Actor, director to pay if film flops
The producer can pay the final remuneration to the director and actor only after the committee's nod.
Why should film distributors and exhibitors be the only ones to suffer at the hands of box office failures? In order to right this wrong, Tollywood film distributors and filmmakers are chalking out a plan to ensure that the responsibility of a film’s debacle is shared, fair and square, by the lead actor as well as the director not just in person, but monetarily as well.
In the same light, a committee headed by and including Suresh Babu, Dil Raju and Sunil Narang of Asian Cinemas has been formed. “They (lead actor and director) are the highest paid people of the film industry, so the filmmakers have decided to form a committee and are making a plant to sort out the huge losses incurred from big but flop films,” says a source in the know. Interestingly, the committee’s proposal of recovering a part of the losses, if the film doesn’t live up to expectations post its release, from the lead actor and director’s remunerations will be presented to the Telugu Film Chamber of Commerce (TFCC) on October 24. “Everyone from the industry are going to meet on October 24 at the Film Chamber office to decide about the said committee proposal,” added the source.
According to the committee’s proposal, the producer has to keep aside 25 per cent of the lead actor and director’s pay.
“If the buyer loses more than 25 per cent of his money, then the producer has to distribute this 25 per cent to those buyers who incur huge losses,” revealed the source. The committee has also recommended in their proposal that this remuneration be released two weeks after the release of the film.
“The committee heads are also going to look after the actual collections, GST, rental charges and other aspects,” further added the source.
Notably, it is also mentioned in the proposal that the producer of the film can pay the final remuneration to the said actor and director only after the committee’s green signal. Another interesting point is that if anyone wants to buy the area distributors rights for a particular film, he should be registered with the Telugu Distribution Council. “This will most probably apply from Akhil Akkineni’s film Hello (which releases on December 22),” mentioned the source.
In the Telugu film industry, many directors like S.S. Rajamouli, Trivik-ram Srinivas, V. V. Vinayak, Boyapati Srinu, Srinu Vaitla, Koratala Siva, Puri Jagannadh, A.R. Murugudoss and others, are taking home more than Rs 15 crore as remuneration per film.
Actors like Pawan Kalyan, Mahesh Babu, Prabhas, Jr NTR, Allu Arjun, Ram Charan and others are also banking between Rs 13 crore and 30 crore while Ravi Teja, Nagarjuna, Balakrishna and Venkatesh charge Rs 8 to Rs 11 crore for each film.