Imagine you’re an actor on a hit TV show. The show has a few healthy seasons and a loyal following, and with a still-hungry audience champing at the bit, it is immediately syndicated on cable television after the series finale. Viewers find it on various networks at numerous times of day, and years later the show ends up on Nick at Nite, celebrated for decades as a cherished American timepiece. But imagine that as a performer, you reap no financial reward for the show’s lasting impact. For you, once shooting wrapped, so did your paycheck. Though the show plays over and over again on TV and the scenes have turned into classics, you never see another royal cent. Would Bill Cosby have stood for that? Or the Golden Girls? What about the cast of Friends or the girls of Sex and the City? more ›