Jon Bernthal revealed a shocking detail about his pay on The Walking Dead in a resurfaced interview on The Howard Stern Show in 2017 while promoting Marvel's The Punisher.
In the interview, Stern asked about how the pay works on The Walking Dead because the actors were relatively unknown when the series started and how that impacts negotiations and pay as the series continued. Specifically, Stern compared Bernthal's case to Norman Reedus, who stayed on The Walking Dead for all 11 seasons before signing on for the spinoff series, The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon.
"Let's put it this way. I didn't make a f*****g penny on The Walking Dead," Bernthal said. "Norman Reedus is never going to have to worry about money."
Stern asked him if he could renegotiate his contract for the second season, and Bernthal said that he tried, but AMC wouldn't budge.
"No, believe me, I tried, man," Bernthal said. "You know, when it started, and like I said, you get paid by the episode, so if you get picked up for six episodes, at that point, it was the biggest year of my career by far, as far as what I was doing. But I never made less money."
Obviously, Bernthal is joking, somewhat. He didn't work for free. When you have to factor in living expenses and all the taxes and fees that actors like Bernthal, who was rising in the ranks at the time, pay to managers and agents, he probably didn't make that much money, especially compared to the payday the other stars had in the future, especially someone like Reedus, who has been one of the biggest stars of The Walking Dead for quite sometime after Andrew Lincoln left the series.
That's the most surprising thing that I think fans don't understand about TV and movies. The Walking Dead became the biggest show in the world for a time, but it did not start that way. AMC wasn't really known for making big-budget, smash-hit TV shows. Breaking Bad was obviously massive, but the ratings immediately were not that good. It took a long time until The Walking Dead started to pay off, and that's when the seasons started getting longer, the budget got bigger, and the cast size increased.
Unfortunately for Bernthal, that happened pretty much right before Shane was killed off the series. Shane died in the penultimate episode of season 2. Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) killed Shane before Shane could kill him, and then, before we knew it, Hershel's Farm was overrun with walkers and Rick's group was on the run again.
Stern also asked what it felt like for Bernthal to get killed off right as the show became a massive hit.
"No, look, I knew it was going to happen from the beginning, and it scared the s*** out of me," Bernthal said. "I thought this is just my luck. This is totally part and parcel for every other thing in my life that I finally get on a show, and it's crazy successful, and then they kill my ass as soon as it starts popping off."
Bernthal recently spoke about how much he owed The Walking Dead for giving him his big break.
Even though he only made it two seasons, it's great to see that Bernthal still appreciates his time on the series. It's clear that fans of the series also appreciate what Bernthal and Shane meant to the story, too.
You can watch all 11 seasons of The Walking Dead on Netflix right now.
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