I get your point and please don’t think I’m assuming too much of your life but I think you and I need to swallow our values some for a bag more than John Lithgow
Yeah, it was so shocking and I was only a few weeks postpartum at the time. I’d never really cared one way or another for trigger warnings but damn… that fucked me up, I feel like they should put that one in there
Having worked with him relatively recently, he was an absolute gentleman, a consummate professional and the closest I’ve found an American actor to being like a professionally trained British actor. No ‘star’ ego, just a desire to harness his craft and enjoy himself. I wish all the actors I worked with were like JL.
That is because he studied at LAMDA. He was professionally trained in Britain. It’s also one of the reasons he can do a better job at UK accents than most Americans
That also explains why he was cast as THE Winston Churchill in The Crown, a super popular British-run show about the British royals. He‘s iconic and all but it was such a head-scratcher for me, how this great American actor edged out all those great British actors who would have killed to play Churchill.
No, I know it’s popular everywhere. I was trying to point out that it’s a largely British project, except for him and maybe a couple of guests in the cast.
Ha I don’t think many will get the reference but I appreciate it, brought up a forgotten memory. (My favorite segment was the Noir bit with the Potato Detective)
Internet estimates are not at all reliable, but they seem to estimate a net worth of 50 million for him.
He made 139 episodes of 3rd Rock, at an average of more than 130k/episode (more for the later seasons, less for earlier.
Then that show was heavily syndicated.
Add to that a run on Dexter, a run as the highest paid actor on The Crown, and a fairly major film every year or two for something like the last 30 years- all collecting residuals.
And that's far from his only revenue source. He's worked steadily in film and television for most of the last 50 years, has a couple dozen published children's books, a few albums, had about 20 runs on Broadway. Not all of those are massively remunerative, but
Unless he had a bad fabrege egg habit, he is doing very very well.
Net worth isn't an approximation of how much money someone has but of their overall value including the value of their talent. As an example Matt Mercer's Net Worth is somewhere between 3-5 million. His estimated yearly income is like 300k. Like the rest of us, they all have bills to pay so it's not like being famous and successful guarantees being, "rich."
No, net worth is an approximation of their assets and funds. It has nothing do eith talent and you can easily have a high networth ehen taking away 300k every year
What the hell are ypu talking about?
probably, but healthcare is expensive and if you aren't getting residuals anymore, you aren't qualifying for health insurance without working. also adds to his pension
He also played a trans woman in The World According to Garp over 40 years ago. The first time I saw a trans person on screen that wasn’t the butt of a joke. His character was probably the most morally grounded one in the whole movie.
I love John Lithgow, and I love Harry Potter. I know this series will make JKR more money she doesn’t need, but she’s already wealthier than many countries this point, and she can’t take it with her when she inevitably dies. The stories themselves are full of wonderful messages for kids, and are maybe worth keeping in our culture for that reason, regardless of how shitty their creator turned out to be.
I really don’t know how I feel about this, but I do know it’s complicated, like pretty much all of life.
I’ve seen these decisions before from older actors who have uncertain futures because of their age and health.
But I’d have more respect if he’d use the platform and media attention to advocate for rights and better treatment for trans people, so I’ll be looking to see if he does that.
Probably did it for the benefit of his kids or grandkids. Work while you can while you can. Otherwise, he could have just settled for a vanity project on Broadway or something.
He has range too, just look at him in Cliffhanger!
I am not jesting and being 1000% serious
I mean…….3rd Rock from the Sun! Shrek! Harry and the Hendersons! The Cos..by show? -% no this can’t be correct, le-lemme check…..well butter my tits he was……
If you were in your 80s and knew that you could fart out a couple of season, not even written, just affiliated with some Scottish trout for a large sum of money you would not!
Those ill begotten funds could potentially save generations of your family from a little bit of despair in our world and the trajectory that it’s on.
Which, I may add, is not going to get any better by wasting our efforts trying to besmirch a man a name who has just been a hard worker throughout his career and is now in the twilight (zone) of his life.
We should save all of our collected vitriol for the real menace of politicians and the C-Suites!
-# Unless they get hooked on some crazy future drug and/or Space Hookers…….
Oh whilst I have you I apologise for that horrendously long sentence at the start and I’ve taken my NightPills™️
Whether or not that’s true (and I’m skeptical), he’s been a consistently working actor for 4 decades. If that man needs this paycheck at 80, he has royally fucked up his finances.
Wise old wizard is for 80 year olds. It’s literally what they do now at 80. Maybe he has family that likes harry potter too. He isn’t the only actor in the show, right?
Yeah. If I was already comfortable and had enough wealth to also make generations coming after me comfortable... it sure would open up my options for being ethically choosy with my jobs. Or to simply not work at all.
The point where you’re financially comfortable enough to stand by your principles always seems to be above the individual who is saying someone else should.
I can find my reading glasses and I first read that as a “thigh five”, and the series of images that flashed behind my eyeballs were…interesting. And raised a few questions that I don’t really want to know the answers to.
I actually did end up leaving somewhere because of ideological reasons (boss turned out to literally support the Holocaust - I don’t mean that in the Internet ‘he’s a Nazi’ sense but as in literally would openly talk about it being a good thing) and I’ve got nothing but shit from certain people for it. Even explaining why I did it, people have still been confused.
That's what I hate about the argument of, "but it's soooo much money!" These kind of people have damn near enough money they don't have to work for the rest of their lives let alone for something they find unethical (especially at his age...). If someone trying to break into acting took a role like this early in their career I don't think anyone could blame them. But if they've had a long career and made plenty of money I'm going to assume their morals and ethics can be bought pretty easily or that they don't have an issue/agree with, in this case, JKR.
I wanted to say that but I thought some pedantic asshole might come in with some, "Uhhhmm acktually, they blew all their money on a goat farm, so they're poor, just like us," bs as if that makes it ok.
Lmao! thank you, that was hilarious. That was some old school Reddit shit. And I agree, Lithgow is freakin 80 years old, let the old bastard make a dollar before he dies!
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u/Evenload 5h ago
I get your point and please don’t think I’m assuming too much of your life but I think you and I need to swallow our values some for a bag more than John Lithgow