Jon Cryer Says ‘I Got a Third’ of Charlie Sheen’s Pay on ‘Two and a Half Men’: People ‘Were So Scared of Him That They Would Shovel Money at Him’

Jon Cryer reveals in Netflix’s “aka Charlie Sheen” that his “Two and a Half Men” payday was “a third” of co-star Charlie Sheen‘s despite the latter’s erratic behavior that threatened the show’s survival and ultimately got Sheen fired after Season 8, the filming of which had already been delayed after Sheen entered drug rehabilitation and disparaged show creator Chuck Lorre.

“He’s in the midst of falling apart in every way that I can imagine, and he’s renegotiating his contract for another year of a show that I’m supposed to be on too,” Cryer says in the documentary (via Entertainment Weekly).

“The dictator of North Korea was a guy named Kim Jong-Il. He acted crazy all the time and thus got enormous amounts of aid from countries who were so scared of him that they would shovel money at him,” Cryer explained.. “Well, that’s what happened here. [Sheen’s] negotiations went off the charts because his life was falling apart. Me, whose life was pretty good at that time, I got a third of that.”

Cryer continued with “Two and a Half” men through its 12th and final season. In the documentary, Cryer says that CBS was more or less forced to “spend this astonishing amount of money on Charlie” because it had already “pre-sold a couple extra seasons of the show” before Sheen’s public breakdown. A 2011 report in Forbes magazine claimed Sheen was making $1.9 million on each “Two and a Half Men” episode.

Elsewhere in “aka Charlie Sheen,” Cryer expressed his hesitation in even participating in the two-part Netflix series.

“I worked with Charlie Sheen for eight years,” Cryer says. “And if you wonder what it’s like to work with Charlie Sheen for eight years, when I started, I had hair. I had some trepidation about participating in this, partially because part of the cycle of Charlie Sheen’s life has been that he messes up terribly, he hits rock bottom, and then he gets things he gets things going again. And he brings a lot of positivity in his life, and that’s when he burns himself out again. He just can’t help but set that house on fire, and I didn’t want to be a part of that cycle. I’m not here to build him up and I’m not here to tear him down. But I sure hope this doesn’t go bad.”

“aka Charlie Sheen” is now available to stream on Netflix.