CAA Beats Terrence Howard Lawsuit Over ‘Empire’ Salary

CAA won’t have to face a lawsuit from Terrence Howard accusing the agency of botching negotiations for his contract on Empire, a court has ruled.

Howard in 2023 sued CAA, alleging his agents had a conflict of interest when they convinced him into taking below-market salaries for his six-season run starring in the series. The sweeping lawsuit targeted packaging fees, a lucrative commission paid to agencies for bundling key creative elements — like writers, directors and actors — into a single project.

Howard’s relationship with CAA started to sour in 2018, when it pushed to renegotiate the actor’s contract for Empire, one of the most-watched shows on Fox during its run in which he played the lead character Lucious Lyon. His concerns weren’t limited to his per-episode salary. He wanted profit participation, perks and promotional opportunities, among other things, along the lines of a Kevin Spacey for House of Cards or Jon Hamm for Mad Men, according to court documents. Fox rebuffed the ask, declining to reopen his deal.

Those talks broke down again a year later after Howard asked to up his episodic fee from $325,000 to $750,000. Around this time, he was growing increasingly frustrated with CAA’s handling of his deal. He alleged in the lawsuit that his agents didn’t tell him of key developments that undermined his leverage or that CAA also represented series co-creators Lee Daniels and Danny Strong and production company Imagine Entertainment.

“Had CAA disclosed those facts when they mattered, I would have sought independent advice separate from CAA, required corrected compensation information, insisted on a written demand to Fox, and reconsidered whether CAA should continue advising me regarding Empire,” Howard wrote in a court declaration.

The dismissal swung on the structure through which Howard was compensated for his appearance on Empire. Fox dealt with his loan-out company, Universal Bridges, which in turn gave the actor a fixed salary as an employee. The court found that any increase to his salary — even if it was successfully negotiated — wouldn’t have necessarily translated into additional payments.

The alleged damages, the court stressed, are too speculative to greenlight the case for trial.

“The immediate economic result of an increase in compensation would have been an increase in revenue to Universal Bridges only,” wrote Los Angeles Superior Court judge Cherol Nellon in the ruling issued on July 31.

The judge added that CAA pushed to renegotiate Howard’s deal but that Fox ultimately had the final say. Evidence that the agency should’ve negotiated differently doesn’t establish that the network would’ve agreed to the terms, according to the ruling, which noted that Fox “rejected all attempts at renegotiation.”

Howard brought claims for breach of fiduciary duty, constructive fraud and fraudulent misrepresentation against CAA, which didn’t respond to a request for comment. Since filing the lawsuit in 2023, the Oscar-nominated actor has had a mixed run of appearances in mostly independent films.