[lucianbr]

> that decreases their risk if the TV show or movie doesn't do well.

The risk is not decreased. The risk is the same, just moved around. Instead of the producers risking not making a certain amount of profit, now you have the risk that the actor only asked and got a paltry sum for a runaway success.

The uncertainty of how a movie will fare cannot be removed from existence through contracts or financial arrangements. But you can make it so some other party suffers instead of you.

...it's possible we have the same opinion. I'm not sure if this is a counter argument or just a rephrasing :)

[netrus]

I think the core idea is to avoid someone actually losing money. The producer might end up with a loss, the actor's profit is strictly positive (not accounting for opportunity costs...).