His most iconic role earned him a hefty payday
Neil Patrick Harris is one of the most successful actors of the 21st century.
With roles in everything from Gone Girl to Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, the star has certainly been around the block.
However, the part that made him a household name is undoubtedly that of Barney Stinson in How I Met Your Mother.
Harris starred as the serial womaniser for nine seasons, from 2005 to 2014, and turns out he got paid a pretty penny for his work.
During an appearance on The Howard Stern Show back in 2014, the 51-year-old revealed that he was ‘well paid’ for his work in the show’s later seasons.
So well paid, in fact, that his pay was a whopping $250,000 per week. Yes, you read that right – a quarter of a million dollars every single week.
Stern asked the star if he was happy with that salary, to which Harris replied: “Are you kidding? Yes I was happy with that.”
The radio host went on to probe as to whether Harris was earning more than his co-stars, but the actor confirmed that by the end of the show’s run, the leading ensemble were all being paid equally.
However, he did go on to confirm that during negotiations around the fourth and fifth season, this wasn’t necessarily what he wished for.
He explained how some casts try to negotiate their pay as a unit, but that sometimes individuals want to break away from this, with Stern pointing out that this can harm the working relationship.
Harris admitted he was “more in the latter camp than the former camp.”
“So the asshole was you,” Stern joked.
“It seemed like we all had individual careers that we had nurtured up until that point,” Harris responded.
“And so when you end up with an agent and a manager and an attorney, you have relationships with them and they’re hardcore fighting for you financially for your future.”
“It wasn’t like I was trying to take someone else’s money,” he continued.
“I just wanted my team to fight as hard as they could for me for my next season’s worth.”
He said that it felt wrong “to have solidarity with someone who has done less.”
However, by season nine, Harris said that everyone in the cast had ‘proven their worth’, and so everyone ‘deserved to get paid well’.
