Actors for popular Burbank-based YouTube channel protest for better wages, work conditions

BURBANK, Calif. (KABC) -- Stars of a studio with millions of subscribers on a YouTube channel say the company has not been acting in good faith. They're protesting over wages and what they claim are unfair working conditions.

If you're looking for a stories with a positive message, then you may have checked out the Dhar Mann YouTube channel.

Dhar Mann Studios cranks out short shows with moral lessons that have attracted millions of fans. But some of the studio's actors say morals are a big problem with Dhar Mann.

"If you're going to profit off of these morals you need to at least give the people who are working underneath them the respect of what you are preaching," actor Dylan J. Harris said at a Tuesday press conference.

Most of the actors say they were with Dhar Mann since its fledgling days.

The studio has grown from a handful of people in 2018, to a company that now runs three sound stages in Burbank.

The analytics company SocialBlade.com says the YouTube channel has a whopping 17.8 million subscribers and boasts more than 10 billion views.

But the actors say all that success has not led to better wages or working conditions.

"There are just basic elements to running a motion picture company that are not being met," actor Colin A. Borden said.

Mann did post a lengthy statement on the company's YouTube channel, saying many of the upset actors haven't even worked with the company in years, and that some "spread false information to hurt the studio, my family and me."

A representative for the company said the upset actors only represent a tiny fraction of the actors who work for the company, and that the complaints are misleading and unfair.

But the actors who protested say they're done with Dhar Mann, the bridge burned, their welcome there gone. Their hope is that the studio will eventually share more of its success with the people seen on the screen.