Full House actor Jodie Sweetin has opened up about the surprisingly small residual payments she receives, after it emerged that the cast of Friends can still earn up to $20 million a year.
Although Friends ended around 20 years ago, Lisa Kudrow appeared to confirm in a recent interview that the cast continue to take home roughly $20 million annually through residuals.
Asked by The Times last month how the group still makes that kind of money, Kudrow joked: “Because Phoebe Buffay was so great?”
Back when the sitcom was at its peak, reports suggested the six main stars negotiated salaries of $1 million per episode.
Residuals are extra payments made to cast and crew when a film or series is reused—through reruns, licensing deals, streaming availability, or physical media sales.
Rates and structures for these payments are shaped by unions like SAG-AFTRA and the WGA, with long-running, frequently licensed titles typically delivering the most value over time.
Entertainment lawyer Joshua Edwards, a partner at Fox Rothschild LLP, explained the principle to the LA Times: “If a title is something that has a long lifetime and is continually licensed over and over again to different platforms, then that actor or writer should continue to benefit.”
Sweetin, however, says her experience has been very different. During a recent podcast appearance, she revealed she’d received a residual check for just $.01, despite starring across eight seasons of Full House.
Sweetin played Stephanie Tanner from 1987 to 1995, later returning for the 2016 to 2020 reboot, but said the financial upside from residuals hasn’t matched her years on the show.
On the McBride Rewind podcast, she said: “I got a one-cent check the other day. There’s no syndication anymore because it’s all in streaming. Who gets paid for that? Nobody gets paid for that.”
Now 44, Sweetin noted she used to see larger—and more frequent—residual payments earlier in her life, but said those amounts dwindled as the original series became less common on traditional TV.
She explained: “Sure, in my 20s, there would be money, but not reliable. You don’t know how much it’s going to be or how often they’re going to run the show.”
Sweetin added that when payments did arrive, the impact could vary widely: “So, sometimes you’re like, ‘Oh, cool. That was nice.’ And then sometimes you’re like, ‘All right, well, there’s a nice dinner out.’”
Because of that unpredictability, she said she doesn’t live lavishly and described her situation candidly: “I drive my 2023 used Hyundai Sonata that I love. I rent my house. I have credit cards that are maxed out. I live a normal life.
“And yeah, there are moments when you’re like, ‘This is going well.’ And there are times when you’re like, ‘I need a day job.’”