I did Broadway shows. And I started realizing that this is actually how I'm going to make my living. So maybe I should try to do television and film and make a better living and get an occasional residual check so I can pay a mortgage someday.
What people forget is that every movie that gets made keeps making money for somebody FOREVER.
Artists need to be valued. Many of our shows are re-run in other countries. In Hollywood, if a show is being re-run, artists are paid royalty.
What the advertisers are trying to do by eliminating residuals is the most appalling form of greed that I cry thinking about it.
I remember my first professional paycheck. I couldn't keep it as a memento because I needed the money, but I have kept some of the residuals that I get. I got one the other day that was for two cents. I might put that in a frame.
About 10 minutes before I found out that I had landed 'Fantastic Beasts', I got a residual check in the mail for zero dollars. On the check it said 'Advice Slip.' And I was like, 'Well, what's the advice? Go into another line of work?
I went to Washington to ask for a little residual payment for the people who had written films in the early, early days, people who never got any residuals on tapes or anything at all.
You know, people want to honor me, and on the one hand I just don't want to be a poster child; but on the other, I want to do something classy and great - something where the residuals will go to the cause.
Everyone who appears in a scene gets paid.
Actors make less than you think.
I think if you contribute to a job, and it's repeated and repeated, and sold over the world, and the producers are making millions, you should benefit from it.
Some of the big movies, you get checks for a long, long time.
