David Krumholtz says the annual checks from The Santa Clause have fallen to about $150 a year, even though the 1994 holiday film still plays constantly. He said the money is so small now because the movie keeps running, and every time it does, his share drops.
He made the comments recently in remarks to Page Six, which is why the number is getting attention now. For a movie that has become a seasonal fixture, Krumholtz put a hard dollar figure on what long-lived fame can look like from the inside: not a windfall, but a check that barely registers.
Krumholtz played Bernard, the head elf opposite Tim Allen's Santa, in The Santa Clause and its 2002 sequel. He did not return for the 2006 third installment, but he did make a cameo in the 2022 Disney+ follow-up The Santa Clauses, keeping him attached to a franchise that has remained part of the holiday TV cycle for decades.
The actor said residuals work on a grade scale, so the more a title plays, the less he makes each time. He said the checks were good in the first few years after the original film's release, but the numbers have since thinned out to what he called “150 bucks a year.” That is the friction at the center of the story: The Santa Clause is a hugely successful film that plays so much, yet the residuals tied to it are now minimal.
Krumholtz said his biggest residual payment comes from 2023's Oppenheimer, where he played Isidor Isaac Rabi, but even that check came to $12.73. He joked that it was enough to buy a hot dog in New York. He also said he once saved 150 children from a fire on the set of The Santa Clause after a light overheated and smoke gathered around a group of kids on the second level, and he received a bottle of champagne the next day as thanks.
What remains unanswered is how much he was paid at the start and how the old checks compare across the franchise over time. But on the amount he says arrives now, Krumholtz has already answered the part that matters most: the holiday classic that made him recognizable is still running, and the money has long since stopped matching the audience.
