So have you ever wondered why your favorite child stars just disappear?

Well, it turns out, Hollywood is not a fairy tale.

This is a story of stolen money, abuse of power, and non-existent residuals.

But the thing is, guys, this story isn't just about bad contracts or bad apples in the industry. This is about a system that is built to profit off of the labor of children and leave them with nothing. But before we dive into that, make sure that you're following our podcast page and please rate the show if you're enjoying it. And of course, if you want to stay up to date on all things with this show and channel and all things I'm doing. Make sure to go to brett cooper.com.

That is the hub for all of that information.

So I know that abuse of power is not a new thing for you guys,

because obviously we have talked about this a lot this year,

especially with our whole Justin Bieber series.

But there was a recent viral video from actor Drake Bell.

He was one of the stars of Drake and Josh,

if you guys grew up watching that on Nickelodeon, and he went viral for talking about what it's like financially to be a former very successful child star and the fact that it's really not all that it's cracked up to me. And I was watching that video and then I was kind of following the comments and then I went down a Reddit loophole and I saw other things and I just strung together this entire episode and this entire story that I thought you guys might not know about what it's like to be a child on

television working at these children's networks. Now, the first thing that you need to know about

being a child actor and a child star or just being an actor in general in the payment structure

is you need to know about residuals. As an actor, you get paid for your time.

Like when I was doing Heather's or whatever it was, I was paid by the episode. So it was like,

okay, we're going to make this amount for this episode that you do. We kind of, you know,

that breaks down into a day rate. And those rates are usually determined by your actors union.

So sag afterra. And you make that money based on the time that you've worked.

But then after the show has been released, if it's put on, you know, cable or if a streaming

service buys it, you get residual checks in the mail for, you know, every time that it airs.

However much money, that episode or that show makes the networks, then you get a small cut of that. And that cut is predetermined in your contracts. And a lot of the time, that cut is predetermined by the unions, if it is a union project. So this is how historically, actors have been able to kind of sustain themselves when they're not working. So, you know, they do a couple of shows, but if they go through a dry spell, if they're taking some time off, they'll know that they'll have these residual checks come in and they're modest for most people, but they are consistent money and SAG after requires them. However, a lot of people, a lot of actors, are not seeing a ton of money from these residuals, especially as networks have switched

to streaming rather than selling and licensing the shows to cable, which obviously made

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