Caitlin Sanchez, the voice behind Dora the Explorer since 2007, has sued Nickelodeon for not properly compensating her.
According to a statement issued by the lawyers representing Sanchez and her parents, the suit claims that Nickelodeon “took advantage of a hard-working teenage girl” and “charges that Caitlin and her parents were pressured into signing an unconscionable contract with convoluted, vague and undefined terms that allowed producers of the Nickelodeon hit to exploit her.”
The complaint, which was filed Wednesday night, claims that Sanchez is “due millions in promised compensation for merchandising, re-runs, promotional work and recordings.”
According to CNN, the studio maintains that Caitlin’s voice changed (as did the previous voice talent) and was no longer able to play the part, but in addition to her compensation for the Dora roll they also offered her other work with the studio because they enjoyed working with her.
When I saw this article on Huffpost and TMZ I was pretty taken aback by how vicious the comments were towards the girl. My niece and nephew both live and breath this show and Nickelodeon made and makes great heaping scads of cash off this show yet the girl was paid a pretty low rate for such a successful show… even for an unknown voice actor, which is often taken advantage of, her performance rate according to the articles I read was $1250 an hour.
Now yeah, I know, that’s a lot of money. I would kill to be paid that much. But keep in mind that the articles reported that over the space of 3 years the actress only made about $300k. This is a show that has earned, again according to the articles, 11 Billion in sales of books, DVD’s and related merch with 1.9 million viewers for each new episode.
Since the show is 10 years old that’s 1.1 billion a year and of that 1.1B Caitlin, the voice of the character, was making $100,000.
I’m not saying that she should have gotten a better deal. I mean, you sign a contract you gotta live with it. If it sucks fire your lawyer/agent whatever. But the circumstances under which they’ve let her go, in light of the voice-mail the girl’s lawyer is sending around is kind of fishy.
But I was surprised how many people were like “raaaarrrr how dare she ask for more money! She already made so much! Raaaarrr!!”
TMZ Articles
http://www.tmz.com/2010/10/12/dora-the-explorer-nickelodeon-caitlin-sanchez-lawsuit-audio/
http://www.tmz.com/2010/10/12/dora-the-explorer-caitlin-sanchez-salary-nickelodeon/
Huffpost
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/08/voice-of-dora-the-explore_n_756345.html
“We did compensate her unfairly, but in our defense, we also made her offers to do a lot more underpaid work for us.”
“I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT! I’M THE SUIT!”
“I’M THE SU-U-U-UIT!”
Sorry. Couldn’t resist.
We live and learn….now about her chances of another voice-over gig…..