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White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon is listed as a producer for 18 movies on IMDb, including such classics as The Indian Runner and Fire from the Heartland, the “first-ever film to tell the entire story of the conservative woman in her own words.” But like all things Trump, Bannon’s most (only?) notorious claim to fame in Hollywood relates to television. Two years before the series went into syndication, Bannon “accepted a stake in five shows, including one in its third season regarded as the runt of the litter: Seinfeld.”
Forbes reported that Bannon has “made about $32.6 million since 1998” from the deal (much to Jason Alexander and Rob Reiner’s dismay), but you shouldn’t feel guilty about binging Seinfeld on Hulu; it’s unlikely Bannon continues to make money from the show. “It is possible that Bannon’s deal was capped and paid out at that time,” according to the New Yorker, because since then, “neither CBS nor Castle Rock nor Warner Bros. has records of payments to Bannon, if those records are as they were described to me.”
In April 1997, he submitted an “income and expense declaration,” indicating that his annual salary was roughly $500,000, and that his total assets were around $1.1 million. Any profit participations from Seinfeld should have shown up at that time. Either they were not substantial or Bannon failed to disclose them in a sworn statement.
You’d think the co-creator of a wildly popular show would know everyone who profits from his work, but Larry David isn’t any co-creator. “I don’t think I ever heard of him until he surfaced with the Trump campaign,” he confessed, “and I had no idea that he was profiting from the work of industrious Jews!”
Worst of all, Bannon’s favorite episode is “The Puerto Rican Day.” Do better.
(Via the New Yorker)