Rules
Lookalike face matches: questions for a photo double booking
Lookalike face matches can lead to photo double work. Here are questions to ask about the role, coverage, paperwork, reuse and credit before booking.
For lookalike face matches, the first booking question is what work you are being hired to do. Use the role distinctions and paperwork checks below to frame questions about coverage, pay, reuse and credit.
What to take away
- A lookalike hired to match a principal on camera for a signatory production is a photo double, so the photo double minimums apply.
- Coverage turns on three facts in orderwho employs you, whether the production is signed with SAG-AFTRA, and your on-camera function.
- Rates sit in the rate sheet of the current TV/Theatrical or Commercials agreement, and the sheet year is what counts.
- Residuals are a percentage of your own schedule minimum, so a double earns far less than the star on the same reuse.
- Screen credit follows the agreement's billing provisions, which are written for principals.
Three questions to start a coverage check
Coverage turns on the deal structure, not the resemblance.
Who employs you. A signatory producer hiring you directly brings you under the agreement for a single day. A third party hiring you and licensing your image sits outside it.
Is the production signatory. Series, features, commercials and new media signed to SAG-AFTRA agreements must cover performers inside the scope of those agreements.
What you do on camera. Holding a mark while the crew sets light is stand-in work. Matching a principal's build and features for a shot meant for the cut is doubling. A lookalike booked for a press event may sit outside these agreements.
[figure 1]
Is the shoot SAG-AFTRA covered?
Signatory producer hires you directly?
Covered under SAG-AFTRA contract
Third party licenses image, analysis changes
Pay categories to check against the written offer
Principal performer
- Schedule
- Principal performer terms
- Day minimum
- About $1,000 and up in recent cycles
- Residuals
- Wide reuse payments
- Screen credit
- Usually required
- Pension and health
- Yes on covered days
Photo double
- Schedule
- Photo double provisions
- Day minimum
- A fraction of that, often a few hundred dollars
- Residuals
- Percentage of the double minimum
- Screen credit
- Usually none
- Pension and health
- Yes on covered days
Stand-in
- Schedule
- Stand-in provisions
- Day minimum
- Lower again
- Residuals
- Rarely applicable
- Screen credit
- Almost never
- Pension and health
- Yes on covered days
Every figure is a range, not a quote. Ask which rate sheet year applies to your start date.
Commercials work on other mechanics, a session fee for the shoot day plus use fees set by media, length and market. Before weighing two offers, check what a fee actually buys, as a celebrity lookalike cost per hour breakdown shows.
Reuse and credit questions for the booking
TV residual schedules price reuse as a percentage of the applicable minimum. A common pattern pays 100 percent for the first rerun, less for later runs, and caps after a set number of exhibitions.
The base for a photo double is the double minimum, not the principal's. One episode can pay a principal thousands and a double a small fraction of that.
Network reruns, cable runs, streaming and foreign broadcasts each carry their own treatment. Ask what the producer licensed before you estimate.
Credit is separate. Billing provisions are written around principals, so doubles and stand-ins normally receive none.
Photo double, stand-in and lookalike on one call sheet
A stand-in holds position so the crew can set focus, lighting and framing. That performer is rarely photographed for the final cut, and the rate reflects it.
A photo double matches a principal's appearance for photography that will be used. The match can be partial, a back or a hand, and still counts as doubling.
A lookalike is a resemblance booking for camera, press or a live appearance. Only those placed before a signatory camera land in the doubling category.
Resemblance is one input among several. Hair, prosthetics and wardrobe carry much of the match, so it helps to know how to spot a costume department's work before calling a performer a natural double.
Seven checks before you sign the deal memo
Read the memo and the voucher beside the schedule it names. Standard contract clauses on holds, exclusivity and morality sit in the same document.
Seven checks before you sign
- Find the schedule namephoto double, stand-in or principal. If none appears, ask in writing.
- Check the rate against the current rate sheet. Below-minimum pay is a defect, not a haggle.
- Read the reuse and residuals clause. Note the markets and runs that trigger payment.
- Read the credit clause. Note whether credit is promised, optional or silent.
- Check wardrobe, fitting and travel terms. Unpaid fittings cut the real day rate.
- Check hold and exclusivity language. A blocking hold costs you even when it pays nothing.
- Keep a copy of everything you sign, including the set voucher.
[figure 3]
Paperwork checklist before you sign
- Schedule named in writing
- Day rate meets schedule minimum
- Overtime and turnaround stated
- Fittings, travel, parking addressed
- Residuals clause names media and trigger
- Credit clause says what appears on screen
- Employer of record identified
If the production is signatory, the union can answer schedule questions directly. If it is not, the memo is the whole deal and state law is your backstop.
Appearance and licensing deals raise likeness questions a performer memo never touches, so run a celebrity lookalike contract clauses review beside this list.
What non-union lookalike work leaves out
Non-union resemblance work is legitimate and often a lookalike's first paid booking. It is thinner on protections.
A buyout pays once, and the footage can be reused without further payment. Union days carry reuse money and pension and health contributions instead.
Nothing accrues to a plan, so the booking value ends at the fee. No grievance route exists either, which leaves a demand letter or a state law claim if the footage travels.
Federal wage law still applies underneath. Where the producer controls your hours, wardrobe and position, employee status can follow the invoice, as the Labor Department explains in its FLSA guidance.
Where covered doubling days lead
Covered days accumulate, and casting offices place performers with union paperwork more easily. The New York lookalike work on Broadway and network TV market runs much of its doubling and stand-in hiring through covered days rather than open calls.
Pay data for the field is thin. The Bureau of Labor Statistics entry for actors folds doubles, stand-ins and principals into one occupation, so the agreement rate sheet is the number to argue from.
