Posted on 10/23/2015 7:57:01 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
There was a time when charges of sexism in Hollywood revolved around the exploitation of beautiful young country bumpkins desperate to make it into the business. Now it’s all about the “gender pay gap” between the millions of dollars some actresses are making and the few more millions some of their male counterparts are racking up for the very same films.
Most recently it was Jessica Chastain grumbling about the substantial discrepancy between her and Matt Damon’s salaries for The Martian, despite the fact that Damon was the unquestionable star of that film and her role was minuscule by comparison. She follows in the footsteps of Hunger Games star Jennifer Lawrence, who recently penned a piece in Lena Dunham’s newsletter lamenting that she made less than her male costars on American Hustle, even though she’s the highest-paid actress in the world. In fact the only actor making more than her is Iron Man star Robert Downey Jr. whose name Gwyneth Paltrow coincidentally dropped earlier this month when complaining how it “feels sh*tty” to make less than male actors.
Of the three, Lawrence is the only one who comes up with a comparison that is remotely fair, and even she admits she failed to hold out for more money because of her own preconceptions about negotiating. That hasn’t stopped the media from demanding some answers from some of the male costars she named though. Bradley Cooper, who worked with Lawrence on American Hustle, quickly fell in line to say he and his peers should start teaming up with their female counterparts to negotiate salaries.
Fortunately, Jeremy Renner, who also had a supporting role in American Hustle, sees the situation a little more clearly. When asked by Business Insider if he’d join Cooper in working to get their female costars paid more money, he responded “That’s not my job.”
“I don’t know contracts and money and all that sort of stuff,” Renner went on to say.
Adding he fully supports actresses receiving equal pay as actors, he said he’s more focused on his craft than what everyone is making.
“I’m a performer and I know human behavior. When it comes to that sort of stuff I let other people deal with that,” said the two-time Oscar nominee. “I do what I’m good at, that’s what I focus on.”
As Renner rightly points out, it’s not even his job to negotiate for his own salary, much less that of his costars. That’s what agents are for, and that’s why the first response to any actor who wants more money should be “have you talked to your agent?” Either that agent isn’t doing a particularly good job, or the actor has some unreasonable expectations of their value to the people writing their checks.
A million different things may factor into how that value gets calculated for any given role, but ultimately it all boils down to how many butts that actor can put in seats by taking that part. That’s why the guy who plays the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist upon which the multi-billion dollar Marvel Cinematic Universe was built gets the big bucks, and the woman who plays the supporting girlfriend character who can easily be recast with barely a thought does not.
Like the general difference seen in earnings between men and women that feminists argue proves the existence of The Patriarchy™, any pay gap between the genders in Hollywood is almost entirely due to the choices of women in the industry. If they want to make more, they’re not going to get there by hoping the male actors are all going to take pay cuts to spread the wealth around. Instead they’ll have to follow Renner’s example by hiring agents who won’t settle for less and focusing on making themselves better at their craft to wow audiences and casting directors alike.
Discussing pay rates has been frowned upon in every non union shop I’ve ever worked in for good reason.
Jeremy Renner is pretty awesome, He was terrific in the Hurt Locker.
Problem solved.
WTH? Whaaaaa. They’re only paying me a million $’s for reciting crap someone else wrote. Box office draw is where it’s at. “But I had to memorize two whole pages of dialog.”
If the little sluts don’t like the terms of the contract, then they shouldn’t sign the contract.
These people are so out of touch with reality.
They are making millions because the ONLY talent they have is they know how to EMOTE.
Cry me a frickin’ river.
Easy - Equal pay for equal work, extras get same pay as the stars! We can call it the Sanders Equality Plan.
I think Hurt Locker is the only movie that no Freeper can reach a consensus if it was anti war or not. Lots of threads on it, and there’s no one major view of it.
Actor is not gender specific
Gwyneth Paltrow’s silly remarks on Robert Downey’s salary started thus nonsense. The Iron Man films each made over a billion dollars worldwide, and if you’ve ever seen any you know that people go to see him, not her. She is so forgettable they didn’t even bother to put her in the last Avengers movie.
Agreed, Downey literally owns that role and it’s a license to print money.
And in American Hustle she was a supporting character up against Christian Bale, who is very talented.
Lawrence that is, not Paltrow in AH.
Equal Pay means that women tennis pros get paid the same for playing Three Sets. While the Men play five. See? Fair......
Downey as Iron man is one of the best casting decisions ever made. Captain America and Thor are both pretty good too but Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk needs to be killed and eaten by vegetarians.
Plus, Rufallo is a certified loon politically. His Hulk is bad, but his ignorance in real life is worse.
The tv show ‘The Big Bang Theory’. 3 actors get $1 million per episode. 2 guys and a gal. The 2 other principal guys get about $350,000 to 800,000 per episode in the final year of the contract. The other 2 women make about $60,000 to 100,000 per episode. The comic book guy should get more money as he needs it as the store ain’t doing so well. They also get profit sharing.
Reason for the pay gap? The ones getting the most either draw in more people or have been in other successful shows or slept with the producer or director.
The movie actors also get residuals. The guy who was the prison warden in ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ makes $100,000 a year from a 21 year old movie thanks to the tv repeats. Imagine what the actors from ‘The Big Bang Theory’ are pulling in.
Any actor complaining about the money they make should shut up.
Main point is if an actor is dissatisfied with their compensation the person to blame is the agent who negotiated the deal, or him or herself for signing the contract. In the case of American Hustle maybe Ms. Lawrence discovered during filming that Christian Bale lived up to his reputation for manic perfectionism and she wanted a hazardous duty increase. Either way, after getting a gold statuette and huge profile boost out of the deal she’s really got no reason to complain. And Paltrow? She’s an Obama lap dancer with a tenth the talent (or looks) of Jennifer Lawrence.
“Easy - Equal pay for equal work, extras get same pay as the stars! We can call it the Sanders Equality Plan”
I like the way you think. That would shut Hollywood up real quick and they would close their wallets even quicker.
http://www.celebritynetworth.com/richest-celebrities/actors/gwyneth-paltrow-net-worth/
GWYNETH PALTROW, Age 43 NET WORTH: $140 Million
http://www.forbes.com/profile/jennifer-lawrence/
JENNIFER LAWRENCE, age, 25, NET WORTH : $52 Million
http://www.celebritynetworth.com/richest-celebrities/actors/jeremy-renner-net-worth/
JEREMY RENNER, Age, 44 NET WORTH: $35 Million
ROBERT DOWNEY Jr. Age 50, NET WORTH: $170 Million
I don’t know what the above actresses are complaining about....
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