Wage gap among wealthy and crazy Asians: writer Adele Lim renounces pay equity



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The aftermath of the hit movie 2018 Crazy Rich Asians On the way to the big screen, Adele Lim, co-screenwriter of the film and so-called scriptwriter of her two sequels (which must be shot simultaneously), walked away from the project, citing a huge pay gap between her and the # 39, another writer credited with the film, Peter Chiarelli. The Hollywood Reporter was the first to report the departure of Lim.

The Hollywood Reporter cites unnamed sources that Chiarelli would earn between $ 800,000 and $ 1 million from both films, while Lim would earn only $ 110,000 or more. (This "plus" does a lot of work, but it's hard to imagine it means anything close to $ 125,000.)

In itself, this wage gap is not so remarkable. Studios often rely on "quotes" to set prices for hiring writers. Your quote is usually based on your resume – ie the work you have done in movies – and theCrazy Rich Asians the work was all on television. Meanwhile, Chiarelli has written several blockbuster films, including the 2009 rom-com by Sandra Bullock / Ryan Reynolds. Proposal.

But still: the idea that Lim would, at best, one-eighth of what Chiarelli would do – and maybe as little as one-tenth – is quite remarkable, given the huge Crazy Rich Asians was. (The film grossed $ 238 million worldwide, at a time when the romantic comedy was largely considered dead at the box office.) Normally, the sequel to a hit movie would generate a big raise for everyone, which means 1) the Warner Bros. studio. thought that he should not pay, or 2) Warner Bros. made think it gave Lim a big salary.

Much of the negotiations between Warner Bros. and his Crazy Rich Asians the authors appear to have been executed last fall and early this year. It seems that Lim at one point refused an agreement to share Chiarelli's fees with him, hoping to receive a payment equal to or close to what he was earning.

The value of Lim at Crazy Rich Asians extends beyond his writing credits. She was hired to work on the first film to add details on cultural specificity, as a writer of Asian descent. But Lim fears that his ability to offer a distinct cultural sensitivity is considered his only value for the screenplay.

She told the Hollywood Reporter that her point of view, like other women and color writers, was too often used as "soy sauce" – to garnish to give a project the feeling of being in a good mood. cultural authenticity without having to engage in much more difficult work. to be culturally authentic. This perspective alone could otherwise have increased his quote for Crazy Rich Asians of what would typically be a lower level.

(It also complicates things: Lim has an agreement with Disney, where she writes the upcoming 2020 animation film Raya and the last dragonbut Disney was apparently willing to give him time to work on the Crazy Rich Asians effects.)

Lim had this to say to the Hollywood Reporter:

Pete has been incredibly lovable, but what I do should not depend on the generosity of the white author. If I could not get pay equity after ARCI can not imagine what it would be for anyone, since the value of what you are worth is having made quotes from previous movies, what women of color would never have been. [hired for]. There is no realistic way to achieve this equity.

Now that negotiations have spilled over into the press, it remains to be seen whether Warner Brothers will find a way to conclude an agreement with Lim on a series of films under scrutiny. As we have seen with cases like the pay gap between Michelle Williams and Mark Wahlberg the All the money in the worldThe shots, Hollywood can be turned into action (in this case Williams received a salary equal to future projects she had already filmed). But sometimes, you have to negotiate in public.

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