Summer Fun: Remembering Gilligan’s Island

Dawn Wells Still Gets Paid for Her Role on Gilligan’s Island

The actors on Gilligan’s Island all signed pretty standard contracts. They each got a certain amount of money per original episode and a residual payment for each time the episodes re-aired (up to five times). This was not the case for Dawn Wells. Dawn Wells was a bit smarter.

At the time, Dawn was married to Larry Rosen, an industry agent who advised her to ask for a different agreement – to be paid a residual every time the show ran reruns, not just the first five times. Because of this, Dawn is the only cast member who still gets paid for her work on the show.