Join me: Host Graham Norton earned about $6.6 million for his show in 2021 and insiders say it's likely Michael McIntyre's earnings are in the same ballpark. Photo / Getty Images
Join me: Host Graham Norton earned about $6.6 million for his show in 2021 and insiders say it's likely Michael McIntyre's earnings are in the same ballpark. Photo / Getty Images
KEY FACTS:
The BBC doesn’t have to report salaries if stars trade as limited companies or appear in shows made by independent production companies.
Limited companies don’t have to publish their accounts immediately and can refuse to break down what they pay directors and staff.
The only people with a legally accurate idea of those stars’ incomes are their accountants or business partners.
Stephen Armstrong is an author and journalist, writing for the Daily Telegraph, the Guardian and the Sunday Times.
OPINION
The likes of Michael McIntyre and Graham Norton don’t have their salaries published in the BBC’s annual report. So how much do they make?
It’s BBC salaries season and – with annual pay of £1.35 million (NZ$2.94m) – sports presenter Gary Lineker leads the field as usual. But there’s as much, if not more, speculation about the names absent from the list: the likes of Michael McIntyre, Claudia Winkleman, Romesh Ranganathan, Graham Norton and Alexander Armstrong.
The BBC doesn’t have to report their salaries because they trade as limited companies or appear in shows made by independent production companies, including Strictly Come Dancing’s home BBC Studios. In both cases, the BBC pays a fee to the production company that includes a presenter fee but the company chooses how to distribute that cash.
Ferreting out exactly what these sums are likely to total is a difficult job. Limited companies don’t have to publish their accounts until a year after their trading year ends and are small enough to refuse to break out the amounts they pay directors and staff. Meanwhile, short of a personal confession, the only people with an accurate idea of those stars’ incomes are their accountants or business partners – and they are unsurprisingly reluctant to speak on the subject.
A ring around the industry reveals a similar aversion to discussing the money but talent agents, managers and producers were willing to give broad outlines of what they might expect for talent in specific show types. The first point most people made is that, despite the hype, the BBC is a stingy employer.
“Honestly, I don’t tend to push clients to the BBC,” one comedy talent manager said. “Comedians always risk getting fired very publicly by a corporation that loves to apologise and the presenter fees are generally lower than Channel 4 or ITV.”
If a comic or presenter turns up on a pre-existing BBC format – such as Romesh Ranganathan on The Weakest Link – they’ll have a buyout contract or, at best, an equity contract that limits their earnings to the per-show fee.
Romesh Ranganathan presents the BBC's The Weakest Link. Photo / NZ Comedy Fest
“You would be surprised by the names on buyout contracts who are getting just £30k per show,” he explained. “Channel 4, that’s £40-50k and ITV can go far higher. If it’s a BBC equity contract then, after a certain number of repeats and sales, 17% of the extra money is split between those on an equity contract but, for a light entertainment show, repeats payments are very unlikely. I can’t see Romesh in any BBC shows that he devised. He’ll be on around £350,000 for the Weakest Link, the same for Misadventures, which has just ended.” So, not bad but no Lineker.
Perhaps surprisingly, the same is true for big stars such as Claudia Winkleman. She has no stake in the formats for Strictly or The Traitors, which was originally a Dutch format. In 2017, when Strictly was still an in-house BBC show, Winkleman was the highest-paid female celebrity, earning between $981,000 and $1.09 million for Strictly, her Radio 2 programme and The Great British Sewing Bee. There will have been salary hikes and her Traitors pay will push that up but “she’s unlikely to be getting £1m, closer to £800,000 plus,” said one producer. “Although the brand work and corporate work she gets on the back of it should take her to seven figures.”
Winkleman has just parted company with her agents at YMU for a new company owned by her former agent and her husband, film producer Kris Thykier, the producer reports. He suspects the new operation will be working on formats she has a stake in, pointing to Graham Norton and Michael McIntyre’s level of wealth.
Michael McIntyre runs his businesses through production companies.
They both run their business through production companies and limited companies, so they report their earnings slightly differently. McIntyre’s two companies – his company Breachcroft and his co-owned TV production company Hungry McBear, which makes his shows The Wheel and Michael McIntyre’s Big Show – both take advantage of section 477 of the Limited Companies Act, which allows companies turning over less than $22.2m to avoid posting a full audit to Companies House.
As a result, only the companies’ assets are published – Breachcroft’s assets almost tripled from $2.49m to $7.09m in the 12 months to April 2022 and Hungry McBear’s owners are sitting on assets of $3.9m in the year ending December 2022.
Norton’s So Television, as an ITV subsidiary, had its results folded into ITV’s general accounts from 2022 but its last accounts for 2021 show he earned $6.6m from presenter fees, production fees and royalties.
“Michael is host, co-owns the production company and gets 50% of the production fees, so he’s easily in the Graham Norton ballpark,” one talent manager suggested.
As for Alexander Armstrong, the BBC pays independent production companies between $44,000 and $284,000 per episode for a daytime entertainment show. On a long-running show like Pointless, there may be deals either way, one producer explains. “If you’ve got a long-lasting contract for lots of episodes over a number of years, that’s valuable security in these troubled times so the [BBC] is going to be pushing for a bulk discount while the indie is pushing for an increase as the show is vital to daytime.”
He speculates that Pointless co-presenters Armstrong and Richard Osman would be on $44,000 an episode, possibly less. Osman has reduced his appearances but was involved in devising the format so would earn from overseas sales and production fees. With recent seasons running to 55 episodes, however, $44,000 a pop means Armstrong trousering a cool $2.4m.
When this is repeated back to the producer, there’s a long pause. “That does sound an awful lot,” he says eventually. “I’m not sure of my numbers. You absolutely aren’t going to use my name, are you? Things are so tight in TV at the moment. You could lose your job for chatting presenters’ salaries.”
