Nina Dobrev says she left The Vampire Diaries over pay gap with male co-stars

Nina Dobrev says she left The Vampire Diaries after six seasons over pay gap with Paul Wesley and Ian Somerhalder.

Nina Dobrev has opened up about the real reason behind her early exit from The Vampire Diaries.

In Entertainment Weekly editor Samantha Highfill’s new book, I Was Feeling Epic: An Oral History of The Vampire Diaries, the actress revealed she left the series due to a significant pay disparity with co-stars Paul Wesley and Ian Somerhalder.

Dobrev, now 36, explained that while her contract only covered her role as Elena Gilbert, she also played multiple doppelgängers — most notably Katherine Pierce — which doubled her workload. “I had to be on set for double the amount of time, I had to memorize double the amount of lines,” Dobrev said. “I wanted to be compensated fairly.”

According to Dobrev, she, Candice King, and Kat Graham were the lowest-paid series regulars during the show’s first two seasons. Although she eventually secured a pay raise, she claims she was never compensated equally with Wesley and Somerhalder. Creator Julie Plec recalled that tensions escalated to the point where writers were told to stop including Katherine in scripts because the studio “had to pay” Dobrev for both roles.

Feeling undervalued, Dobrev decided not to renew her contract after season six, and her character Elena was written out in May 2015. She later returned for the series finale in 2017, but only after pushing for pay parity. “It wasn’t about the money — it was about principle,” she said.

I Was Feeling Epic: An Oral History of The Vampire Diaries is available now.