Why Netflix should pay all the contestants on Blown Away

I spent the last week binge watching both seasons of Blown Away, Netflix’s glass blowing competition show. (Yes, I did other work too. They are fairly short seasons!) Despite a few little quirks (it feels like they gloss over some pretty big parts of the process) it’s a fairly entertaining show that I think most artists and makers would find fun.

But there is, as far as I can tell, one glaring problem that we need to talk about. And that’s the the fact that it’s bullshit that the contestants aren’t paid to be on the show.

Now, I want to be honest here – I’m not 100% positive the contestants aren’t paid. All I could turn up in my Google searching was that the winner gets a “prize package valued at $60,000,” which is something they emphasized throughout the show. One interesting note was that in Season One, several of the contestants talked excitedly about the potential of winning $60k, but the show never comes out and says they get that as cold hard cash. It’s always “a prize package worth…”

So as far as I can tell, the contestants aren’t paid, and if I’m wrong, I would love for someone to tell me, because I believe they do deserved to be paid for all the reasons I’m about to outline.  And I would happily eat crow if it meant these talented artists were actually being paid for their work and time. But assuming they aren’t paid, here’s why they should be:

Reason #1: Exposure doesn’t pay the bills.

I was already feeling a little salty about the artists giving up their time to be on a show where they aren’t actually paid when my husband sat down to watch a few episodes with me.  When he made a comment about the contestants getting “exposure,” I quickly replied with “exposure doesn’t pay the bills.”

For far too long, artists and makers have been expected to do things for “exposure.” We send our work to gallery shows at our own expense and are asked to donate work to auctions because “it will be great exposure.” And this was all before the Internet and social media made it seem like we should all just work for exposure all the time.

But you can’t pay the rent or buy food with exposure. And exposure is never a guarantee that you’ll get paid down the line. Instead, we need to start acknowledging “exposure” for what it really is – a tool to exploit anyone (artists and makers included) who is hoping to someday make a living from their work. Which is why it’s essential that we stop letting exposure be a stand-in for actually getting paid for our work.

Reason #2: They are professionals who should be compensated for their skills.

I understand that there are some reality shows where people just go on because it sounds like a good time.  But on Blown Away, the artists aren’t just there on a lark. Even the most “inexperienced” competitors on the show have around ten years experience in glass blowing. 

That makes them all professionals in my book, and if you monetize professional performance on TV as a competition, in my mind, that doesn’t make it a reality show. It makes it something more akin to a professional sport. And professional athletes (at least those in the major sports) are getting paid for their work.

Can you imagine if players in the NFL only got paid if their team won the Super Bowl? And anything leading up to that was just for “exposure?”  It would never happen. 

And while sadly, I know the myth of competing for exposure does still pervade some sports (particularly for women and of course, the BS structure that is collegiate sports in the US) I think it’s time artists, makers, and creators took a page from professional sports and insisted on getting paid just for showing up, regardless of how successful we are in the competition, especially when TV is involved and other people are profiting. 

Reason #3: They are taking time out of their own studios and paid work to be on the show.

I’m not sure exactly how long the filming process as a whole was, but given the amount of time in the hot shop plus all the parts of the process that weren’t shown (not to mention the filming of narrative elements) its safe to say being on this show was more than a weekend away.  For contestants who made it further into the competition, we are easily talking several weeks of filming.

Now, I can’t speak to these particular artists, but the artists and makers I work with feel hard-pressed to take a few days off from work, let alone several weeks. (Don’t worry, we’re working on that.)  For most makers I know, spending several weeks away from their studios and not selling their work would be a huge blow financially.

Then you add in the fact that the show likely won’t air for close to a year after filming, which means any potential financial benefit from “exposure” is a long way off, and you’re asking artists to put themselves in a potentially precarious financial position. Which means at the very least, the artists on the show should be compensated for their time away from their own studios and production.

Reason #4: Pretty much everyone else working on the show is getting paid.

No one is expecting the host, or the camera crew, or the producers and editors involved with the show to work for free, so why is that expected of the artists?  (Because I couldn’t find a lot of hard data on the show, I’m obviously making some assumptions here, and I’m not sure that the assistant glass blowers from Sheridan College are getting paid, but I think it’s safe to assume that everyone else on the show is. And if they aren’t, well they should be as well!)

It’s one thing to work on a project where everyone involved is working out of love, but it’s entirely different to be asked to perform for the camera for free while everyone else around you is being paid.  The artists on the show are just as crucial as any of the other paid positions, so why shouldn’t they be compensated as well?

Reason #5: Netflix can afford to pay them.

First, I understand that this show was created by a production company and sold to Netflix. But now that Netflix is airing the show, they should pay up.

Let’s say, for arguments sake, that the competitors were paid $1,000 for every episode they were in.  Personally, I still think this is low (especially when compared to many reality shows) but it does seem to be in line with what the dancers are each paid per episode of Dance Moms, at least for the early seasons. (Yes, I’ve been doing a lot of Google searching around what reality show participants do and don’t get paid!)  And I know that, unfortunately, getting between $1k and $10k would feel like a substantial sum to a lot of artists and makers. So we’ll start with $1k per episode.

At $1k per episode, with one contestant leaving each episode, the total payout would be just under $60,000. For everyone. Total.  In the third quarter of 2020 alone, Netflix made over 6 billion dollars. That’s billion with a B. $60k is a drop in the bucket compared to that, as is $120k if you double it to include “the prize package worth…” As would be pretty much any number you could think of to pay the contestants.

I don’t know if Netflix is planning a third season, or when it might come out (I imagine a show where multiple people are blowing into metal pipes might be tricky to film in a pandemic) but I hope that if they do, they actually pay the competitors next time around.  

And this isn’t just a call for Netflix and Blown Away. I believe that any kind of competition show that involves skilled artists or makers should be paying them. It’s time to stop pretending that exposure is enough and start fairly compensating everyone involved in making a show a success.