Topics: Film and TV, Celebrity, Money, Amazon Prime
Priyanka Chopra says she has reached a milestone that should've happened long before 2023: equal pay.
The Bollywood star, who has been in front of the camera for more than two decades, is not afraid to point out the disparity between the salary she receives and that of her male co-stars.
In a previous interview, the 40-year-old claimed that she gets just '10 percent' of what the male lead does in her Bollywood films, describing the gender pay gap as 'substantially large'.
Chopra spoke about the issue in a panel with Amazon Studios’ Jennifer Salke at the 2023 SXSW Festival in Austin, Texas, on Friday (March 10).
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During the Q&A, she revealed that she's achieved equal pay for the first time in her career with the upcoming Amazon Prime show Citadel.
Set to premiere in April, the sci-fi series sees Chopra star as agent Nadia Singh in what's being billed as an 'action-packed spy series with a compelling emotional centre'.
The Hollywood Reporter quoted Chopra saying to Salke: "I might get into trouble for [saying this], depends on who’s watching.
"I’ve been working in the entertainment industry for now 22 years, and I have done about 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."
The Barfi! star added: "I’m laughing about this, but it’s kind of nuts. 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."
Chopra previously spoke with BBC 100 Women about the gender pay gap in Bollywood, saying parity was something she 'never had' within the industry.
"I would get paid about 10 percent of the salary of my male co-actor. [The pay gap] is large, substantially large," she explained.
"And so many women still deal with that. I'm sure I will too if I worked with a male co-actor now in Bollywood.
"My generation of female actors have definitely asked [for equal pay]. We've asked, but we've not got it."
