Joseph Morgan will this week appear for the last time as Klaus Mikaelson in The Vampire Diaries series of TV shows. The actor has agreed to return to the role for the series finale of Legacies, the second spinoff from the famous CW vampire drama series of the 2010s.
British-born Morgan has been fired up about this swansong, revealing to his supporters through a video on his Instagram profile that he had been offered the chance to feature in Legacies before.
“As you know, I’ve been asked again and again to make an appearance on Legacies, and it never felt right… until now,” said Morgan. “Now it feels right. So, I hope you enjoy this and feel as passionate about it as I do. This one is for you guys.”
Morgan’s filmography covers roles on a much wider scale than Klaus, but this is a character that has very much come to define his career. Eight out of the 20 years he has spent as an actor have been in the shoes of the famous character.
Morgan portrayed Klaus in The Vampire Diaries and later in The Originals, but it was in the latter where he really profited from the role.
How Much Was The Cast Of ‘The Vampire Diaries’ Paid Per Episode?
The Vampire Diaries premiered on The CW in September 2009, having received a full-season order of 22 episodes. Nina Dobrev, Paul Wesley and Ian Somerhalder were the three main stars of the show, as the characters Elena Gilbert and the vampire brothers Stefan and Damon Salvatore, respectively.
For the first season of the show, the main cast line-up was completed by – among others – Steve R. McQueen as Elena’s brother, Jeremy, Kat Graham as the witch Bonnie Bennett, and Candice King as Caroline Forbes.
As a supporting cast member, McQueen wasn’t paid as much as his colleagues on the show. Still, he reportedly earned a nonetheless worthwhile $15,000 for every episode he featured in.
Dobrev, Wesley and Somerhalder were the big guns on the show, and this status was reflected accordingly with their salary of about $40,000 per episode.
Joseph Morgan eventually joined the cast in Season 2. According to reports, his salary fell in the rung just below the main stars’, as he raked in around $35,000 per episode.
How Much Was Joseph Morgan Paid Per Episode In ‘The Originals’?
Joseph Morgan’s Klaus Mikaelson might have become the star attraction in The Vampire Diaries, but the primary story always continued to revolve around Elena Gilbert and the Salvatore brothers.
In The Originals, however, Klaus became the main guy, alongside his siblings – mainly Elijah (Daniel Gillies) and Rebekah (Claire Holt). A plot summary for the show on IMDb reads, ‘A family of power-hungry thousand-year-old vampires look to take back the city that they built (New Orleans) and dominate all those who have done them wrong.’
Although Klaus was now the central leading character in The Originals, Morgan only carried forward his salary from The Vampire Diaries, into the new show. For the duration between 2013 and 2018 that he played Klaus in the spinoff series, he continued to make $35,000 per episode.
Apart from the Mikaelson siblings, werewolf Haley Marshall was one of the other characters who crossed-over into The Originals. Haley and Klaus had a one-night stand, which resulted in the birth of a girl named Hope, around whom the show Legacies is premised.
Danielle Rose Russell plays that main character in the cast of Legacies.
Joseph Morgan Made More From ‘The Originals’ Than He Did From ‘The Vampire Diaries’
When all is said and done, Joseph Morgan profited more from his time as Klaus on The Originals than he did playing the same character in The Vampire Diaries. Considering the actor was paid equally for both shows on an episode-per-episode basis, the math simply comes down to the series in which he featured more.
Having joined the cast of The Vampire Diaries in 2011, Morgan went on to feature on the show in a total of 51 episodes. The final one of those came in 2016, in the 14th episode of Season 7.
All told, the actor had raked in a gross total of around $1.8 million during his spell on TVD. On the other hand, he featured in 92 episodes of The Originals between 2013 and 2018.
On the same $35,000 weekly salary, this would translate to around $3.2 million, nearly half of what he earned in the first show.
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