Billy Porter Reveals He’s Making Meager $0.6 Residual Checks From ‘Pose’

Porter shared that most artists live check to check.

Billy Porter sat down to talk about the lingering struggles following the huge SAG-AFTRA writers’ strike in an interview with Channel 4 News’ Ways to Change the World podcast on Dec 1.

The 54-year-old actor and singer revealed how little he makes from his residual checks. He explained, “I’m making six-cent checks on Pose. A show that I won an Emmy for.”

“That’s why we were on strike for 118 days. No. Y’all don’t get to do that to us anymore … Everybody in this business, except for the ones who are making the F-you money, are three months away from homelessness.”

The shocking numbers caused the podcast host to question if it was true, asking if the financial situation was so bad that Porter “really lost a home.”

Porter confirmed that, as previously reported, he had to sell his house at the height of the SAG-AFTRA strike. Amid his divorce from his former husband of six years, Adam Smith, he had to stay with friends around London in August since he had no home.

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“Yes, why would I be lying?” Porter said incredulously, “If you lost your job tomorrow and didn’t get a job for three months, you’d be in a [bad place].”

After selling his house due to the financial strain of the strike, Porter told outlets that it was unbelievable that many artists had to live check to check with no complaint before the SAG-AFTRA strike began.

“The life of an artist, until you make F-you money — which I haven’t made yet — is still check-to-check,” he told outlets. “To hear [the CEO of Disney] Bob Iger say that our demands for a living wage are unrealistic? While he makes $78,000 a day? I don’t have any words for it, but f*** you.”