Natalie Portman Says Ashton Kutcher Was Paid More Than She Was on 'No Strings Attached'
Three times more, to be exact.
Hollywood spent a lot of time talking about the gender pay gap after Jennifer Lawrence penned an essay on the subject in 2015, but—like most hot button topics—the conversation eventually died down. However, Natalie Portman just opened up about her own experience not making as much money as her male costars, and thank goodness—after all, nothing will change unless women keep speaking up.
"Ashton Kutcher was paid three times as much as me on No Strings Attached," the actress recently told Marie Claire UK. "I knew and I went along with it because there's this thing with 'quotes' in Hollywood. His was three times higher than mine, so they said he should get three times more. I wasn't as pissed as I should have been. I mean, we get paid a lot, so it's hard to complain, but the disparity is crazy."
True that. A 2014 Sony hack revealed that Jennifer Lawrence and Amy Adams were paid significantly less than their costars on American Hustle, and many celebrities have spoken about their own experience with similar disparities.
As Portman notes, "Compared to men, in most professions, women make 80 cents to the dollar. In Hollywood, we are making 30 cents to the dollar."
Time for a major change.
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Mehera Bonner is a celebrity and entertainment news writer who enjoys Bravo and Antiques Roadshow with equal enthusiasm. She was previously entertainment editor at Marie Claire and has covered pop culture for over a decade.