The Sony Hacks revealed a lot of unpleasant things, and one of them was the unequal pay between men and women, even in Hollywood. One, amazing, ballsy, actress was having none of this however. Charlize Theron negotiated a $10 million pay rise after reading that male co-star Chris Hemsworth was to be paid millions more for The Huntsman. She will now be paid the same as her male co-star. What an inspiration. We need more honesty about pay so more women can get paid what they are worth, and certainly as much as men. The pay gap between men and women is still significantly unequal.
The hacked emails from Sony showed vast pay gaps between male and female stars. In American Hustle all of the male stars, and the male director, got 9 per cent of back-end profits. The two female stars, Amy Adams and Jennifer Lawrence only got 7 per cent. This is despite the fact that Jennifer Lawrence was an Oscar-winning actress and that Amy Adams had been nominated four times.
At Sony things were not any better. Out of 6,000 employees, only one of the seventeen who made over $1 million or more was a woman. Even worse, while Michael De Luca and Hannah Minghella share a job as co-presidents of production at Columbia Pictures, De Luca makes almost $1 million more than Minghella.
In the UK the pay disparity between men and women is so great that women effectively work from November 4th until the end of the year for free. There are a number of social and feminist movements trying to make a difference. We must join them and do what we can. Find out how much men doing the same job are being paid and negotiate a better deal.