Emma Stone has revealed that male actors she has worked with have taken a pay cut to match her salary.
The Oscar winning actress praised her fellow actors for stepping up to ensure equality is present on set.
“In my career so far, I’ve needed my male co-stars to take a pay cut so that I may have parity with them. And that’s something they do for me because they feel it’s what’s right and fair,” she told Out magazine.
“That’s something that’s also not discussed, necessarily – that our getting equal pay is going to require people to selflessly say, ‘That’s what’s fair.'”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrKM7DXM4a8
She added, “If my male co-star, who has a higher quote than me but believes we are equal, takes a pay cut so that I can match him, that changes my quote in the future and changes my life. And this is Billie Jean’s feminism, and I love it—she is equality, man: equality, equality, equality.”
The actress does not name any specific movies where actors have taken a pay cut, but she has starred along male Hollywood A-List actors in her most recent projects including La La Land, Aloha and Irrational Man.
“It’s not about, ‘Women are this and men are that.’ It is, ‘We are all the same, we are all equal, we all deserve the same respect and the same rights.’ And that’s really what I’ve been so grateful for with male co-stars—when I’ve been in a similar-size role in films, and it’s been multiple people who have been really incredible and said, ‘That’s what I want to do. That’s what’s fair and what’s right.'” she explained.
Stone will next appear in Battle Of The Sexes. The film tells the true story of the 1973 tennis match between No. 1 Billie Jean King and ex-champ and serial hustler Bobby Riggs.
It hits cinemas on September 22.