GTA 4's Niko Bellic Voice Actor Wants More Money
"Obviously I'm incredibly thankful to Rockstar... But it's tough, when you see Grand Theft Auto IV out there as the biggest thing going right now, when they're making hundreds of millions of dollars, and we don't see any of it," said Hollick.
"I don't blame Rockstar. I blame our union for not having the agreements in place to protect the creative people who drive the sales of these games."
Hollick noted that while his appearance in Rockstar's wildly successful opus has propelled him to new levels of notoriety, contracts between the actors' union and the entertainment industry offer no provisions for electronic media such as video games. As such, Hollick was paid the standard Screen Actors Guild day rate.
"Yes, the technology is important, but it's the human performances within them that people really connect to, and I hope actors will get more respect for the work they do within those technologies," Hollick added.
Prior to his breakout role as Niko Bellic, Hollick-based in New York-found acting work in soap operas and musicals, but aspired to Broadway and other top-shelf gigs.
-
Dynotaku
replyWhile I do kind of see his point, I don't have a lot of sympathy for someone who made $100K in just over a year.
-
-
Actually he made $100,000 for slightly over 90 days of work over 15 months
-
But that's not nearly as sensational! Lol.
-
-
-
-
-
Swap him for 1000's of other semi-competent actors and the game would of sold the same amount.
-
-
He's quite grateful. Read the damn article.
-
No, he's not.
If he was grateful he wouldn't be complaining about being paid $100,000 for 90 days work. He was grossly overcompensated for the piss poor job he did as the voice of Niko Bellic. I know at least dozen people that could have done a better job, myself included, none of whom would have complained about the pay.
Basically, this guy thinks he should be able to retire because he played an irrelevant role in the second most successful video game to date. Sorry buddy, GTA ain't your lottery. You're gonna have to keep waiting tables... and I'd keep paying your SAG dues for that insurance just in case the two of us ever meet.-
[deleted]
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
How about the people who power everything you see in the actual game? The people who worked for four-some years writing the code, balancing stuff, scripting engines, working with the middleware etc,.
These guys almost certainly get worse pay and are lucky to see royalties from a project. -
I think someone once said "The only job an actor has is to not fuck up everyone else's hard work". I'm not sure I agree with that all the time, but when it comes to voice acting, I can't help but feel that's very true.
-
-
-
As long as he got paid for what he did, I don't see what the problem is. The game cost $100M to make and there are hundreds and hundreds of people who worked on this game over 4 years (just look at the fucking 30 minute credit roll).
He did a great job as Niko and probably got paid more than most of the other voice actors just because of the sheer amount of dialogue the main character has. Rockstar went with mostly no-names to keep production costs down because of the crazy amount of dialogue there is (something like 80,000 lines? i can't remember), if he's upset about royalties that's his own damn fault. Or his agents.
-
-
Well, it's what the market will tolerate. I mean I think the vast majority of pro athletes are over paid, but not many around here will agree with me.
-
It's not how much he made in any particular amount of time that's the issue, it's how much he made vs. how much the game made, and how much his work can be attributed to the game's success. But even that argument is academic -- all that really matters is what the contract said that he agreed to.
-
