sell their apartments,’ you’ve already starved me out.”

Porter was referring to an anonymous studio executive who told Deadline that the networks were in no rush to make a deal. “The end game is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses,” the source said.

The strike began in July, when SAG-AFTRA — the union representing film and television actors – could not agree on a new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP).

Actors have been picketing alongside members of the Writers Guild of America (WGA), who went on strike in May. Like screenwriters, actors are demanding better working conditions and livable wages for working artists who may not be household names.

But recognizable actors like Porter who’ve appeared on high-profile shows are also pointing to the catastrophic effect the streaming boom has had on the residuals that they used to be able to rely on. Residuals are the financial compensation that actors and others involved in TV and film productions traditionally receive from re-runs, syndication, and home media sales.

In a recent New Yorker story, the cast of Netflix’s Orange is the New Black revealed how little they made on the show, one of the first major hits of the streaming era. Out actor Lea DeLaria told The New Yorker’s Michael Schulman that her residuals checks for her work on the series are often around $20. Meanwhile, Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos’s salary is $22 million, the magazine reported.

While picketing in New York last week with his partner and their son, gay actor Anthony Rapp also laid out the impact streaming has had on actors’ residuals checks.

“I did a few episodes of The Knick several years ago and it’s on some form of streaming now, and I get like $1.25 in residuals a couple times a year,” he told Variety. “I did a couple episodes of The Good Fight, again, $3 residuals, $1.50 residuals.”

Former child star Mara Wilson, who identifies as bisexual, tweeted on July 13 that she made so little from her voice roles on Netflix’s BoJack Horseman and in Disney’s Big Hero 6 that she has never qualified for SAG-AFTRA’s healthcare benefits.

After Disney Iger described both WGA and SAG-AFTRA demands as “unrealistic” during an appearance on CNBC’s Squawk Box, many performers and creatives reacted with fury as well.

“The unmitigated gall & arrogance of a small group of multi-millionaires representing multi-billion dollar companies to say the entire field of working-class writers and actors are ‘unrealistic’ because we want to survive and afford rent and put food on our tables,” tweeted bisexual screenwriter Jen Richards, adding that “the vast majority of actors & writers are working class in a very unpredictable industry and barely get by.”

“To the already disgustingly rich it’s ‘unreasonable’ that we want to be able to afford homes and take care of our children or parents if there’s even the possibility that they will make a little less profit tomorrow than they did yesterday,” she continued. “The rich MUST always be getting richer.”