The cat has been out of the bag for a while now: Pay gaps between men and women are a huge problem in Hollywood. With that in mind, we were bracing ourselves to see how Selena Gomez‘s salary stacked up against her Only Murders in the Building co-stars, comedy greats Steven Martin and Martin Short.
Times Are Changing… We Hope
There’s no doubting that Selena Gomez has held her own with her Only Murders in the Building co-stars Steven Martin and Martin Short—but does her compensation match her performance? Well, according to a recent report from Variety, Gomez, Martin, and Short are all bringing home a whopping $600K per episode for their work on the show.
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Considering how easily Gomez could have gone underpaid, this is a reassuring revelation going into the show’s second season. Furthermore, looking at other TV salaries, we cannot help but feel like times are changing.
Winona Ryder and David Harbour received equal pay for their roles on Stranger Things. Millie Bobby Brown even surpassed the other actors in her age group by $50,000 per episode—that’s no small chunk of change. It’s easy to celebrate these steps in the right direction, but, unfortunately, there’s still a long way to go.
Bryce Dallas Howard Is Still Fighting For Equal Pay
Bryce Dallas Howard has been making headlines recently for exposing the pay gap between herself and her Jurassic World co-star Chris Pratt. Back in 2018, a report claimed Howard took home $2 million less for the film than Pratt did. Howard hit back at the claim, insisting she actually made far less than what was reported.
“When I started negotiating for ‘Jurassic,’ it was 2014 and it was a different world, and I was at a great disadvantage. And, unfortunately, you have to sign up for three movies and so your deals are set,” Howard explained.
Thankfully, Howard wasn’t alone in her fight for equal pay. According to the Black Mirror actress, Pratt went to bat for her every time he could.
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“What I will say is that Chris and I have discussed it, and whenever there was an opportunity to move the needle on stuff that hadn’t been already negotiated, like a game or a ride, he literally told me, ‘You guys don’t even have to do anything. I’m gonna do all the negotiating. We’re gonna be paid the same and you don’t have to think about this, Bryce.’ I love him so much for doing that,” Howard revealed. “I really do, because I’ve been paid more for those kinds of things than I ever was for the movie.”
It just goes to show that these age-old industry practices die hard. It’s been made abundantly clear that actresses won’t receive equal pay without demanding it, but we hope equal pay between men and women continues to become more and more normalized in the future.