The top three execs at UTA will forgo their pay for the rest of the year as the talent agency starts to implement company-wide pay cuts. The move follows Paradigm’s “temporary layoff” of hundreds of employees on Friday.
UTA CEO Jeremy Zimmer (pictured) and co-Presidents David Kramer and Jay Sures said they hoped to avoid layoffs as the coronavirus spreads across the U.S.
"Like companies across the industry and our country, UTA is taking some immediate and painful steps to ensure we get through the current public health and economic crisis as strong as possible," the agency said in a statement. "In addition to aggressive cost-cutting measures, this includes asking our colleagues at every level to take pay reductions, structured so our most senior colleagues make the largest financial sacrifice.
"While we do not know what the future holds, we are committed to being candid and transparent about where things stand as we navigate these uncharted waters together."
Paradigm, which has a much larger music department than UTA and has clearly been affected by the shut-off of live entertainment, took a different approach at the end of last week, laying off between one-sixth and one-quarter of the company’s staff.
Deadline reported that laid-off employees were given no severance and that health benefits run out at the end of April. On Monday, Paradigm became the first major talent agency to sign a new franchise agreement with the Writers Guild of America regarding television packaging.
