For first time in 22 years, Priyanka Chopra is being paid the same pay as her male lead

Bollywood actor Priyanka Chopra has been vocal about pay parity in the entertainment industry. The actor, who has starred in numerous Indian and international projects, has recently shared that her upcoming show, Citadel, is the first venture where she is being paid the same amount as her male counterpart. 

“I might get into trouble for [saying this], depends on who’s watching," Chopra told Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke at the South by Southwest Film Festival (SXSW 2023). "I’ve been working in the entertainment industry for now 22 years, and I have done almost 70-plus features and two TV shows. But when I did Citadel, it was the first time in my career that I had pay parity. I’m laughing about this, but it’s kind of nuts," the former Miss World said.

The actor further added, “I put in the same amount of investment and work, but I get paid much less. But the ease in which Amazon Studios said, ‘That’s what you deserve, you are co-leads, that’s just fair,’ and I was like, ‘You’re right, it’s fair.’ And I wonder: Did that happen because there are very few female decision-makers in Hollywood? Would that have been a different conversation if a woman didn’t make that decision? Those are not conversations that happened very easily."

In 2021, Chopra opened up about this one time she was asked to leave a film set after raising the issue of pay parity. She went on to recall how it was after conversing with various women of the fraternity that she became motivated to take a stand for herself.

During an interview with the Skimm'd from the Couch podcast, Chopra, while narrating the incident, claimed that after bringing up the issue of her pay in comparison to her male costars, a film executive on the set told her she could "take the paycheque, which was nominal" compared to the men in the cast, or she could simply leave.

According to her the producers had said, "There are so many other girls who will take this opportunity. And, you know, women in movies are interchangeable.” "I didn’t do anything about it," the Quantico star added. "I had to work within the system because that's what we're told, that, 'You know if you want this job… this is the only way'."

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