Mandy Moore Shares Her Shockingly Low ‘This Is Us’ Residual Pay from Hulu: “Pennies”

Emmy-nominated actress Mandy Moore is opening up about how little she gets paid in residuals from her hit show This Is Us.

Moore is one of the hundreds of actors who have taken to the picket line amid the SAG-AFTRA strike against the working conditions and compensation of Hollywood’s streamers and studios. The This Is Us star revealed she’s received checks ranging from a penny to 81 cents from the show’s streaming deal with Hulu. 

After starring on the show for all six seasons as the Pearson family matriarch Rebecca, Moore shares she received  “very tiny — like 81-cent checks” for the streaming residuals. “I was talking with my business manager, who said he’s received a residual for a penny and two pennies,” Moore told The Hollywood Reporter on Tuesday (July 18). 

“The residual issue is a huge issue,” Moore continued. “We’re in incredibly fortunate positions as working actors having been on shows that found tremendous success in one way or another… but many actors in our position for years before us were able to live off of residuals or at least pay their bills.”

It is worth noting that Moore was paid quite a bit for her work on This Is Us over the years. According to a very detailed report in US Weekly, she started off making $85,000 per episode during the show’s first season back in 2016, a rate that increased to $250,000 per episode by the show’s third season. Along the way, she also earned a $250,000 bonus after the show’s first season, and a $2 million cash bonus before the show’s final season began filming. All told, Moore was reportedly paid just a little south of $23 million over the course of the show’s 6 seasons.

The actress was joined on the picket line by Scandal star Katie Lowes, who noted that she also hadn’t received any substantial earnings from Hulu, Disney, or Netflix for her series. 

“If you are someone who has been fortunate enough in our positions to do 120-plus episodes of a successful show in previous years — 10, 15, 20 years ago — that re-airing would be the thing that could sustain you on years where I did this smaller project or I wanted to go do a play or you have kids and you have a family to provide for,” Lowes said as she detailed the residuals model. “And that’s just not a reality anymore. The entire model has changed.”  

This Is Us is now streaming on Hulu and Peacock, but Mandy Moore won’t see a lot of money off of that.